When you are going to be attending a university or college one of your main concerns will probably be financial aid. There are many options for financing your education; you just have to be committed to searching for them and then applying. You will find many scholarships available that will require you to fill out an application form. Some will even require you to write an essay and all them definitely have to be turned in by a deadline. This can be very stressful considering all of the scholarship opportunities that you will find and all of the essays and applications you will have to fill out. Well there is some hope and relief in your school-funding search. Alongside, searching for scholarships you will also have to fill out a Free Application for Federal Student Aid so that you can qualify for a student loan. This application is a way of applying for student loans and grants that will help you pay for school. This application used to be a long list of questions. However, on June 24 the Obama Administration created a new Free Application for Federal Student Aid. It is now shorter, simpler and easy to use.
The reason the Obama Administration simplified the Free Application for Federal Student Aid was to allow more people the opportunity to go to or return to college by knowing how and where to go for a student loan or grant. The easier it is to fill out the Free Application for Federal Student Aid the more likely more people won’t shy away from the process and will fill out the application so that they can possibly get the funding they need for school. The Free Application for Federal Student Aid used to be filled with all kinds of questions that many students had to fill out year after year. Now that the changes have been put into place the process for returning students is shorter and easier as well.
The changes that have put into place for the Free Application for Federal Student Aid are a great way to motivate people to use the process. With the changes, you can get a quicker estimate if the amount of Pell Grants you are eligible for as well as the amount of student loan you are eligible for. If you are 24 years or older or married, the system will automatically skip the questions about the financial information of your parents. If you are a man older than 26, the question about Selective Service will be skipped, information about graduation rates or any more information on colleges will be able to be accessed through the application, students with low incomes won’t be required to answer the asset questions and new students won’t be asked about prior drug convictions.
The new Free Application for Federal Student Aid is definitely a step in the right direction for decreasing confusion when completing the application. The new process is also very time saving and makes the financial aid process a lot quicker and more understandable.
