So you’ve submitted your FAFSA for the coming school year…
Now what happens?
Well, the hardest part is over! Now, you’ll mostly just wait until your federal aid package is calculated. This could take a number of months. Of course, if you want to maximize the time you’ve already invested, there are a few simple steps you can still follow.
If you’ve just completed your FAFSA, it doesn’t hurt to double-check a few things and tie up some potential loose ends. After all, it’s better to discover/fix small errors right away – otherwise, the folks calculating your aid may get back to you with a notice that they can’t complete your paperwork until some small (but important) oversight is addressed.
If that happens, other students may get their federal aid offers before you do, and that could mean you lose out on money! Best to quickly cover all your bases now while the FAFSA process is still fresh in your mind.
Follow these 5 steps once your FAFSA is completed, and you can rest easy.
1. Double-Check The FAFSA Confirmation Page
After you finish up your FAFSA, there will be a confirmation page to get through. Don’t confuse this with your financial aid offer! That will come much later, and you’ll get it from the school(s) that have officially accepted you.
The confirmation page gives you financial aid estimates based on the info you provided in your FAFSA. Importantly, these figures are estimates – they assume your provided info is correct, so this is the time to look things over and confirm you got everything right. As your schools calculate aid, they’ll factor in other things like the cost of attendance.
Note that these estimates only consider federal aid, not scholarships or similar financial assistance for which you might qualify. If you include a school on your FAFSA and it accepts you, it will send you an offer. Until then, it’s hard to say how much aid you might get. Every school is different.
2. Look Over Your Expected Family Contribution One More Time
This part is a little confusing: Your expected family contribution (EFC) is not the money your family will have to pay for your education. The EFC is actually just an index number that financial aid offices use to calculate your overall need. It considers more than just income too. Factors like family size, dependency status, and currently attending family members are just some of the other factors.
And while each school does its best to meet your financial need, it’s pretty variable. Some schools may cover 100% of your costs, while others may only meet 10%. Every school has different aid available, and it depends on a lot of factors. In fact, it may be different from one year to the next. This is one of the reasons you’ll have to complete your FAFSA annually.
4. Keep an Eye Out for Your Offer
Even if you submit your FAFSA “on the dot” on Oct 1st, you won’t necessarily get an aid offer right away. In fact, it will likely be months before you hear about it again. Schools operate on different financial aid award schedules, so patience is a virtue in this department.
Remember aid is disbursed by the school itself, not the government itself. If you’d like details on what to expect as far as award timing, contact your school’s financial aid office. This will also be your go-to strategy for reporting significant changes in your family/finances. In any case, keep an eye on that mailbox as you begin the waiting game.
You want to know right away when that offer arrives because this will maximize available information ASAP, helping your decision process. Deciding on a school can be a really tough choice, so don’t make things harder than they need to be – get ready for those offers to arrive!
4. Apply for Scholarships!
Since a lot of schools won’t be able to meet you at your full financial need, you’ll need a way to pay the difference. One way to fill this gap is through scholarships. Here’s the key though: As with completing the FAFSA itself, don’t postpone your scholarship applications.
If you don’t begin the scholarship hunt until after receiving your aid offer, you are virtually guaranteed to miss a lot of scholarship application deadlines. There are thousands of possible scholarships available, but there are a lot of other students too. Procrastination is no reason to miss out on literal free money!
So after your FAFSA is complete, one of the most important things you can do is to focus on scholarships. Applications are not anyone’s favorite activity, and they may take some time… But considering the potential payout, it’s definitely worth it.
5. Make Corrections (As Needed)
What happens if you make a mistake on your FAFSA?
After your FAFSA is fully processed—this usually takes three days or so—it will be possible to go back and submit corrections to some portions of your form. You can fix errors like typos, add extra schools, update financial info, etc.. Importantly, this has to be done by the student in question—even dependent students. Parents can’t submit corrections to a FAFSA – that’s just how it works. Students can, however, create a “Save Key” they can share with their parent(s), and of course, there’s no rule that parents can’t be involved in the process regardless.