Guide to Education Grants

The Financial Aid Process is often thought of as a complex minefield of numbers, signatures and tax information, as just another cog in the already laborious bureaucracy of the Federal Government. However, back in September, Margaret Spellings, the U.S. Secretary of Education, started a movement to simply the process, beginning with the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA).

According to an article written by Elizabeth Redden, titled, “How to Trim FAFSA’s Fat,” that appeared in the March 21, 2007 edition of Inside Higher Education, “Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.), chairman of the House Committee on Education and Labor, and Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Ill.), announced new legislation that would cut the form’s length from five pages to two, while increasing Web access, allowing high school juniors to file a “Pre-FAFSA” for planning purposes and encouraging coordination between the Internal Revenue Service and the Department of Education. Similar legislation was also introduced in the Senate. Meanwhile, Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.), chairman of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions lauded the Education Department’s development of a new ‘FAFSA forecaster’ as ‘a good first step.’”

Going to the Source
Apparently, these Congressional announcements came as a result of a report released on Tuesday by the Institute for College Access & Success. Redden Reports, “Lauren Asher, author of ‘Going to the Source: A Practical Way to Simplify the FAFSA,’ points out that 31 questions on the federal financial aid form — or about two-thirds of those relating to income and assets — ask for information already provided to the federal government on tax forms. Asher argues that by enabling students to easily authorize the IRS to forward that data directly to the Education Department, students would end up facing a far less intimidating form, while colleges could save millions in verification costs.”

Gateway to Financial Aid
College access is one of the hot-topics on Capital Hill lately and many involved in higher education see the FAFSA as one of the barriers to college access. Redden reports, “Student advocates, lawmakers and Secretary Spellings alike have criticized the complexity of the current financial aid form as being a barrier to college access, particularly among low-income students, who, the report states, tend to have greater difficulty compiling the necessary financial information. An estimated 1.5 million low-income students who were likely eligible for Pell Grants did not apply for aid in 2004, nearly double the number in 2000, according to the report.”

The student loan advisers at NextStudent are helpful and knowledgeable about the Financial Aid Process and student loans. They are a trusted source in getting you the appropriate information about your student loan options, student loan consolidation and helping students get the college financing they need. Go to www.nextstudent.com for more information.

Be sure to tune in next Thursday for my next blog on student loan advice.

Student Loan Girl
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This entry was posted on Thursday, March 29th, 2007 at 10:51 am and is filed under Student Loans. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.