Fewer students across the country are applying and receiving federal financial aid, according to a study by the American Council on Education (ACE) released on Oct. 11.
The ACE found that half of the eight million undergraduates in its study did not fully complete the main financial aid application during the 1999-2000 school year.
And not every student who skipped the application did so because he did not need aid. Some students found the forms too complex, missed the deadlines, or assumed that the money was for someone else.
Students often miss financial aid opportunities because they aren't aware of how the system works, CNN reported last week.
"That's how it has been for quite some time," The Education Resources Institute (TERI) President Dr. Tom Parker said. "If [students] go to a high school where there's no culture of going to college, they just don't know. Imagine if there's one guidance counselor for 500 kids."
One of the most surprising numbers from the study was that 850,000 students who met the requirements to receive federal Pell Grants didn't even apply. Such a large number left financial aid officers scratching their heads.
"The Pell Grant is a need-based scholarship, so the family income has to be quite low," Parker said. It would be expected, then, that low income families would apply for aid.
But not everyone believes the ACE study accurately measured the state of federal financial aid applications. "The financial aid community is a little suspicious of the article [on the study]," said Patricia Reilly, Director of Financial Aid and Co-Manager of Student Financial Services. "How do they know who would have received aid if they didn't apply?"
One reason families may not apply is common misunderstandings over who is eligible. "We talked to middle-class parents who said the money's only available if you're really poor, and poor parents said you had to have a perfect SAT score," ACE Center for Policy Analysis Director Jacqueline King said in the CNN article.
Parker emphasized the need to make information available to families. "We should encourage external non-profit organizations to set up facilities to have information available, not just to high school age kids but to adults as well," he said.
"You have to start in fifth grade," Parker said. "Some of these kids and families believe they aren't college material, so they don't go through the process towards it."
Tufts students are not immune from this cloud of ignorance about financial aid. When asked if he received federal financial aid, sophomore Jake Becker said, "Maybe I am. I don't know, though."
Around 3,000 Tufts undergraduates applied for financial aid last year and 2,500 students receive aid of some kind. "Five hundred were offered unsubsidized Stafford Loans and chose not to take them," Reilly said.
Contrary to the trends measured by the ACE, federal financial aid at Tufts increased this year, though only nominally.
"The only fund where we got more money [from the government] was work-study," Reilly said. "All other funds were even."
Reilly said that Tufts officials ensure that low-income students get their forms filled out and provide help when necessary.
Students agree that the process is manageable. "I have federal Stafford Loans and federal work-study," sophomore Hanna Kolberg said. "There were some deadlines, but I don't remember them being that burdensome."
Kolberg said that completing forms is not a difficult task when they are necessary. "I am very dependent on financial aid," Kolberg said. "Without it, college would be a no-no."
"A lot of kids' parents cut checks so why do they care," Kolberg said. "But when you have to write the check it means a little more."
Tufts receives campus-based federal aid through three different channels. The U.S. government gives universities a certain amount of money, to be distributed to deserving students. The universities act as middle-men.
Another type of federal aid is entitlement, including the Stafford Student Loan program and the Pell Grant, where "the government decides [who receives aid] based on their formula," according to Reilly.
Professionals specializing in financial aid disagree over how aid applications should be designed. "Some people feel they're too complicated and want to make them simple so more families can apply," Reilly said. The Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) forms are four pages long, with additional worksheets.
Other specialists push for longer applications requesting more information so that governmental and university financial aid offices can make better decisions on who deserves aid.
"There's been discussion of simplification since the 1970s. We will always be tinkering with it," Parker said. "One of the things that frustrates financial aid officers is that they do get fooled. They've become pretty good sleuths."
Tufts students fill both the FAFSA and a form called the CSS Profile. "We feel there's more information that we need," Reilly said. "We use [the CSS Profile] as do many universities for institutional aid."
Parker said there is a growing controversy around the difference between need-based and merit-based aid. "States out West are getting into state-based merit scholarships," he said. "That battle between merit and need-based aid is a prominent feature on the financial aid landscape."<$>
