Financial Aid and FAFSA 101

Webinar Transcription

32022-05-09 Financial Aid and FAFSA 101

[00:00:00] Hi, everyone. Welcome to CollegeAdvisor’s webinar on Financial Aid and FAFSA 101. To orient everyone with the webinar timing, we’ll start off with a presentation. Then answer your questions in a live Q&A on the sidebar. You can download our slides and you can start submitting your questions in the Q&A tab.

Now let’s meet our families. Hi everyone. My name is Ashly Cargle-Thompson. I am a former admissions officer here at CollegeAdvisor. Um, my educational background is that I got my BA in religious studies from Lawrence university. It’s a tiny little school in Appleton, Wisconsin. Um, and I got my masters of, um, the sociology of religion and Islamic studies from the university of Chicago.

Uh, since then since getting that degree, uh, I’ve spent most of my time, eight years of it, uh, in Atlanta, Georgia working at Emory university, uh, as the [00:01:00] associate director of admissions and financial aid, uh, for graduate programs with, uh, emphasis on financial aid. So financial aid is something that I’m really passionate about.

I’m really grateful for the opportunity to help students, um, To acquaint students to the financial aid process very, very early, uh, so that if you plan on continuing your education, you’re able to do so with the cleanest light possible. So I’m really happy to spend this time together and yeah, let’s get going, Mackenzie.

Yes. So real quick, we’re going to start off with a quick poll. So what grade are you currently in eighth, ninth, 10th, 11th, 12th, or other, and other can be if you’re a graduate student or a transfer, and if you’re a parent on the call, you can just put what, um, great your student is in. And while we wait for those to roll in, uh, Ashly , can you tell us a bit about what is the most challenging thing that you see parents or students, um, going through in the financial [00:02:00] aid process?

Sure. So I think the most challenging thing with financial aid is really that. It’s kind of the way that we approach it. It’s a really stressful part of the admissions process. It’s a stressful part of being a student sometimes most of the time. Um, and so some of that can cause us to shut down a little bit, um, which means that it’s harder to kind of taken all of these things that are being thrown at you.

So I like to think about financial aid and especially figuring out how to fund your own college experience as a puzzle, as an opportunity to build a strategy. Uh, and we’ll talk about kind of what my guiding principles are about that a little bit later, but I think if we approach it as a, as a puzzle, as a fun type of challenge, as a challenge where we can have really, really great outcomes, if [00:03:00] we really are dedicated to learning the system and in some ways outsmarting the system, uh, then it becomes a little bit like.

Daunting. Um, and then beyond that, a lot of times financial language, financial documents, they are, um, tedious and they’re hard to find sometimes. And so all of that is a turnoff, but my hope is that in our conversation today, we’ll demystify some of that so that you can approach it a little bit with slightly lighter hearts.

Yes. So it is looking like we have 0%, eighth graders, 5%, ninth graders, 14%, 10th graders, 65%. Uh, 11th grade is making up the majority 13%, 12th graders and 2% other and Rowe quick. There were a few comments about audio. Can you hear me clearly? I can hear you. Okay. Um, if anyone’s having audio issues, try logging out and logging back into big [00:04:00] marker that should help or check your way.

And you can control the slides now. Right. So it’s great to know kind of what that breakdown is because that’s a perfect kind of swath of students junior year is definitely when you really want to be leaning into financial aid. Um, honestly I would say that you want to start having the conversations as a family, even prior to that.

So when we talk about when’s a good time to start thinking about financial aid, it’s immediately in some situations it’s yesterday. Uh, you want to be thinking about it as early as possible because financial aid is going to be about more than just the package that you’re going to get. When you’re admitted to colleges, it’s an entire ecosystem of.

Policies of paperwork, of different, uh, tasks that you have to complete, but it’s also kind of your earning potential. It’s the potential for you to get all of the things that you [00:05:00] want so that you can do what you want to do. Um, and so the big thing that you need to be talking about, even as a freshman, even as a sophomore with your families, is, you know, what are the types of things that are absolutely non-negotiables for financial aid?

What sorts of things can. Not do without. So if your family is like, you know, you have to get a full tuition scholarship, we cannot afford to put any money out of pocket toward your education, which is really common. That’s something that needs to go on your non-negotiables. There can’t be any out-of-pocket expenses.

Um, if your family is incredibly opposed to taking out student loans, um, that is a personal choice and totally understandable, but that needs to be something that you’re discussing all together as, um, kind of your list of non-negotiables because what we want to avoid is having the student, looking [00:06:00] at certain things, looking at, you know, Student life and curriculum and, you know, location and all the things that you’re thinking about as a student, meanwhile, the parents have a completely different agenda.

And then by the time it’s time to apply, which is supposed to be the exciting time when everyone pulls together. Now we’re having a division and expectations. So it’s important to start having those conversations as soon as you possibly can. Um, it also will help you develop your college list. Your college list should have all of the things that you want in terms of curriculum.

And. Campus culture, all of that, but it should also be something that is financially attainable. And so we want to make sure that our college list is full of options that you can attain financially. Again, you want to avoid the heartbreak of applying for schools that are financially unattainable, um, and getting in, and then feeling stuck between a rock and a hard place you want to [00:07:00] avoid getting in over your head.

And then finally, a big reason to start early is that it streamlines paperwork and applications. If you have any friends, uh, family, friends, or, uh, students who are seniors right now, friends who are seniors right now, and you’ve heard the horror stories about all the financial aid things that they have to do, chances are that they use the more traditional timeline and decided to, and start to tackle things like the FAFSA and the CSS.

You know, their senior year, they learned about it. You know, their senior year, they applied their senior year and they kind of condensed everything. Well, you can’t start earlier than the applications open for you knowing exactly what you need to do and acquainting yourself with all of those systems and tasks means that when it’s time for you to do it, a lot of the anxiety that I was talking about, the tends to shut us down or cause us to kind of push things to the side, you’ve dealt with all that.

That’s all gone. That’s old hat, you know what a FAFSA looks [00:08:00] like. Let’s just get into it and get going. So, as you’re thinking about all that, it’s really important that we define and know what the definitions of a lot of terms that you’re going to hear. R. So you’ll hear the term financial aid. That’s actually a catchall financial aid just means the processes through which you’re going to fund your college education or your graduate education.

All of the things though, financial aid is the external scholarships that you get from girl Scouts or boy Scouts, financial aid is whatever amount of money your family puts in. That’s part of your financial aid package. It’s obviously scholarships and grants and work, study and loans. Anything that is going to go to that school to pay toward your tuition fees, room and board books, all of that is considered [00:09:00] part of financial aid.

So when people use it, that is an umbrella term, it doesn’t necessarily mean we’re talking about loans. It doesn’t necessarily mean we’re talking about scholarships. It means we are talking about that entire ecosystem, um, scholarships and grants. I think we all know what loans, um, so loans, if we’re not, if you’re not clear, loans are funds that you can get ahead of time and depending on the type of loan, um, They will accrue interest or not accrue interest, and you will have to pay them back upon leaving your institution or graduating or whatever, the terms of that loan that you signed.

And you will have to pay any interest that accrues and has accrued while you’re in school. So, um, I think we’re all pretty familiar with that scholarships and grants is where people sometimes get tripped up. Now, those are often used interchangeably. You might talk to someone in a financial aid office at any given [00:10:00] college and they’ll say, oh yes, we have a grant for, we have a anthropology grant, you know, an anthropology honors grants.

Sometimes they’ll use grant to mean scholarships, but most of the time grants, especially when you’re talking about federal aid, mean that there is a need based component to the eligibility criteria where scholarships are usually merit-based or in some way achievement based. So whether it’s an athletic scholarship, an academic scholarship, it usually has something to do with the level of.

Your level of performance in something in either case, what you just really need to hear is that both of those mean free money, um, that that is money that you do not have to pay back. Uh, and so when we’re thinking about, uh, strategies to pay for college, we want as many scholarships and grants in that conversation as possible.[00:11:00]

So let’s get into what you’re all really here for, and that’s to talk about the FAFSA. Um, so the fastest, fastest stands for free application for federal student aid. That’s literally all it is, is an application it and an it in and of itself does not give you anything. It doesn’t commit you to anything.

It is literally just a document that you’re filling out to determine eligibility for federal aid. Uh, what it basically does is it pulls all of your income and financial information together and predicts your ability to contribute toward college. And it’ll create something called an EFC and estimated family contribution.

And what that number that’s generated is, is more or less the marker for the extent of financial need, that the information you’ve [00:12:00] provided on your FAFSA demonstrates. So an EFC of zero, which is a very common EFC to get means that you are very high need. It means that based on the information that you’ve provided in your.

You cannot, your family cannot afford to put anything, uh, toward your education in terms of out-of-pocket fees. Um, eh, EFCs above, I believe 6,000. You usually start to take you out of the need based categories. Um, so it’s literally just that determining what your financial need is as it pertains to federal aid, um, sometimes, uh, institutions, different colleges, if they only take FAFSA, we’ll also use that EFC to determine your eligibility for need based funding offered by that institution, or if you have external [00:13:00] scholarships, um, we’ll also use that number to determine whether or not you meet need eligibility.

Um, one thing about the FAFSA in terms of who is eligible to fill it out, who is eligible to complete it, or who needs to complete it, versus which people in which students and families, um, can just kind of bypass it. If you are a United States citizen or otherwise eligible non-citizen, you should complete the FAFSA, even if, uh, if we have any parents on the call, even if, uh, you are relatively sure that your income places you outside of the realm of need, the FAFSA is a really important document that kind of crystallizes the financial aid process.

A lot of schools, for instance, um, Emory creates student accounts from the FAFSA, our system automatically generated your financial aid account, just even the footprint where we would put [00:14:00] any scholarships or anything. Based on FAFSA submissions. Um, and so if we had domestic students who didn’t submit the FAFSA, sometimes they could fall through the cracks because the system didn’t automatically create it.

So then people would have to manually manually go and find, um, who hadn’t submitted their FAFSA. Also a lot of schools, it is a requirement to complete the FAFSA. So if you’re a us citizen or eligible, otherwise eligible, non-citizen complete the FAFSA. If you are a DACA student, um, undocumented international, you do not need to complete the FAFSA.

It’s always a good idea to call the schools that you’re interested in and ask what particular financial aid, um, programs they have available for students who are either undocumented or international. A lot of times they will have kind of supplementary. Financial [00:15:00] aid for students who cannot, for whatever reason, uh, submit a FAFSA.

So that’s important to note the other, uh, acronym that you might hear a lot is the CSS profile and that’s the college scholarship service profile. And what that is is basically a common app that you’re going to complete. It has, um, short answers. It asks you a lot of personal information. So it’ll ask you everything that the FAFSA asks for.

And then it’ll ask for information about, um, your extracurriculars. It will ask you for a lot more, um, Information on your background, it’ll ask you about, um, your parents. It will ask you about whether or not you’re a first-generation student. It’ll ask you a lot more biographical information than what you’re going to ask, be asked in the FAFSA.

And the reason for that is that all of the info, and it will still ask you for the financial [00:16:00] information that the facet does. Um, but the reason for that is that the CSS profile basically pulls all of that information together. And the CSS schools that use it will take that and use it to kind of automatically match you with institutional scholarships that they have available.

So instead of you having to go onto the financial aid website and look for what other scholarships they might have, they will automatically match you. So you can kind of. Put everything you want to, into that profile and know that as far as institutional awards, you will be matched with whatever it is that they can give you.

Um, not all schools use the CSS profile, so some schools are not going to ask you for it. Some schools will, and they will all have deadlines, uh, that they set themselves. So it’s important to know which of your schools are CSS schools [00:17:00] and it’s important to know what their particular deadlines are because it’s not all one day.

Um, for schools that do have a CSS profile, DACA, undocumented, international students, you should apply, you should absolutely, um, complete your CSS profile. And I would even say, as you’re building your college list, um, schools that have CSS profile, um, are usually, um, more. Efficient at matching you based on your, your holistic kind of profile, um, then than schools that aren’t.

So, um, I would say if I’m a DACA student, if I’m an international student, it’s a benefit. If the schools that I’m applying for, uh, have a CSS profile, it takes a lot off of your plate. So deadlines, as I mentioned, um, can vary from school to school. What’s [00:18:00] important to know is that both the CSS profile and the FAFSA are open for you to begin applying if you are going into your senior year.

So if you will be a rising senior this summer, um, those applications open on October 1st. So you can jump on that. As soon as possible. And I really recommend kind of a self-imposed deadline of November 15th. Just get it out of the way, uh, so that you don’t have to worry about those deadlines. Um, usually the deadlines are a little bit later than that.

Um, sometimes December, December 15th, but by the time December rolls around, you will be knee deep in application stuff. Uh, and so if you can get the financial aid stuff out of the way faster, that’s, that’s even better. So the materials that you’ll need to complete the FAFSA and the CSS you’ll see are, are, there’s a [00:19:00] lot of overlap there, but the first thing you need to know about the FAFSA is that there’s one step just before submitting your FAFSA and that’s the FSA ID.

So an FSA ID is basically a secure ID. And pin number that allows you to electronically sign and save any FAFSA data that you, that you have. So, because you’ll be working with really sensitive information with social security numbers, with tax records, all of that, um, this gives you a way of really protect one of them, verifying your identity incredibly rigorously, and to being able to go in and out of that document with a, um, with log-in credentials that are very vigorously and rigorously vetted, um, do know that each household should have two FSA IDs, one for the parent or guardian or parents or [00:20:00] in guardians and one for the student.

They each need to have unique email addresses, because like I said, these are basically your electronic signatures. And at the end of the FAFSA, both the student and the parent are going to need to be able to independently electronically sign that document of the things that you’ll need for your, to create your FSA ID, our, uh, social security number, um, or alien registration, number, your, your full name, your date of birth.

Those are the main things that you just have to be able to do. So it should be pretty quick for you to complete an FSA ID. And if I’m not mistaken, um, you might be able to complete your FSA ID. Now, set that up, have it ready to go so that when October runs or comes around, you already have that. You can skip this, the whole FSA ID generation step, um, The FAFSA will ask for similar information, it’ll [00:21:00] ask for your social security number, alien registration number, and then it’s going to ask for tax documents.

So, because it opens on October 1st, 2022, they don’t expect you to necessarily have your completed 20, 21 documents, a tax document. So it’s actually going to base your. Your FAFSA is going to be based on your 2020 tax returns. So you’ll need to have the tax returns, the W2’s, um, any bank statements, investment records, anything like that, but you can also, and this is unless you have incredibly complicated taxes, I would say about 85% of the time when you complete the FAFSA that you have the option of porting your.

Um, tax information directly from the IRS’s website. So if you’ve completed your taxes and your taxes are straight forward, then once you’re in the [00:22:00] application, they’ll give you the option of either completing it, manually your tax information manually, or importing it over from irs.gov. And it’ll walk you through that entire process.

Uh, if it’s successful, then everything moves over very neatly and you don’t have to really dig through any of your tax records. Um, sometimes it doesn’t work. So that’s why it’s important to have it on hand. And then obviously you want to have your FSA ID so that you can get in there and sign everything.

Um, make sure that if in any situation, families should have all of this information for both the parent guardians, as well as the student, you’re going to all be asked the same amount of questions. Uh, the student’s part usually goes pretty quickly, uh, because. There’s not as much financial background there, but that’s basically what you are going to need for the FAFSA, for the CSS.

It’s, it’s pretty similar. Uh, you would need your [00:23:00] college. You wouldn’t want to create a college board account. Um, which again, if I’m not mistaken, you might be able to do that now, uh, to just have it set up. Um, you would want your most recent tax returns and W2’s, so if you have anything that is incredibly, um, if you have anything, if you’ve completed your taxes and you want to use those, you can, um, if not, you can still use the 20, 20 taxes, but they will want records of current income.

So pay stubs, that type of thing. Um, they’ll also want the same financial records that you needed for your FAFSA and bank statements. Um, and then the important thing with the CSS is that if you’re in a one parent or guardian household, they expect. The CSS to be completed by both biological parents. If the parents, even if the parents are divorced or separated, however, if that’s not an option, there is you do have the ability to complete a [00:24:00] non-custodial parent waiver, which allows them to base everything, um, on the finances of the custodial parent.

Um, yeah, McKinsey. Oh, and we will be, we will have the webinar go an additional 10 minutes just so we can get to that Q and a at the end and have appropriate amount of time. So real quick, um, where are you in the application process? So having started on researching schools, I’m working on my essays. I’m getting my application materials together, or if you’re really lucky, I’m almost done.

And what we wait for those responses to roll in. Uh, what are some external aid opportunities students can look. Sure. So there are a lot of external opportunities that you’ll want to be aware of, again, as a writer, the summer you’re rising senior summer at summer, that you’re a rising senior. The really big ones are, you’ve probably heard of the Coca-Cola fellowship.

Um, I believe Siemens has won [00:25:00] national merit awards. That’s another plug for completing the FAFSA. The FAFSA is the gateway into the national merit, um, scholarship programs. So if that’s something that you are interested in in doing, um, but there’s, there are a lot of really large, uh, scholarships that are out there.

But then this is also a good time to kind of find those mid tier scholarships that are kind of built for you built for your very specific interests. And what I recommend students do is find a scholarship clearing house that they feel really comfortable with. Um, Fastweb is one of them. Um, scaly is another, my favorite, my personal favorite is called going Mary.

Uh, and basically it pulls all of your, all of the scholarship information kind of out there together. It vets it, you complete a profile. That’s kind of like a common app and it matches you with scholarships. And then if, if the, if they have enough [00:26:00] information through your profile, they will auto match you and auto apply you.

The goal is to apply for seven to 10 external scholarships per month until you start. Um, and you can stop winning the full cost of attendance of your college is covered, um, by renewable scholarships, then you can. Wow. I haven’t even thought of that. My favorite thing is just to go for a school with great financial aid and grants, because it’s just covered at once, but it’s looking like we have 28% of students haven’t started.

Uh, 51% are researching schools. 8% are working on essays. 7% are getting application materials together, and 6%, the lucky few are almost done. All right. Well, that’s great. Again, everybody is in a good place to kind of start adding, um, financial aid into the conversation. Um, So now that we’re [00:27:00] kind of talking about, you know, what do we do now?

We know about the facts that we know about the general brass tax of it. Um, now it’s time to start thinking more strategically thinking in terms of, um, the different terminology, really making sure that you understand what this whole financial aid thing is about. And so, um, the next couple of slides, we’re going to talk about some terminology that can be kind of confusing for students.

And a lot of times will lead students down the wrong path or incorrectly set expectations. And I’m all about having realistic expectations and not being surprised by anything on what should be the happiest day of your life up till now. Um, so to two terms that you probably are hearing a lot are need blind and need aware.

Um, so it’s important to know what those are need blind simply means that the school commits to. Um, the [00:28:00] school is committing to admitting students regardless of their ability to pay. So they’re not looking at your FAFSA information while they’re making their admissions decisions. They’re only admitting you based on whatever their admissions criteria are, need aware means that your ability to pay could impact your admissions decision.

So a common misconception is that need blindness and needle. Our financial aid policies that in some way, shape or form, this indicates a school’s ability, um, and commitment to funding you. In reality, they are simply admissions policies. They are simply laying out that your ability to pay is either going to work for or against you, or will not be considered at all.

Um, the other kind of misconception that can come in is that need aware schools are a better match for low income students. [00:29:00] Um, that’s not necessarily true, just because a needle where school reserves the right to deny low-income students. And they’re telling you that, um, upfront, that doesn’t mean they will.

A lot of times need aware. Schools actually have endowed funds for high needs students and it’s to their benefit to use those endowed funds, um, to pay your tuition. So don’t allow. Either of those terms to be the reason you do or don’t apply, but understand that because a lot of schools will throw out like we’re, need-blind we’re need blind and it makes you think you’re getting something.

Um, you’re not, uh, not anything financially what you want to be looking for. Uh, our schools that talk about meeting full financial need. And so what that is, is a school saying that they will guarantee that [00:30:00] if you’re admitted, we are going to give you a financial aid package that meets the full cost of attendance.

So meaning tuition fees, room, board, lab fees, books, all of that. Now again, there are, there’s kind of a catch to that, right? A lot of times people hear meaningful financial need and think that means that you won’t have to pay anything out of pocket, or maybe you won’t have to borrow loans. But really what they’re saying is that, remember financial aid and financial need there, these are umbrella terms.

It means that your financial aid package. So that’s inclusive of loans, grants, scholarships, work, study, merit awards. If you have paid internships, all of that goes into your financial aid package, including any sort of family contribution. So even if, and this is another thing that I want you to be aware of, [00:31:00] even if your EFC is.

Right. And you apply to a school that says they meet 100% of financial need. And even if you’re like, I’m fine, getting loans, loans are not a problem. I just can’t pay out of pocket. Even with all of those things in place, you might be admitted to a school that is committed to meeting full financial need.

That is still going to tell you that you need to pay something out of pocket because they will take all of your information from FAFSA. They’ll run it through their own formula to determine the institutional need, which is different than the federal need. And if their institution, if your institutional need is greater than zero, then they’ll say, okay, based on our formula, you can actually afford to pay $7,000 a year.

Even if the federal, you know, even if the department of education calculated it differently. So know that just by applying to these schools, it is not a guarantee for [00:32:00] full. Not to be a Debbie downer. Sometimes you do get full funding, but we’ll get to why. Um, I like to approach things the way that I do because of that later.

Um, so in terms of finding out, you know, these kinds of, um, w like, what are you going to pay and how do I predict what I can pay? Um, there’s a couple of tools out there. Uh, the department of education actually has EFC calculators that you can use right now. They’ll ask you some general questions and it will spit out an estimated estimated family contribution.

It’ll try and predict it. Um, and it’ll at least help you identify whether or not you fall into that high need or low need or no need category. Um, the vast majority of financial aid websites at different colleges have net cost calculators that will help you figure out [00:33:00] really kind of what, what all do we have to pay.

Um, and some of them will even help you predict your financial aid based on your EFC. Um, what you want to look for ideally is schools that advertise being full. And debt-free. And so what those schools are saying, um, is that they will meet a hundred percent of your need and they are not calculating loans into that.

They’re not factoring loans into that. Those are unicorn schools, but there are a few out there. Um, but that’s a good way of also being able to predict if I apply to this school at the very least, I know I’m not going to have to borrow any money. Um, and then finally, the safest steadiest, most predictable way to figure out how much you might be paying for college before you even apply is to look at state schools.

State schools are the most transparent in terms of the cost of attendance, um, because they, because if you are an in-state [00:34:00] student, you basically are able to attend at a discounted rate. Published everywhere. Versus if you’re going to a private institution, a lot of your financial aid package is actually scholarships.

It’s not a discount. It’s, we’re going to match you with a bunch of money. You don’t know how much money we have. You don’t know what our rubric is. All of that is very surreptitious on your end. And so you have to wait until they’ve done what they’re going to do to know what you’re going to get. So if really knowing is something that’s really important, then absolutely.

Um, research your state schools. Um, look at them, get excited about them. It’s a great way of being able to predict what college is going to cost. Um, so in terms of scholarships and financial aid, when crafting your school list or knowing what’s available, um, institutional financial aid websites are really your [00:35:00] best.

Friends. Um, they can be really dense. They can be really boring, but they usually have most of the tools that you’re going to need. Um, they’re going to tell you what your tuition and the cost of attendance is. They w that’s where they’re going to tell you whether or not they’re need-blind full needs, zero debt, any of those, that’s where you’re going to find the net calculators that I talked about.

Um, and you might find some really important and helpful statistics so that you can figure out on average in general, how are these schools operating? What are their financial aid packages like across the board? If you can’t. I really recommend calling them calling either the financial aid office or the admissions office and asking for that information, ask them what the average financial aid packages that’s usually published.

Um, average, the average out of pocket cost per second. That’s probably published about 60% of the time. Um, average loans borrowed per student, that’s usually not published, but they should be able to give you that [00:36:00] information. And also the pervasiveness of private loans. And the reason why that’s important is because that tells you whether or not their packages are still meeting student need.

Um, if between federal package and what the schools are giving them are adequately meeting school, student need. If there’s a high pervasiveness of pervasiveness of private loans, it means that whatever it is that the school is giving is not enough and families are having to go outside of the institution and outside of the department of education to supplement their aid pack.

Um, in terms of who we can contact for more information, your college counselors, if you have them are a great resource, just because they have good anecdotal experience and a knowledge based send students who’ve come before you, especially if you’re applying to a school that’s popular at your high school.

Um, so there’ll be able to tell you how things have kind of panned out and what scholarships have worked and how students from your school tend to do, or your district tend to do. [00:37:00] Um, the admissions offices at the colleges are also the first place that you want to ask, because they’re used to working with incoming students more than anyone else.

Remember that financial aid offices, their largest group of kind of customers are current students. And so they’re not usually primed to. Engage with incoming students, as much as, as the admissions offices are, but the admissions office can set up a conversation or a meeting with someone from financial aid and prep them so that you can get the help that you need that way too.

And then finally, um, CollegeAdvisor, uh, right here, we have a financial aid team, um, that will do one-on-one consultations with families, uh, to help you figure out your specific context and what you need. And you can ask, uh, your advisor, your admissions advisor, um, for assistance booking an [00:38:00] appointment for one of those one-on-ones.

Okay. And finally, uh, the, my last piece of advice that I would give for families about financial aid and applying for college is do everything that you can to operate from a place of. Um, you want to avoid feeling ruled by your circumstances. You don’t want to feel like you have to make a decision about your academic career or your re your academic passions or kind of whatever dreams you’re chasing right now at this point of your life.

You’re not, you want to avoid feeling like you’re going to have to make decisions about that based on finances. So as many strategies as you can have in place as many different levers, as you can pull to ensure that you’re not cornered into a single decision, um, the better, and some of the things that you can [00:39:00] do to start to start thinking that way.

One is to reframe the idea of a safety school. It’s not safe. It’s secure. So. Sometimes safety schools tend to be the state schools. They tend to be the local option. Um, that’s not a less than, uh, there are definitely benefits to that. So when you’re creating your college lists, you should be psyched on every single school that’s on it.

And some of that is doing your research and finding which schools meet all those criteria. And some of it is not putting so much pressure on yourself to get into the reach schools that you lose sight of the fact that there was a time that you would have been excited to go to a school that might be a little bit less expensive.

Um, also diversify your funding sources. So Mackenzie mentioned like getting all the money all at once from one place that’s fantastic, but usually all that money has strings attached. [00:40:00] So it might be attached to a major, it might be attached to a grade point average. There are all sorts of things that you’re going to have to keep up in order to keep that money.

And if anything. Falls out of the out of balance. Now you don’t have that money and now all of your money has gone. So I would much rather, I mean, if you can get it, absolutely get it. Not saying to turn it down, but to know what that means. Having diverse funding options allows you to be a little bit more flexible.

Um, because if you have lots of external scholarships that aren’t tied to a major that aren’t necessarily tied to a grade point average, um, that means that if one of those things falls, if you drop one of those plates, you’ve still got three quarters of your funding going. Um, if you go to the school and you’re like, oh, this is not, these are not my people.

I need to go somewhere else. Um, if you have a good amount of external scholarship and it’s transferable [00:41:00] fantastic, you can go, um, and you can make the decisions that are right for you can follow your bliss and then finally prioritize realistically. Having the unicorn school, that’s going to give you, you know, full tuition plus the stipend that is, you know, X miles from home that has all of the things, all of the things I’m expecting for you to have a college list.

That’s going to have all of that for every single school. It’s not realistic. So really again, go back to your non-negotiables and you should have them for financial aid and you should have them for the actual schools themselves and prioritize those things. Uh, try to stay out of the mentality that I want all the groceries in the bag, but I don’t want the bag to be heavy.

You’re the bags either going to be heavier, you got to have to take some groceries out. Um, but if you do that again in a way that you’re not thinking that these are concessions, but these are. Decisions and strategies that I’m [00:42:00] putting into place in order to afford college and set myself up well, um, then that makes it much easier to digest.

Now. I think we have time for some time for questions. I’m sorry. I love financial aid. I taught. And so a few students were asking about the scholarship websites and organizations that you were talking about. Uh, could you type some of the, um, links or names in the chat? And, um, I’m gonna read something real quick.

So that is the end of the presentation part of the webinar. I hope you found this information helpful and remember that you can download the slide from the link in the handouts tab, moving onto the live Q and a I’ll read through your questions. You submitted in the Q and a tab, and then read them aloud before our panelists gives you an answer as a heads up, if your Q and a tab, isn’t letting you submit questions, just make sure that you join the link through the custom link sent to your email and not from the webinar landing page.

Also known as the website, just because if you joined from there, you won’t get all the [00:43:00] features of big marker. So just make sure you join through that custom link. Also, this is a larger crowd tonight, and we really want to make sure that we get to the questions that are most relevant to everybody on the call.

So we want to remind you not to message either me or Ashly . Um, what specific questions please put them in the Q and a tab. And then also do not click the vote button on your question, just because that messes up the order of the questions and makes the process go a bit slower. So just to keep this as smooth as possible, we’ll get through as many questions as we can.

And then, um, that benefit the group. And if you have any specific questions, you can always sign up for CollegeAdvisor. If you aren’t already working with us, um, to get those very detailed and personalized and individualized, um, financial aid questions answered. Okay. So now going into the, um, Q and a, uh, also I added some info in the chat.

I just wanted to mention the [00:44:00] cost of FAFSA and CSS. FAFSA is free and then CSS does have a cost, um, for families that make over a hundred thousand dollars is what the website said. And it’s $25 for the first application, 16 for every additional application that you send to schools. Like it’s like, it’s the same application, but you just send it to different schools.

Okay. And going on. Um, okay. So the first student, a lot of students are worried about like having too high of an income. So they’re asking what income range is qualify for financial aid and what are the set categories for what you qualify for. So, unfortunately there aren’t any kind of brackets that you can go to and say, okay, if my family makes X amount of dollars, then I’ll get this much in financial aid.

Um, and the reason for that is that they ask for much more than just your income, they ask about, um, what’s [00:45:00] the, they obviously ask about income, but they also want to know about what other, um, what other sources of income you might have. They want to know if you own houses. If you have IRAs, anything like that, they want to know how many children are currently in college.

They want to know about your expenses. So there’s a pretty, um, a pretty complicated formula that they’re running all of your data through. Um, I think the easiest way to factor it in is to determine what the national poverty line is. Um, and if your family is near or below that you are pretty, pretty, pretty, um, sure.

To be considered a high need student, um, in terms of what that means you will get. Again, it depends on a lot of factors. It depends on your eligibility for [00:46:00] particular need based grants. It depends on how much money they have available for those need-based grants, because those that can change from year to year.

Um, and it also depends on whether or not. Um, there are any state there’s any state funding, um, that you can get or that you can be directed to once you’ve completed your fastest. So if you’re from most schools and I should have mentioned that, um, most states have some sort of state-based funding for students who are in, who are residents in that state, um, whether it’s, uh, whether it’s grants, um, or scholarship programs for need-based students, but know that you have to usually be going to school in the state of residence.

Yes. Okay. So, uh, there are a lot of specific questions about the FAFSA side, so we’ll just be going through those. Um, so about applying early one student said, I heard that you shouldn’t send in FAFSA too soon. Um, but you should get your financial, um, [00:47:00] in line first. Uh, can you talk a bit about like the timeline sending in early, what you need to get together?

Yeah, so. There is you don’t have the ability to technically send in the FAFSA too early. Uh, and that’s because the it’s not open all the time. Once it opens on October 1st, it’s officially not too early to submit your FAFSA. Um, some families might have more complicated financial situations, but 90% of the time, even those families are not able to resolve whatever that financial Infor situation is in such a way that it’s reflected on their FAFSA and makes a huge impact once they do finally have to submit it usually in no later than mid December.

Um, so what usually will end up happening and what you’re concerned about is that, okay, my financial situation is about to change dramatically or it has changed dramatically. And I want to wait for all of those things to come through before I [00:48:00] submit no that you can always appeal the FAFSA. Um, so there’s a couple of things you can actually change it and edit it within a certain window.

Um, if you believe that there are any errors or if something didn’t come through correctly, then that’s an option. Um, and then even if everything is correct and your basic, your family feels like, okay, even though we gave them all the money that is not, or gave them all of our information, and this is whatever formula they use to calculate this, this EFC is not a reflection of our actual day today, financial situation, um, like maybe you have.

Property or something that you got, um, that was inherited, right? And so that property is technically an asset, but it doesn’t bring in income. And so it’s just kind of sandbagging you and making you look like you have more money and assets than you really do. Those are all things [00:49:00] that you can appeal. Uh, if a, uh, if a parent has lost a job since 2020, um, deaths in the family, the birth of a new kid, there are a lot of things that you can appeal after the fact.

But, um, in terms of kind of just waiting, um, as a strategy, I don’t recommend it, uh, because again, usually whatever it is that you’re trying to work out, you won’t be able to accomplish in time or in such a way that it’s reflected on your fast though. W even when you do that, Yes. Um, so, uh, okay. These are about to be some kind of niche, but kind of broad questions.

So, um, another student is asking, um, okay, so the student is a dependent for their parents, but they are also about to become a parent. What they still be. Do they use their parents’ information or do they use their own since technically they’re going to have a [00:50:00] dependent, if that makes sense. Yes. That’s a good question.

Um, so. The first thing you want to do is have a conversation with your parent, um, about how you want to go forward. I’m not a hundred percent. Um, I don’t believe that you automatically get independent status and that your parent can no longer claim you as an independent, just because you have a child. Um, what your parent is going to have to figure out is whether or not they’re going to claim you and your child as an independent or not claim you as at all.

Um, and whether you’re going to claim your child. So those there’s a lot of decisions that have to be made, uh, made there. Um, but you do not, as far as I know, you do not have to separate from your parent and not have, and not maintain that dependent status. Um, just because there is a baby on the way. Um, and again, remember the FAFSA is based on.

[00:51:00] 2020, um, when there wasn’t a baby on the way. So I would, I would hope. Um, so that would mean that you would have to, um, still figure out a way to work that in, through an appeal. Um, if you believe that EFC, um, doesn’t appropriately reflect your current situation. Yes. And another question going on like dependency and guardianship, uh, if we live with grandparents, but they don’t contribute to my care except a roof over my head, do I have to claim their income on my documents?

That’s a good question. Um, so you would need to have, if you do not have a legal guardian, then you would need to, um, Go through the process of completing the FAFSA as an independent, um, you would need to be 18 in order to do that. Um, or you would need to, um, [00:52:00] have been, um, legally emancipated in order to do that.

So, um, if your parent grandparents are legal guardians, and even if they don’t contribute to your, to your care outside of housing, um, if they’re legally your guardians, then you would need to. Provide that information. Yes. And on the actual FAFSA form, there are going to be a lot of questions asking about who you live with.

Who’s provided income for a half of the year for you, and very specific questions. If you’re a ward of the state, if you’re a dependent, if you have dependents. So a lot of these questions can, you can find the answer on the actual FAFSA form when you’re filling it out. Um, that will definitely make it a bit easier.

And then they do have like a Q and a portion on the actual website. If you want more information, uh, just to, um, go to a different topic and then we’ll come back to FAFSA, um, a students asking how would I qualify for a full ride [00:53:00] scholarship? So. The best way to qualify for a full ride squad scholarship is to be incredibly strategic about the schools that you’re applying to, um, and to put a lot of work into your application, um, but really ha you really have to do the calculus between all right, as far as kind of the average applicant for the school and the size of the school, where do I match up?

Like if the average act score for the entire school is a 26 and you have a 32 and the median GPA is a three eight and you have a 4.3 and you, um, put a lot of time and effort into your applications and your essays and making sure that they really understand who you are and that you’re able to reflect on how you, um, would benefit from an education at that institution and how you could [00:54:00] contribute to their community.

That that’s what puts you. Um, in the running. And then the other thing that I recommend to everyone, who’s wanting to get institutional scholarships. Don’t do everything you can to avoid being a stealth applicant. And what that means. Self applicants are students who admissions department. I have no idea that you exist until you submit your application.

And it happens a lot, obviously all 25 schools that you might be applying to, or that might be on your college list. Um, you can’t have deep personal conversations with admissions representatives at all of them. It’s okay to be a self applicant, but the schools that you’re really interested in that you really, really care about, show up, like give them the full picture of who you are, show your interest, go to events, go to online events, go to in-person events, go on campus visits, ask questions, um, make sure that they can really [00:55:00] gauge your interest so that when that fantastic application comes in and they look at your profile next to kind of what the typical student is there.

And they say, oh my goodness, I remember this student. And they were so delightful. Um, all of those things play into. What, how you’re going to be perceived and therefore what decisions are going to be made, um, from those schools, remember admissions is it’s, it’s a hundred percent subjective. Um, it really, really is.

And so you want to do everything that you can to put yourself in front of people and make the best impression that really is the best way to get a full. Yes. And from my own experience, I applied to Cornell university and Howard university Cornell has needs based financial aid. So that one is a bit different.

But for Howard university, it was merit based. And I, with my application, I was able to get there, um, full scholarship. I believe it’s called the founders or it was called the president’s [00:56:00] scholarship and it’s basically a full ride. And then I just have to, I would have had to keep up my GPA every year to keep getting it.

It pays for everything. Tuition. All of that good stuff. Um, and it was, I was able to get that because of my application, what I did in high school and, um, all those things, putting together a great application, um, to really get those merit based scholarships or even needs based scholarships on the financial aid, um, application process side, um, really does require some work.

And if you need support in that CollegeAdvisor provides great services, um, with our advising team where you’ll get matched with an advisor tab one-on-one meetings, and that advisor will work with you for months on end. Um, throughout every step of the application process from essays to college list building to figuring out financial aid and scholarships, and they can really help you put together a great essays and great activities list to really stand out on the, um, in the process to get those [00:57:00] out, um, to get those scholarships and grants and all that money.

So please, if you’re not already working with us, um, make sure to go to app.CollegeAdvisor.com. I did put the link in the chat as well as some other information, um, where you and your parents can sign up for a free web platform. And you will be able to connect with us and sign up for a free consultation, uh, to meet with one of our match team representatives in order to get matched with an advisor.

And you can find out all the information about packages, uh, cost, how much time you get, what services we provide, you’ll get access to the financial aid team, which is great. Um, so yeah, so just make sure to [email protected] for more information. Okay. So now back to the Q and a, um, okay, so another student is asking, where did the question goes?

Sorry. Um, okay. A lot of students in general, just asking, um, just to get these out the way, when should [00:58:00] you fill out FAFSA? And then also they’re asking about the specific textures. I did list in the chat for like 20, 22, 20, 23. You need the 20, 20, um, text forms and then a few other years after that. Um, so yeah.

Yeah, so basically. The FAFSA is always going to want the tech, the full taxi or prior. So right now your family would have just submitted in April. They would have just submitted their 20, 22 taxes. Um, so that doesn’t count. You could skip over 2120. So if you were going into college this fall, your FAFSA would have asked for fall 2020, or for your 2020 taxes.

So basically subtract two years from the fall that you wanted to attend. And that’s the tax year that you would need to have. So next year, Uh, if you’re going into college fall 2023, [00:59:00] then you’re going to use your 21 taxes, 2024. You’re going to use your, um, 22 taxes. So it goes that way. In terms of when you have to submit the FAFSA, it is going to depend on the schools that you’re applying to.

They will all have their own deadlines based on their own financial aid programs and the way that they process and package financial aid. I recommend a self-imposed deadline of November 15th. Um, and that’s just because, and McKinsey can attest to this. Um, somewhere after mid November, after Thanksgiving, senior year, it gets really, really crazy.

Um, you can’t apply before October 1st of your senior year for FAFSA or CSS. So you do have to wait until senior year to actually start those applications and submit them. So the earlier you can do it. Definitely. And so with parents, it’s great to start parents and guardians. It’s great to start [01:00:00] getting your tax forms from the year that is listed.

And when you go on to the actual web portals, you’ll be able to see what year you’re trying to apply for. And it’ll tell you what. Forms from what you’re that you need. Um, and so it’s great to just make sure that you get those, um, documents ready. I know finding all those files can be really hard. Um, so getting those, um, ready and prepared so that when you, um, the application opens on October 1st, you can just start and get it done.

That’s one of the first things you really want to get done in the application process, just because it is tedious and you can forget about it easily. Getting it done earlier does help, especially for merit based schools that have lower endowment amounts because they at some schools do run on a first come first serve basis where I’m applying earlier does get you more money.

So just make sure to really read up on the schools you’re applying to for that information. And some schools have priority deadlines for scholarships or grants or certain it, [01:01:00] um, awards. So really make sure that you’re reading the fine print. You can find it on the school’s financial aid. The site, or you can contact them to find out, but it is just a bit easier to go on the website.

And that’s a good point to McKinsey. If you’re thinking that you might ever want to apply early action or early decision, then, I mean, you want to jump on the fast that the second that it opens, uh, because that, that is true. Um, a lot of times the faster you get submitted, uh, the better your chances are at getting a higher scholarship.

Again, remember that the financial aid people and the people who are awarding scholarships are human beings. And so if I start reading applications, um, for eligibility, for scholarships, and I have a full pot of scholars, Chances are even subconsciously I’m going to be a lot more generous when I have a full pot of money to work with, versus when we start getting past priority [01:02:00] deadline and the money is dwindling.

Now I have to make it stretch further and further. So even just in terms of kind of how human brains work, uh, the earlier you get it in, uh, for the reading team, also admissions readers tend to be more generous, um, scores the earlier you get it in because if you’re application 12 that they read, you know, in, even if it’s just regular decision, if you’re an application number like 12 that they read and regular decision versus application 397, they’re going to read application 12, a little bit more generously.

Um, because frankly they won’t be. Yes. Um, uh, so going onto the next question, a lot of people are just curious about like the actual, like technical side of the FAFSA CSS. So, um, some students are asking, um, where do you get the Fs aid? And then another student is asking, when do you find out about how much aid you’re going to receive?[01:03:00]

Right. Okay. So I’m going to put it in webs, in the chat, everything that you need, you can get [email protected], um, that is going to give you access to the actual FAFSA application. Um, but if you click that link, you’ll see who right out of the gates. The very first thing you see is like, it says something like, are you new to this process?

Are you, you know, coming here for the first time and they really walk you through the entire. Um, set up and I believe that if you say that you are, they’ll, they’ll figure out a way to filter you to getting your FSA ID set up to. Um, so like McKinsey pointed out a lot of it. A lot of the nerves I think is because you haven’t seen it before.

Um, so I’m actually gonna also put this little step-by-step guide that [01:04:00] I found, um, for the FAFSA into the chat. And it’s literally a walkthrough. Um, it’s not an online walkthrough, but it shows you all of the questions that they’re going to ask you on the FAFSA. Um, they might have screenshots, no, no screen.

Oh no, they do. They show you the paper version and the online version. Um, so you can go through and do a little tour. Um, the fastest so that you can know what to expect before the application opens. So, yes. So going on to the next question, um, a lot, some students are asking if you have to keep applying for FAFSA every single year, and then kind of going off of that question.

Um, uh, some parents are asking on what to do if their income changes. So like talking about like, if their income changes now, while they’re applying and then later on in the. Sure. So yes, you file the facet annually. So every year that you’re in school, you’ll file file the FAFSA. It won’t [01:05:00] necessarily be this intense every year.

Um, you can kind of, if nothing has changed, if nothing significantly has changed, um, then you can kind of just do a quick refile, um, that doesn’t take quite as long and doesn’t require as much legwork. Um, but you can also opt to provide additional kind of supplementary materials. Um, if you, if you need to, for the most part, once you’re in, um, your FAFSA and your package, doesn’t change, um, a lot of schools are not going to package and repackage you and repackage you, um, based on your FAFSA, but submitting the FAFSA and annually filing the FAFSA is what gives you that, um, it provides you with the documentation that if you need to appeal, you actually can show them.

This documentation that they’ve been collecting to say, this is why I need to appeal. This is why I need need-based funds. This is why X, Y, Z. Um, if you are getting ready to submit a [01:06:00] FAFSA and again, you know, that your financial situation is going to change dramatically or has recently changed dramatically.

Uh, then again, you can always submit an appeal and the way that the appeals work is that you don’t actually appeal, um, the, the department of education, um, on the Fastly. You’re not trying to appeal getting your EFC changed per se. What you’re appealing to is the actual colleges to which you’ve applied.

So if I apply to Georgia tech, um, and based on my 2020, um, taxes, and then my. My mom loses her job, or my mom decides to become a stay at home mom then. And so we lose an income. Then I am going to actually write an appeal letter to Georgia [01:07:00] Tech’s, um, office of financial aid and say, this is what’s happened.

This is the amount of income that we’ve lost. Obviously that’s not reflected on the FAFSA. This is how much money we have available to put toward my education. This is how much we need an additional aid based on our current situation. The best thing you can do when you, um, are appealing for more aid is to give them as much information as you possibly can and show them that you’re trying to work with them.

That you’re really serious about. Trying to get your student. They’re trying to get enrolled and figure out a way to cover the costs, as opposed to just saying this changed. Give me more money. Um, the more, the more descriptive you can be in the more details you can provide, the easier it is for them to give you a very quick hearing.

Um, and again, it’s one of those subconscious things. The families that are really [01:08:00] demonstrating, um, the desire to meet the schools halfway or at the very least to give all the details that they might need. So it doesn’t have to be this big back and forth. Um, usually, uh, we’ll have better. Definitely. And, um, some schools may require you to submit resubmit a CSS profile every year, once you’re in this school.

Um, that’s very tedious, um, for Cornell it’s just fast every year. So, um, you really do want to keep up with that as you’re going throughout college, just to keep, um, continuing to get that federal money and to make sure that you have all your documents for your financial aid, um, while you’re in school and going on to the next question and we are coming to a close, so you can close out with any additional tips or tricks.

Um, but how can you bargain and compare offers from a school? For example, if I got a poor offer from my dream school, could I bargain by stating I got a better offer from somewhere else?[01:09:00]

I love that question for it’s honesty. I don’t recommend it. Um, I think that. At the end of the day, schools want to know that you want to matriculate there because you want to be a part of their community and contribute to their community and learn from their community. Um, that’s how admissions officers, financial aid officers, anyone who is in any sort of administrative role at that school once students to feel.

Um, and so if you are very upfront about the fact that you’re playing one offer against the other, um, then the chances of, of that being successful are pretty low, especially if you’re trying to do that with a really prestigious difficult to school, that’s difficult to get into that has, you know, a really low acceptance rate, um, because they have plenty of other people who are happy to take that admission slot.

Um, [01:10:00] you have to remember that schools do not, they over admit their classes. It’s like an airline. Institutions for their freshmen class over admit they admit more students than they actually have spots for. Um, so it means that there’s, and again, they also, a lot of times have waiting lists. So it means that a lot of times they are banking on some people, withdrawing.

They need people to withdraw and kind of threatening to withdraw or threat or saying like, I could get better over there. You’re really putting yourself in a position to have someone potentially at a school that you still might want to go to that you still might be willing to say, I would go there for this amount.

I just like a little bit more, you’re running the risk of really having someone at a school that you care about saying, okay, well go there then. Um, so I don’t recommend that you go about it that way. [01:11:00] If you need more money period, then. Appeal on that. That’s all you need to do is tell them I need more money.

I really want to come here. Um, and, and this is, this is what I need in order to be able to do that. Um, bringing other offers into the conversation. Um, it doesn’t, it’s not great for how you will be perceived as a student. Um, yeah. And, and closing with that again, I do love that question because it shows that you’re trying to figure out, like, what are the best strategies to use and I’m all about strategy.

Um, but I think the main thing is to be as, um,

to do everything that you can with as much integrity as you possibly can. Um, and to be as transparent as you can, [01:12:00] but with integrity. Um, and so that would mean, you know, just saying, Hey, I need more money. Um, beyond that again, I encourage everyone to try and frame this as a puzzle. Um, this really is just working with a bunch of ideas and a bunch of resources and turning them this way and that, and figuring out what is going to fit best.

And what’s going to make the most sense for you. Um, and if you are already with CollegeAdvisor, please, especially if you’re a junior and you haven’t, um, signed up for a financial aid one-on-one please talk to your advisor about getting that set up, um, so that you can talk to someone on the financial aid team and they can start helping you think through external scholarships, setting up your summer.

Really looking at the college list that you have so far and thinking about that in terms of financial aid and what’s financially feasible. And what are your financial aid reach schools versus your security schools? [01:13:00] Um, if you are not a CollegeAdvisor, If you’re not currently signed up with us, please know that we do have a scholars program, um, that is pro bono college counseling for low income families.

That application for that program will be opening very soon. Uh, so please keep an eye on that. Uh, you will have access to all of the tools and all of the things that we offer a college counselor at a CollegeAdvisor and, um, some additional college prep orientation to help get you going. Um, and then again, please take advantage of all of the tools that we have.

We have so many really great tools and articles and webinars. This webinar will be saved and posted. Um, so yeah, work your way through those and, um, Again, operate from a place of choice and a place to strategy. Definitely. So thank you to our panelists, Ashly , for all this wonderful information, [01:14:00] uh, we hope you found this information helpful.

And remember again that you can not let the slides from the link in the handouts tab, if you would like to read through this information again, and the webinar is being recorded and will be posted on app.CollegeAdvisor.com, or you can go to CollegeAdvisor.com/webinars to find this and other webinars, um, as well as our upcoming webinars, um, for may on increasing your admissions odds.

Um, there are other webinars on FAFSA specifically on the CSS profile specifically, and all other aspects of the financial aid process. If you want more information and we’ll, we will have more in the future where you can get your questions answered, but again, for those very specific and niche and personal questions, you really do want to sign up for CollegeAdvisor to get that one-on-one.

Or, and have access to our financial aid team. You can find out more information by going to app.CollegeAdvisor.com. Um, and you can call the match team on the number that’s on the website. Um, so find a, to figure out different plans that we [01:15:00] offer the cost and fees associated with it. Um, and we do again, have the free webinars.

We have our blog and other resources open to students that aren’t yet working with us. So thank you everyone for coming out tonight and good night.