|
Your bank will probably give you another chance; the colleges probably will not. Schools process their financial aid candidates in batches. At most schools, student aid applications are collected in a pile up until the "priority filing deadline" and then assessed in one batch. If you send in your application three weeks early, you will not be better off than someone who just makes the deadline. However, if your application arrives a day late, it could sit unopened in a small pile of late applications until the entire first batch has been given aid. Then, if there is anything left in their coffers, the FAOs look at the second batch on a rolling basis.
Meeting Deadlines
You should realize that the deadlines for the FAFSA and the PROFILE form might be different for a particular school. While the FAFSA cannot be filed until after January 1, the PROFILE can be filed as soon as you receive it. A few private colleges (Middlebury College in Vermont is one that comes to mind) have in the past required the completion of the PROFILE by mid- to late-December. The earliest FAFSA deadline we've ever seen was the first week in January.
If you are applying to a school that asks you to fill out their own separate supplemental financial aid form in addition to a FAFSA or PROFILE, make sure you know the deadlines for both. Unfortunately, the deadlines are usually different. Even if they are the same, the standardized form may have a postmark deadline while the college form has a receipt deadline, or vice versa. The only way to this straight is to read each college's bulletin carefully and keep track of your deadlines accordingly.
In addition, if you filled out the common application when you applied to the school, make sure to get any supplemental forms the school has—these will contain the individual financial aid forms, filing requirements, and deadline information.
As with Taxes, Filing Close to the Deadline Is Better
Conventional tax logic says that filing on April 15 reduces your chance of an audit. The same logic applies to financial aid applications. Even if you apply as early as you possibly can, the FAOs will not be able to start awarding aid until after the priority filing deadline. While they're waiting for the deadline, they will have time to examine early filers with a fine-tooth comb. Why give the schools extra time to think up embarrassing questions to ask you?
There Are Three Types of Financial Aid Deadlines
1) The school says your application must be mailed (and postmarked) by a particular date. If this is the case, send the form by certified mail, return receipt requested, and make sure the postal worker shows you the postmark on the envelope before you leave the post office.
2) Your application must be received and "date stamped" by the need analysis company by a particular date. In this case, you must factor in delivery time. Again, send the application by certified mail, return receipt requested. If you are mailing the standardized form within two weeks of this type of deadline, use the U.S. Postal Service's Express Mail service (return receipt requested). You cannot use Federal Express or any of the other private carriers because standardized forms must be sent to a post office box. Because the processor is located in a somewhat remote location, it may take two business days for your form to be delivered via Express Mail.
3) Your standardized application must be processed and the results sent to the school by a certain date. To be on the safe side, allow six weeks' processing time. If the deadline is March 15, for example, then you should send the form (via certified mail, return receipt requested) to the need analysis company by February 1.
The Best Deadline Is the Earliest Deadline
In effect, the earliest school's deadline by which a standardized need analysis form must have been sent to or received by the need analysis company becomes your overall deadline. Once the need analysis company has your numbers, it sends them to all the schools you designated.
One thing to be careful about: The instructions for the FAFSA say that you have until late June of the next year (that is, almost until the end of the academic year for which you want aid) to fill out the form. What they mean is that the need analysis company is willing to process the form until this date, but by then, there will be virtually no money left at almost any college in the land. Many colleges need your financial information by February 15 of the prior academic year. Some selective private colleges want the profile information as early as December 15 (and even sooner for "early decision" candidates).
If You Are Filling Out Common Applications... Don't Forget The Application's Supplemental Forms at the Highly Selective Colleges
Some Ivy League schools, the "little Ivies," and many other selective schools have rather extensive financial aid forms of their own. The quantity of paperwork may seem daunting at first, but when you start answering the questions, you will begin to notice that many of the questions on the forms are identical—designed to get more detailed responses to the questions already asked on the FAFSA and the PROFILE and to discover inconsistencies in your responses. Individual schools may also ask a few questions that may strike you as bizarre. For example, Amherst wants to know if the student applicant is "given to drinking, gambling, or smoking." This is less Big Brotherish than it sounds. The FAOs are just trying to find recipients for a rather dated scholarship.
|
