ABC COMPANY - Federal Student Aid



NTT DATA INC.Moderator: Christal SimmsApril 26, 20183:00 pm CTCoordinator:Welcome, and thank you for standing by. At this time, all participants are on listen only mode. Please be advised today's conference will be recorded. If you have any objections you may disconnect at this time. Now, I'd like to turn the meeting over to Ms. Maisha Challenger. You may begin. Maisha Challenger:Thank you so much. Good afternoon, everyone. We want to welcome you to common mistakes on filling out the FAFSA form. My name, again, is Maisha Challenger and I'm an awareness and outreach specialist here at Federal Student Aid. Today during the Webinar, we want to talk about common mistakes in filling out the FAFSA and how we can avoid them. So you can submit and complete your FAFSA application in a timely manner and find out how much financial aid you may receive from one of the colleges that you choose to attend. Hopefully today during this Webinar, we can share some helpful tips, debunk some myths, and talk about the FAFSA form and work on some challenges that will hopefully make it a little bit easier for you all. So we're really glad that you all decided to join. So let's get started. So here's a quick overview of today's Webinar. We're going to go over some frequently asked questions about the FAFSA form. We want to talk about some mistakes. We want to initially talk about what is the FAFSA form and then go into some of the common mistakes when filling out the form, how to avoid some of these mistakes because that's really important, and then give you all some additional online resources to help you complete the FAFSA form. This Webinar will be great and it will be a resource that you will be able to actually go to once we're done on one of our Web sites. We'll tell you about that at the end, but for now, we want to give you some additional resources that you can go to to get more information. And then we want to answer your questions definitely at the end of the presentation. So if you all wanted to actually download the presentation, at the top left hand corner of today's presentation is available for a download. And I have my highly esteemed colleagues standing by to answer your questions as we go through the Webinar. And then at the conclusion of the Webinar, there will be a brief survey we would like you all to fill out. If you don't mind just hanging on for an additional five minutes to fill out the survey right after the presentation that would be great. So again, in the top left hand corner you can actually download the presentation for your own use after the presentation. Okay, so, let's talk about some frequently asked questions about the FAFSA form. The FAFSA some of you know, some of you have filled it out, some of you may not. So I actually want to do a quick poll to figure out who we actually have on for today's Webinar. So here is the first poll question that I want you all to answer for me. Okay, so have you completed the 2018, '19 FAFSA form? I want you guys to answer yes or no and let's see what you guys have to say. Oh, wow, okay. We're going to give it another maybe 10, 15 seconds. So it looks like a lot of you actually have not filled out the FAFSA just yet, okay. So that's good to know. So some of you have, and some of you haven't. So this'll be a really good information session about what the FAFSA is and then talking about some of the mistakes. So thank you all for answering the poll. We really appreciate it. We've got one more poll coming up -- I like the interaction with you all. Okay, so thank you all so much. So frequently asked questions about the FAFSA form. Well, first and foremost, what is the FAFSA form? What does it stand for? It's an acronym. The FAFSA is the Free Application for Federal Student Aid. It is a free form, okay? If you want to know the Web site and someone's telling you that it's the federal government, they want you to pay, do not. It is a free application at no cost. Some of you, and I'm hoping we've got a little bit of students and parents on the Webinar today, have co-counselors that you can ask for assistance. Hopefully you're working with family members or parents but it is a free application. We also have a 1-800 number that we're going to share with you at the end of the Webinar that you can call directly from us to get information or have help answering your questions. So it is a free application for federal student aid. So here's another question. When is the FAFSA form available? So, the 2018,'19 FAFSA form became available on October 1, 2017. So let me give you all a little context. If you are a current high school senior, I mean you guys are graduating, oh, wow, in about another month. So that's super exciting. You would fill out the '18,'19 FAFSA form. That form was available actually last year. Starting with the '17, '18 FAFSA cycle, we started releasing the FAFSA a little bit earlier. Some of you may remember that the FAFSA used to come out on January 1, but we changed it. We moved it to October 1, not January 1 to align with some of the admission processes and giving you all a little more time to fill out the form. So again, the '18, '19 FAFSA has been available now since October 1, 2017. So here's another question. Does it cost money to submit the FAFSA form? Well, we just talked about the fact that the FAFSA is free. I talked about it up there, but I really want to emphasize that if there is a Web site that you are asked to pay, they're asking you to pay money to fill out the form, it is not our official FAFSA site. So is the Web site. When you look at the Webinar slides, you may see a blue hyperlink. Not during the presentation, but you all can click on that to actually go to the FAFSA Web site. There's a site called some of you may have remembered and we actually created a redirect so if you go to it'll directly link you to our official Web site, . So it's really important to remember that. Okay, so do I still qualify for financial aid if my high school GPA is really low? So I'm going to ask you all another poll question and let's see what you all have to say. So let me bring this over. So please answer this question. Only students with good grades get financial aid. What do you think is the answer? Is that true or false? Some of you are saying false, some of you are saying true, okay. So the majority of you say it's false and you're absolutely right. It is false -- great job. So your grades are not a factor when determining how much financial aid you can receive. While a high grade point average will help students with maybe academic scholarships, most federal student aid do not take grades into consideration. So when you are entering in - so this is another myth that we talk about. When you're entering into college, your grades are not a factor. However, when you are actually in school, you must maintain a certain GPA and they call it SAP, Satisfactory Academic Progress. The financial aid offices at school will let you know but hopefully, when you're in school, if you fall below that, you may lose your financial aid but while entering into college, your grades are not a factor as far as how much aid you can receive. So here's another good question. Which tax year information is needed to fill out the FAFSA form? So remember we talked about the FAFSA for the 2018, '19 FAFSA cycle the FAFSA came out in October so what we used to previously do, I don't know if you all remember, is it used to be the previous year's tax information so for '18, '19, in the past it used to be for the prior year so 2017’s information. Well, we changed that. So now for the '18,'19 FAFSA form you and your spouse -- if you're married -- and parents of dependent will report your 2016 income tax information. So what we did is because a lot of times when the FAFSA came out in January, people hadn't filled out their taxes yet for the prior year and people waited, and we don't want people to wait. So what we did is instead of using the previous year's tax information, you go back two years and use 2016’s information. That way, that information is already filed and you can use that information right away to fill out your FAFSA. Make sense? So that's exactly how it works now. So you don't have to worry about 2017’s tax information, we only want 2016’s tax information, okay? So, another thing we're going to talk about a little bit later when we talk about mistakes is we partnered with the IRS and created something called the IRS Data Retrieval Tool where you can directly extract your tax information into the FAFSA form. We're going to talk a little bit about that a little bit later. But it's important to know that you can actually transfer your information from the IRS directly into the FAFSA form. Okay, the next frequently asked question. How much money will I get back when I fill out the FAFSA form? So a lot of people think, okay, I filled out the FAFSA, tell me right away how much I'm going to get. So it varies. So the school will calculate your aid and send you an electric paper offer or you will get sometimes an award letter in the mail. A lot of times more recently, schools will use their portal -- online portal -- to share with you how much financial aid you may receive. The timing of the aid offer varies from school to school. So, for example, let's say you filled out the FAFSA today right after this Webinar. Some people think, okay, the next day I'm going to know how much aid I'm going to receive. Each school -- it really does depend. A school can take a month, a school can take two months. What I suggest is after you've filled out the FAFSA and you can provide an email address, if you haven't heard anything from the school, follow back up with the school financial aid office just to see. Because I know a lot of you are deciding how - which school to go to based on how much aid you may receive. So it's really important that if you haven't received anything within two or three weeks from the school follow back up with them -- it's really important. Okay, so, now I want to talk a little bit about common mistakes when filling out the FAFSA and this is the key part of the Webinar. I also want to remind you all that if you have any questions, please use the live Q&A chat during the presentation and as I mentioned, my colleagues are standing by to answer your questions, okay? So, here are some common mistakes and actually, I want to recap very quickly. The FAFSA is the Free Application for Federal Student Aid. It is free and at no cost. The Web site to fill out the application is . There is no income cut off and I - we didn't talk about that. But we talked about only students with good grades - students with good grades don't receive financial aid. We know that's not true -- it's a myth. Your grades are not a factor when trying to receive financial aid to go into college. But while you're in college, you do have to maintain a certain GPA. So it's really important to remember these things when we talk about the FAFSA and how important it is to fill it out. Okay, let's talk about some common mistakes when filling out the FAFSA form. So, for you all I want to ask you, have you heard this before? The FAFSA form is too hard -- it takes too long to complete. I'll never qualify anyway, so why does it matter? It absolutely does matter. So let me ask some of you that are out there, have you heard some of these before? Let me ask you guys, I'm not going to do a poll, but how many of you think the FAFSA form is going to be too hard to fill out? Let me see you put in your Q&A chat, yes or no. Do you think it'll be hard to fill out? Please put yes or no. I'll give you guys about ten seconds to just share with me what you think. Okay, no, yes, no, oh, you think it'll be easy. No, the form is too hard. No, it's easy. Okay, perfect. So I really want to stress that the form really is not that hard to fill out. But there are a lot of myths out there. So one contrary to popular belief is that there's no income cut off and I kind of spoke to that just briefly a second ago when it comes to financial aid. So there are a lot of different myths that we have as it relates to completing the FAFSA. So we talked about only students with good grades get financial aid. My ethnicity or age makes me ineligible. I don't have good credit so I can't get a student loan. So again, my parents make too much money, so I won't qualify for aid. There is no income cut off when it comes to financial aid. So federal financial aid. So when we talk about federal aid, we're talking about grants which are free money, loans that have to be repaid, and work study where you can work part time to pay off your educational expenses. When we say there's no income cut off, everyone qualifies for some form of financial aid. So if your parents make a certain amount of money, they may not qualify for grants or free money, but they may qualify for a loan. And loans are a form of financial aid that do have to be repaid. So it's important to understand that there's no income cut off. So some people think well, if I make $100,000, $95,000 I won't qualify for financial aid and that simply is not true. What you put on the form will determine how much aid you receive. And also, it's really important to understand and I think a lot of times people choose not to apply because they think, well, I won't qualify for any federal aid, I don't need to fill out the form. The form is not just an application for federal grants, it's just the Pell Grant. It's also an application for work study, loans, and even assistance offered by the state pool of private organizations. So I always like to tell people that when you're looking for aid to go to school, there's four places to look. The federal government gives aid, the state gives aid, the institution gives aid, and then there's outside scholarships maybe from private organizations. They provide inf- (sic) financial aid or assistance for you. So it's really important to understand that a lot of times, they may have applications that require that the FAFSA be filled out. Most of the time that is the case. So if you don't complete the FAFSA form, you could be losing out on thousands of dollars to help you pay for college. And we don't want that because we know college costs are going up each and every day. And I'm sure a lot of you would like the help. And so this is a great way to figure out how much help is available and taking advantage of all the help that is out there for you. So not completing the FAFSA form is the biggest mistake that a lot of people make because they don't understand that the FAFSAs tied to all different source of aid, okay? But let's talk about another common mistake that will happen. Not using the correct Web site, and we've talked about this a little bit earlier. So the official Web site is and again if you see a link in the PowerPoint presentation, it's to the actual Web site. So the is the official Web site. You never have to -- as I mentioned earlier -- pay. I will share with you all, I had a scenario where I do outreach and I went to a FAFSA completion event and there was a parent that came up to me and showed me her FAFSA application as being processed, or it was in the middle of being completed and there was a fee at the bottom of it for about $78. And she was like, "Oh, but that old government says I have to pay this." And I said, "No, ma'am." Unfortunately there was a probably a third party that she thought was the federal government that was basically asking her to pay to fill out the form and you don't have to do that at all, okay? So again, it's really important to understand that it is a free application and if you're asked to provide a credit card, it's not us. It's not the federal government. So it's really important that you guys remember that, okay? If you go to the Web site and click Start a New FAFSA or if you're returning, what I did neglect to mention is for filling out the FAFSA application, you must fill it out every year in college. So it's not a one and done type of application, okay? You're going to fill it out as a high school senior, as a freshman, as a sophomore, as a junior, and a senior in college, okay? So it's really important to understand that each year you're going to fill out the FAFSA. So another common mistake that we have is not filling out the FAFSA form as soon as it is available. So you guys tell me, when did I say the FAFSA was available for the '18, '19 FAFSA? So you high school seniors, was it available in January or October? You guys tell me. Let's see, October 17, October, October, exactly. So it was available in October, okay? So, again, some money is guaranteed money. But some financial aid is first come, first served. So when you're filling out the FAFSA application, as I mentioned, some money is first come, some money is guaranteed money but some money is the earlier you apply, the more opportunity you have to receive that aid, okay? So there are states and colleges that run out of money early and so we're going to talk a little bit about other deadlines because I think people don't realize that there are different deadlines depending on where the aid is coming from. So the FAFSA runs on an 18-month cycle, but there's state aid that has deadlines and then the institution has deadlines. And so I want you all to understand also that the admissions process and financial aid are two different things. I think a lot of time people think, Oh, when I apply, that's also the financial aid application but they're not the same. They're very, very different, okay? And so the other thing that is important to understand that even though some of the deadlines are far off in the future, you want to get it done as soon as possible. So I will say -- because I know we did the poll in the beginning -- that it seemed like a lot of you have not completed your FAFSA yet. But that's okay, it's not too late. You can still fill out the FAFSA for all of you that want to attend college in the fall. And then we talked about the tax information. You don't need 2017’s information, you need 2016’s information whether you're the student or the parent that has filed taxes. So you already have that information. So there's no excuse to wait. I'm sure a lot of you right now are getting ready for prom, it might even be this weekend. But we want you to make sure you understand that - don't wait until after prom to fill out the FAFSA. You can do it right away online, okay? So not filling out the FAFSA as soon as possible is a common mistake that people do. So I want to go back to some of the deadlines because that's a really big important factor when we're talking about mistakes. So not filling out the FAFSA form by the deadline. So as I said, you should fill it out as soon as possible. But there are deadlines. So this is kind of a - this is an info-graphic I want to show you all because as I mentioned earlier, the school has a deadline, the state has a deadline, and the federal government has a deadline. So for the FAFSA, we have an 18-month cycle. So we start October 1, but then for the state, there's a different deadline. If you go to on our homepage at the bottom left there's a link that says deadline. And if you click on that link and if you put in your respective state, if you want to go to school in state and receive in state aid, you must complete the FAFSA application by the state's deadline. So let me say that again because a lot of people don't realize that the state has a separate deadline than the FAFSA. If you go to , we have a link for deadline. If you click on that link, it'll tell you what the state deadline is to receive aid. So if you want to go to school in state and receive financial aid from the respective state, you have to fill the FAFSA out by that deadline. If you do it after that, you may miss out on state aid, which again, is additional money you can use to go to school. Also the institution has a different - also has a deadline. So you just need to be mindful that each type of aid depending on where it's coming from is going to have a different deadline. But most of the time, you need to fill out the FAFSA in order to take advantage of the other aid that is out there, okay? And as I mentioned, going to that link, there's a hyper link at the top on our homepage. We'll let you know what your state deadline may be. Some of the deadlines may have passed, but some may still be available so that you can apply and take advantage of that state aid, okay? So not filling the FAFSA form out by the deadline is super critical. So here is another common mistake that happens. Not creating an FSA ID before filling out your FAFSA form. So let me emphasize to you that we've talked about filling the FAFSA application out. We talked about filling the FAFSA out online. So what is an FSA ID? It's your legal signature. An FSA ID is a user name and password that you must use to log into certain US Department of Education Web sites. Your FSA ID identifies you as someone who has the right to access your own personal information. So it's a legal signature. Both the student and the parent if the student is dependent on the parent need an FSA ID and they won't be the same. They will be very unique to each oth- (sic) they will be very unique to the person that creates it. So there's one FSA ID for the parent, and there's one for the student. If you have any loans and you want to take loans out, your FSA ID is needed to access that information as well, okay? So when can you use your FSA ID? So when you're filling out your FAFSA, we encourage you to fill it out before you fill out the FAFSA, but you can also fill it out when you're actually in the midst of filling out your FAFSA form. So when can I use the new FSA ID? You can use it right away to electronically sign your FAFSA application. Now, for your FSA ID, there's some personal information in there that has to be verified. So for example, we have to verify your social security information. That verification takes one to three days. But you don't have to wait on that verification in order to sign and submit your original FAFSA. Now if you want to go back in and make corrections or there's a renewal FAFSA meeting, you know, when you're going back to school, you want to renew your FAFSA, that FSA ID has to be verified before you can do that. But an original, new FSA ID that you create and you're a new sub- (sic) not a new subscriber but you're initially completing the FAFSA form, that's when you are going to use your FSA ID. Now you can also provide an email address. It's not mandatory, but we recommend that you do that so that you can receive an email once your information is matched with the social security administration. Once that process is complete, you will be able to use your FSA ID to fully access your financial aid administration. So a lot of times when people log into their FSA ID, sometimes they get confused with whose information goes with what. So maybe a parent might try to log into the student's FSA ID information and vice versa. So you want to make sure that you're logging into your own unique FSA ID information, okay? And then, a lot of times people say, "Oh, what if I forget my username and password for my FSA ID?" That's okay, you can go back in, retrieve your username and password if you forget it. That's not a problem at all, okay? So again, not creating an FSA ID is very critical and a lot of times people forget that step. But that's okay, you can do it right ahead of filling out the FAFSA form or when you're in the midst of filling out the form, you can fill it out right then and there. So earlier, I talked about the IRS Data Retrieval Tool. What the IRS Data Retrieval Tool is is it provides tax data that automatically fills in information for part of the FAFSA form. The tax return information that is being transferred into the FAFSA form is coming directly from your 2016 -- not 2017 -- 2016 tax information tax return you filed with the IRS. Your school financial aid office will have access to the transferred information and will follow up with you directly if there's any issues with that information. So the way that it works is in the past, we would transfer over your tax information and you would be able to see the amount. What we've done now is once your tax information is transferred over, you can only see a message that says, Transferred from the IRS, okay? And so again, for the '18, '19 FAFSA, we want 2016 information that needs to be available for the student. So for exa- (sic) so let me also say this. We're talking about current high school seniors but there are some juniors that might be online that will be seniors in the fall. So if you are actually going to be a rising senior and you're going to be a senior starting in fall, you're actually going to fill out the '19, '20 FAFSA. Right now, we're in the '18,'19 cycle. But if you are going to be a high school senior starting in the fall of 2018, then you're going to fill out the FAFSA October 1 of this year. But only if you're going to be a high school senior. The tax information that you're going to use -- well, you know what, let me ask you all. If you're going to be - right now for you high school seniors, we said you're filling out 2016 information. But if you're going to be a senior in the fall and you are using - you're going to fill out the '19, '20 FAFSA, what years tax information do you think you're going to need? You guys tell me. You think it'll be 2018 or 2017? Let me see if I did a good job explaining it to you all. You all are saying 2017, that means I'm doing a good job explaining it, hopefully. Or you just already knew that. So that's exactly right. So for you all rising seniors that are not graduating until next year, 2019, you're going to fill out the 2017 - you're going to fill out the FAFSA in October. But for you current seniors that are about to graduate in just a few months, you're going to use 2016 tax information. Right now, there's no - right now, you can't pull any obviously any 2017 tax information. The only information in the tool will be from 2016, okay? So again, the IRS Data Retrieval Tool -- thank you guys for being so interactive. I love this. So again, the IRS Data Retrieval Tool is the most accurate way to transfer over your tax return information into the FAFSA. So I want to give you all a couple of caveats. Most people can use the IRS Data Retrieval Tool, but everybody doesn't necessarily - everyone doesn't necessarily have access meaning - depending on how you file. So there's certain stipulations of how to file that will allow you to use the tool, but trust me, you'll know if you can't use the tool. But if you can't, that's okay. You can still manually enter in your tax information into the FAFSA form, okay? It is not mandatory to use the tool, but I will say this to you. A lot of schools really do like the tool because they know it's authentic, coming directly from the IRS. So if you can use the tool, that's great. But if you don't have access to the tool, you can manually put in your tax information and what we do, which I think is really great, is we give some guidance if you want to manually put the information in as to what line to look at. So when we talk about tax income or income tax information, you know, we may ask you about your adjusted gross income. We may ask you about your income taxes, things of that nature. But again, we will let you know what line number you need to look at in order to provide the information that we need. Let me also say this, because I know I'm giving you all a lot of information. When you're actually in the FAFSA form we have a help and hints box that can really help you right now to access or explain some of the questions if you're not sure what we're asking for or you're not sure exactly what information to put. If you are in a particular text box and you are starting to fill information out, there's a help and hints box on the right hand side that will give you a description of the information that we're looking for, okay? So I want you all to know that you're not alone when you're filling this out. There's a help and hints box. There's a 1-800 number we'll share with you. But again, use that information to help you. So another common mistake that happens which I think we probably are all guilty of, right? Is not reading definitions clearly, okay? So I know I'm guilty of it. I can admit it - that there are a lot of times where we get an email or we'll get information and we need to follow the instructions as clearly as possible or looking at definitions like I just mentioned of what exactly is being asked of you. When it comes to the FAFSA form, you'll want to read each definition and each question carefully. So this is really important. Here are some items that have specific definitions so when we talk about who is your parent on the FAFSA form, that can sometimes be tricky and people are not necessarily sure. So if you're considered dependent for FAFSA purposes, you need to provide information for the supporting parents or parent. So let me give you a scenario. If your parents are divorced or separated, you want to provide information for the parent who has provided the most support. If you have a stepparent who's currently married to your legal parent, you generally also have to provide information about him or her. So a lot of times that parent has gotten remarried. And if you live in a household where your mom or dad has gotten remarried and they both are supporting you and you're in that household, we need information about both of them. Now what is a legal parent? For FAFSA purposes, a legal parent is your biological or adoptive parent. Or your legal parent is determined by the state. So for example, if the parent is listed on the birth certificate. So notice that I said for FAFSA purposes is your biological or adoptive parent. Legal guardianship a lot of people get confused between - what's the difference between legal guardianship and parent? So let me ask you all, since we're being a little interactive, do you think that legal - your legal guardian is the same as your parent for the FAFSA form? What do you guys think? Do you think legal guardian and parent are the same? Not sure? No, okay, thanks, Johnny. Anyone else not sure? And it gets confusing. I see some more nos, great. So legal guardian is definitely not a parent. It's someone other than your biological or adoptive parent. And for FAFSA purposes, your legal guardian is someone that has been court ordered. So we like to say a lot of times people say, "Well, someone's just taking care of me so they're my legal guardian." Well, that's not necessarily the case for FAFSA purposes. For FAFSA purposes, a lot of times when it comes to filling out the forms, they ask you if you're under something called legal guardianship. The school asks you for supporting documentation about that. But it's important to understand to not put your parent down on the FAFSA form as your legal guardian. I want to go back a little bit to the definition of parent because as it says on the slide, it has nothing to do with who claims you on your taxes. So a lot of times, people put the parent or individual who claims them. And that might not even be the parent. Again, as I've mentioned to you, the parent is the biological or adoptive individual. So if grandma or your aunt claims you on the taxes, that's not the person for FAFSA purposes you want to put on the FAFSA form. It's your biological or adoptive parent. Now, I don't have this in the slide, but I just want to very quickly bring this up. Because a lot of times people talk about special circumstances where maybe you don't have any contact with your biological or adoptive parent and your grandmother or your aunt has been taking care of you. You still cannot put their information on the FAFSA but what you can do is still fill out the FAFSA and then once you fill out the FAFSA, speak to the financial aid office about a special circumstance. Sometimes your parent may have been incarcerated, maybe you don't know their whereabouts, the financial aid office has the final say. So I always like to tell individuals we're the front end. At FAFSA we want to make sure, which is why we're having this Webinar, is we want to avoid any common mistakes, but then we want to make sure that what you put on the FAFSAs accurate so that once we send all that information over, the school can decide how much aid to give you based on your circumstance. So again, if you don't know where your biological or adoptive parents are and you don't have their information, talk to the school. They may be able to still assist you, okay? Even without the parental information, there's something called professional judgment, where it's called a dependency override where even though you'd be considered dependent, it's the dependency override so that can still award you aid based on your circumstance. And every circumstance is not a special circumstance so let's be clear. Okay, so legal guardianship and parent are not the same. A legal guardian is someone other than your parent. And let me also say when we're talking about for the FAFSA if you have someone supporting you, you're dependent, but there are some parts here which makes you independent which means you don't need that person's information and legal guardianship is one of the independent statuses. So if you are independent, I'm sorry, if you are under legal guardianship and it's court ordered, then we actually don't need that person's information, okay? So yes, I just want to - I hope I didn't confuse you all, but I just want to - I want you to understand that there's different definitions for the FAFSA. Okay, so this is a really great info-graphic that I want you all to see, okay? So who is my parent? We just talked about a couple of different scenarios. There's a link under this info-graphic. If you want, you all can copy and paste that into your URL. It won't directly link to it if you try to click on it now. But this is a really great way to see who is my parent when I fill out the FAFSA form and the following people who are not your parents unless they legally adopted you, so they talk about grandparents, foster parents, but these are only if they legally adopted you. Again, adoption and legal guardianship are two different things. But this is a really great system to look at to figure out who are your parents when it comes to filling out the FAFSA form, okay? So, for more information regarding not reading definitions carefully - the number of family members in your household. So the FAFSA form has a specific definition about household size that I want you all to pay very close attention to because a lot of times people don't look at the household size or they're not sure who's in the household. So again, if you click on some of those links, it'll tell you who should be counted as it relates to household size, okay? So enter - so for the '18, '19 FAFSA, you would include yourself or other people in your parents households that are attending college at least half time, okay? So it's really important to remember that. The number of family members in college will not include your parents. I kind of jumped to that. So number of family members in your household that are in general there's a list, remember I talked about that help and hints box of who should be included and you can actually click on the link there to see. But the number of family members in college, they're going to ask you to enter a number of people in the household who will attend college at the same time as you. But do not put your parents. A lot of people think, well, if your parents are at least going half time, you should put them. That's absolutely not the case. For legal purposes, you should not include your parents. And then net worth of investments. That's also a very tricky question because a lot of people put down a lot of information that's not being asked. So when we talk about net investments, for example, a college savings plan is considered an investment, but your mortgage is not considered an investment. So there's a list of different things that should be considered investments. Again, read what those definitions are because a lot of times people may add stuff or not put in information that's relevant and all of that is calculated to determine how much aid a student should receive, okay? So again, reading those definitions is really, really important. Okay, so now let's talk about inputting incorrect information. Because a lot of times, like I said, putting in the right information is correct. But making sure you put in - making sure you're not putting in the wrong information is important, which is pretty much the same thing. So confusing parent information with student information. So a lot of times when you fill out the FAFSA form, there's different sections. And this is what I like to tell people because it's kind of easy to get them confused but there's a really good way to try to remember what sections are just what. So when you're filling out the FAFSA form, the parent section is purple. And on the left hand side when you start filling out the parent section and actually it's purple, but when you start filling out the student section, it is blue. So that's how you can determine whose information should go in what section. I want to share with you another testimony where I did another outreach event recently in New York City and there was a young lady who accidentally put her mom's tax information in her information, in the student section. And the great thing about federal student aid is they sent her an email saying, "Hey, it's very possible that you inadvertently put some information in your - in the student information that probably should be in the parents information so we went back in and sure enough, was able to change it. So the great thing is, where she thought she had initially put in the right information and it happens, right? We all make mistakes. That's okay, because the great thing about the FAFSA is you can go back in and make corrections, okay? So a lot of times people confused the parent information with the student information. If the parent has worked, we need their information in the form and if the student has worked as well, okay? So again, remember if you can that the parents have purple for the FAFSA and when you're filling out student information it's blue. That's how I remember the difference between the different places to look for information on the FAFSA form. Okay, another thing you want to avoid is entering information that doesn't match your FSA ID. So remember we talked about that FSA ID being a user name and password and putting in information like your social security number and date of birth. In that sense, the social security info- (sic) administration to be verified. If you go under a different name, you want to make sure it matches and we like to share this as a guide for individuals. Make sure that what you put down in your FSA ID is what you have, for example, like on your social security card. A lot of people like Elizabeth might put Liz. That's not going to match. We need it to look exactly like it looks on your social security card. So that's a great way and a lot of times, when people will use a nickname, they'll get an error message at the end of filling out their FAFSA because it doesn't match. And this is also- (sic) often the result of a typo or mixing up student information and parent information. So again, it happens a lot more than you realize where a student is at the very end of the FAFSA and it's time to fill it out and they get an error message saying they can't submit and they're trying to figure out what's going on. And sure enough, again, remember you can go into your FSA ID and look at the profile. You go in and maybe instead of for their social security number the first three numbers are 123, they put 124. So it's very important for the way they spell their name. So you can go back and look at that information to make sure it's exactly the way it should be and don't use a nickname and as a guide, use your social security card or how you want to put the information into for - in the FSA ID so that once you get to the end, you won't get an error message and you can be good to go to submit the FAFSA. A lot of times when people make a lot of mistakes and have to make corrections, it prolongs the process on the application and it takes a little bit longer for the school to get the information they need to then give you an aw- (sic) comprise a potential award package for you so you can know how much aid you'll receive, okay? And then federal income tax information. To avoid this error, transfer your tax information to the FAFSA form using the IRS Data Retrieval Tool. We talked again about that IRS Data Retrieval Tool but remember I mentioned earlier depending on the type of tax form you filled out, you can look at - we provide you with a line number so for a 1040 form or 1040A or a 1040EZ, there's different line numbers that we provide for you that you know you have to subtract line number 1, line number 2 to get the total. And then you can put that information in. But a lot of times, a lot of people just mistakenly just put in information and they're not putting in the right information if they do it manually. So again, we suggest you use the IRS DRT tool if you can, okay? I know this is a lot of information, but I'm hoping it's very helpful. So then, another common error is listing only one college. So even though you can see this on the form, how many of you knew that you can list up to ten schools at a time on the FAFSA? Did you know that? Or are you surprised that you can list up to ten schools? Is that more than what you thought or less? How many of you thought you could list less on the FAFSA form? I'll give you about ten seconds. How many of you are like, I didn't realize I put all those schools down? Okay, so you can. You can put up to ten schools at a time on one form. Now, what if you have an eleventh school? You can simply go into that initial list and sub- (sic) take out one school and then replace it with anot- (sic) with the eleventh school. And it won't erase the existing information. Now, why do we want to put more than one school? Because in your mind, you've got that dream school you want to go to. Here's the reality of the situation when it comes to finance - federal financial aid. Every school is going to give you a different award package. So you're going to get a different amount of aid from the federal government based on the various different schools you go to. You may go to school in state, you may want to go to school out of state. There will be a list of different schools. So you want to apply for all the schools that you are interested in just so that you can get an idea of how much aid. Because the school that you really want to go to, School A, may only give you $10,000 in financial aid, but then School C gives you $40,000. So what do you do? And that award letter is going to have not just federal aid, it's going to have state aid, it's going to have institutional aid, it's going to have outside scholarships. It's going to have a list of everything that you're going to receive as an entity if you decide to go to that school, okay? So it's really important to -- and it doesn't hurt your application to add more schools, okay? And if you don't wind up applying or get accepted, the school will just disregard the information so you don't have to worry about that money. But again, put as many - put up to - we always suggest at least three to four schools or if not more. I mean, you may have a list of seven or eight schools you can absolutely list all of those and each school will provide a different amount of award money to the students depending on what they put down. So don't list just one college. We want you to put down multiple schools to figure out how much aid you can receive, okay? And then, finally the last common mistake is not signing the FAFSA form. So a lot of times we talked about this, and we talked about the FSA ID already. So many students, they get to - they answer every question, they're at the end and they actually leave the form and forget to sign and submit with their FSA ID. This happens so many times. Sometimes they've forgotten their FSA ID. And remember, I mentioned to you all that you can retrieve your username and password easily with no problem so if you forget your FSA ID it's okay, it's not the end of the world. You can retrieve it by going to the Web site and then if you have a verified email address they can send you information that way to help you retrieve your username and password. Or you're with your parents - your parent isn't with you and the application is left incomplete. So you need - if you are dependent, the parent has to sign and you have to sign, okay? So if you don't have your FSA ID, we talked about getting one ahead of time or if you're actually in the FAFSA application, you can actually fill out the FSA ID right then and there and use it right away. Now if you're not able to sign with your FSA ID, there is an option to mail in the signature page. So you can mail in a signature page and the address is provided if you don't provide an FSA ID and your application will still be processed, okay? Now we do here -- at Federal Student Aid -- once you have completed your FAFSA form -- send you a confirmation page to let you know, hey, the form has been completed because a lot of times people are like, how do I know that I actually completed the FAFSA form? So to check the status of your application, you can simply log into FAFSA on the Web, the page and go to My FAFSA Page and then once you log in, it'll let you know if you already started or completed your FAFSA. So you can absolutely check on the status of where your FAFSA is if you are not sure if you've completed the FAFSA or where you are in the process, okay? So again, I know this is a lot of information, but I think it's very important to understand there's so many different mistakes that happen that we can avoid when it comes time to filling out the FAFSA. Because we want to put in as much accurate information as possible so that you don't have to resubmit, you don't have to keep putting - making corrections, that you can send it off as soon as possible. Because remember we said some money is first come first served, and some money is guaranteed but we want to make sure the schools get as much information as possible to process your application and provide you hopefully with the financial aid that will allow you to go to the school. So that's kind of just a quick overview of some common mistakes and how to avoid some of the mistakes. What I want to leave you all with is some tools and resources that really I think will be able to help you on your financial aid journey -- because it is a journey. Again, college costs are rising and there is assistance available to you, but you have to know where to go and get information to help you through that process. So I want to share with you all some tools and resources the federal government can offer you. So a lot of information and I want to thank my colleagues. I see them typing away, answering all of your questions. A lot of information on the process can be found at our homepage, okay? This is a great homepage that has the financial aid journey from start to finish preparing for college, types of aid, who gets aid, the FAFSA, and then even retainment. So I would encourage you all in - at your leisure to go to this page and simply just search and look for different information about the FAFSA form. What is FSA ID? What type of aid is available? So all these things are available on this wonderful page, again, is a wonderful Web site to go to for information. And also when we have Webinars -- additional Webinars -- our information can be found on this Web site as well. And then social media -- we all know social media is extremely important so we want to make sure that we provide you all with some social media tools. So we have a Facebook page where we list a lot of our events and answer questions that are current regarding what is the FAFSA? When do we fill it out? What if we want to use 2017’s information versus 2016’s information? And I think just to kind of speak to that, because I don't think I talked about that earlier with tax information. So we said for current seniors right now, for the '18,'19 FAFSA, you're going to use 2016 tax information. But let's say, as a parent, you were working in 2016 but you're not working - but you weren't working in 2017. So people think, oh, well, I wasn't working last year so I'm going to put in last year's information. The FAFSA application still needs 2016 information. So even if you were working in 2016 but you weren't working in 2017, you can speak to the financial aid office. So still put in 2016 and the form itself, the application says only, it says 2016 information. If there's an extreme financial change in your employment, then you want to speak to the financial aid office, let them know and they will let you know how to proceed. But again, the form itself is going to ask for 2016 information but they will take that into account when processing the student's application if there's a significant financial change in their tax income. So for now, 2016’s information for you current seniors and then for you rising seniors that are going to fill out the '19,'20 FAFSA in October, you're going to use 2017’s information. So we tweet, another social media avenue that Federal Student Aid offers is Twitter. We have something called office hours that - I believe we actually had one yesterday on loan repayment. But we offer office hours if you go to our Twitter page, I believe there's going to be one in the next couple - in a few months but we have lots of topics where we can, again, answer your questions about the FAFSA form and about the financial aid process. And then YouTube, we have some really great videos that we offer to individuals on YouTube about what is the FAFSA? When do I fill it out? What is an FSA ID? How do I get it? All those things can be found in some really wonderful quick but very detailed videos about the financial aid journey and filling out the FAFSA. So I just want to share, we've got a Facebook page, we have a Twitter page, and we have a YouTube page that you all can use, okay? And it's free, you can just go on using our hash tag Federal Student Aid FAFSA and Federal Student Aid. And then we have a 1-800 number. So I shared a lot of wonderful -- I'm hoping -- wonderful resources and tools with you all today. But let's say after this Webinar you have questions about, oh my goodness, I have more questions. She shared so mu- (sic) she shared a lot of information, but there's a lot of - there's still some outstanding questions I have and I need to know where to go. So there's a 1-800-4-FED-AID number. It's 1-800-433-3243. That's 1-800-433-3243. You can call that number Monday through Friday and even on weekends during, we say, peak FAFSA season but, you know, there are people available. You can see the hours there at any time to help you with questions you have to your own unique circumstance. We all know that everybody's circumstance is different and I think that it's important to understand that if you have someone you know that's filling out the FAFSA form and they receive a certain amount of aid, you may not necessarily receive a certain amount of aid even if you have very similar circumstances. So I think it's really important to understand that when you call the 1-800 number understand that each situation is very special and unique and if you have questions, we can help you Monday through Friday, Saturdays and Sundays, English and in Spanish, okay? So I know a lot of people I'm hoping have used the 1-800 number. Let me ask. Has anyone on the Webinar used the 1-800 number and really appreciated what information they gave you? Let me see, has anyone actually used the 1-800 number already and had a really great experience with it? Yes, good. Hopefully they were helpful and they were able to give you some information in a timely manner. I know in the past, people have said it takes a while but I know we have worked on our customer service being expedited a little more timely recently because, of course, people have tons of questions. You all can imagine lot - a lot of people are actually filling out the FAFSA form right now as we speak. And so, again, the 1-800 number is really, really important for you all to take advantage of after a Webinar. Or even if you just have a question in the middle of the day and you're not sure what to do, because what we don't want you to do is stop the FAFSA application because you're not sure how to answer a question, okay? That's the other thing. We don't want you to get discouraged if you're not sure or you get stuck. The other thing I want to mention is when you're in the FAFSA application, you always want to click save. I'm one of those people that when you're in the middle of filling out some information and let's say you're at a stopping point, you want to make sure you click save so that all the information you put in is saved because you don't want to lose that information. So while you're in the FAFSA form, if you are at a stopping point and you're not sure how to proceed, you can hit save, stop. If you have a question, call the 1-800 number and then go right back into the FAFSA form to continue filling out the application, okay? So Webinars. So I'm really hoping that this Webinar was very helpful, or at least gave you a little more guidance as far as common mistakes and how to avoid them when filling out the FAFSA. We are in the midst of currently providing additional Webinars in the month of May. And so what I want to do is just let you know that one of our upcoming topics is going to be about financial literacy and fiscal preparing - fiscal on financially preparing for college, okay? And that's going to be on Tuesday, May 15. There was a URL link that you all used to sign up for this particular Webinar. In about a week or two, the registration for that May 15 Webinar should be available, and then we're also hoping to provide another additional Webinar in May. So whatever the URL link that you all used -- and I ask my colleagues if they can to share that with you all. If you give it about another week or two, we should have that link up so that you all can register. Because the Webinars we feel like are important to do some great information sharing with you all, okay? So at this time, what I want to do is try to - I know we've got about five minutes left. I know I shared a lot of information but I see my colleagues have been hopefu- (sic) - my colleagues have been answering your questions as we go so what I want to do is answer some questions that you all have for me. Maybe what I'll do is as I look through some of these questions, kind of just do a quick recap. So you all received some resources to go to and then also go - using the 1-800 number. So those are things that are really important for you to use. The FAFSA form, , is where you go to fill out the FAFSA application. Remember, when you're actually filling out the form to be mindful of different things. So thinking about the number of family members in college not including your parents. Thinking of the number of family members when it talks about household size. What type of investments are you providing or that you're being ask and making sure you know whose information to put in. Who is my parent? Remember your parent for FAFSA purposes -- and I know this was always a hot topic -- is your parent that is biological or adoptive. But a grandmother - if your grandmother's your legal guardian and is court ordered, then remember legal guardian is someone other than your biological or adoptive parent. And a lot of times people think their parent is a legal guardian and they're two different individuals. And for the FAFSA form we only want biological or adoptive if you are under - if you have a legal guardian and it's court ordered, you are actually considered independent for FAFSA purposes and you don't need to put parental information, okay? So it's again important to understand who your parent is, read the definitions that you are given in the FAFSA form. There's a help and hints box right now available to you if you're not sure how to fill out the FAFSA. And then when it comes to tax information, if you have access, use the IRS Data Retrieval Tool which will extract your information directly into the FAFSA form. It's not mandatory, but again, the schools do like the students -- or individuals who are filling out the form -- to use it. And it usually is available to you all, okay? So I am trying to look at some questions that have been assigned and let's see. So one question is why would someone not be able to use the IRS DRT? So most of the parents who file a tax return with the IRS are eligible, as I mentioned. However, there are a few scenarios such as if the student and parent is married and either the student or parent or spouse filed married filing separately. So it's also depending on if the student or parent is married and either the student or parent have both filed as head of household. So as I mentioned earlier, it all depends on your filing status as to why someone may not qualify. But again, it's okay if you don't. You can still manually put in the information. The school will still use that information, okay? And then, one other question that I want to share before we finish. Or actually, I think we are going to run out of time. I'm hoping that this information was very helpful to you all. I know it was a lot, I want to thank my colleagues for answering a lot of questions that you all had. But I am hoping that now that you have witnessed or partook in the Webinar today that you have a better understanding of some mistakes that can happen and some things that you want to avoid. So make sure you create your FSA ID. Make sure you sign your FAFSA, make sure you're going to , because we want you to fill out the application so that you can take advantage of the money that's available to you to go to school. So thank you all so much for joining today. Again, the PowerPoint presentation is available for download at the top left hand corner and we will have this Webinar available on in a week or two. So with that being said, we want to thank you all for joining us today. We hope you enjoy the rest of your evening and we hope to see you soon. Thank you so much. And again, as I mentioned, there is a Webinar that we are going to have in the month of May, May 15 should be the first Webinar about fiscal preparing financially for college. I'm hoping that my colleagues definitely gave you all that information. So anyway, we thank you all for joining and enjoy the rest of your day. Bye-bye. END ................
................

In order to avoid copyright disputes, this page is only a partial summary.

Google Online Preview   Download