By Luke Lattanzi | Staff Writer
Baylor is being affected by nationwide changes made to the Free Application for Federal Student Aid by the U.S. Department of Education. The result has been a delay in when universities will be able to receive data from the new application, with data expected to start pouring in by the first half of March at the earliest.
The hold-up comes from a congressional overhaul of FAFSA to make it easier to use. While current students are not expected to be affected, it has caused issues for prospective students.
“The FAFSA initial delay is actually tied to FAFSA simplification,” Taryn Anderson, assistant vice president of Student Financial Services, said. “So normally, the FAFSA opens Oct. 1, and we knew going into this year it was not likely that the new version of the FAFSA would be ready by October.”
Due to the FAFSA delay, Anderson said Baylor decided to push the deadline for students to March 1 to accommodate. She said the university has made an effort to ensure students are informed of the delay, sending out campuswide emails and helping those who may have questions.
One student demographic that is particularly held up as a result of the FAFSA delay is those whose parents do not have social security numbers. Anderson said the university has sent those families special instructions to ensure they receive help in filling out the FAFSA.
Anderson said the delay is also caused by the Department of Education’s alteration of the FAFSA’s family income calculation for inflation. The calculation is meant to take into account where students live, what tax bracket their families are in, how many people are in their households and more. The remaining income is what is used to determine how much financial aid is available to help pay for college.
Anderson said the calculation adjustment will help students in the long term, as it will account for the rising cost of living necessities, such as housing and food.
“It took a little while for the Department of Education to go ahead and say, ‘We really do need to make that adjustment because it benefits students,’” Anderson said. “It delays everything, which is harmful to students in a way, but more students will show as [in need of financial aid]. And more students will qualify for Pell grants, and students who are Pell-eligible — which are our lowest-income students — will get higher Pell grants.”
While the timeline for current Baylor students has largely gone unaffected, the timeline for prospective students is very different. Many universities have had to push their commitment deadlines back for incoming freshmen as a result.
However, unlike many other schools, Baylor utilizes the CSS Profile — another method for determining how much institutional financial aid students are eligible for in accordance with their household income. The CSS Profile uses a different calculation than the FAFSA and is not dependent on the Department of Education.
“Our prospective students for fall of 2024 were actually able to send us financial information through the CSS Profile on Oct. 1 when that application opened up as normal,” Anderson said. “We’ve had their information and are able to go ahead and award them financial aid.”
Additionally, Baylor created a new process this year called the Initial Aid Summary, which consists of the university’s own internal calculations based on data from the CSS Profile to provide students with estimates for state and federal financial aid, as well as student loans and work study.
While the FAFSA is still necessary to determine official numbers, the Initial Aid Summary gives undecided prospective students an estimate to aid them in their decision-making.
“There’s 4,000 students who, on Feb. 1 or before, actually have an estimated financial aid package in hand and could make their decision,” Anderson said. “And the idea of that was to encourage them to do them faster, because in order for that estimated word to become an official word or an official offer, we do need them to do the FAFSA, but we wanted to give them information.”
Once Baylor receives its first round of FAFSA applications in March, it intends to turn those estimated award summaries into official aid offers. If the information on the FAFSA application matches that of the CSS Profile, then official aid offers will look very similar to the Initial Aid Summary. The challenge in that process lies ultimately in asking families to correct their CSS Profile if it does not match their FAFSA application.
Baylor spokesperson Lori Fogleman said via email that the university continues to watch the situation.
“We are continuing to monitor the situation with FAFSA closely, but the University is in a unique position because we can provide financial aid estimates now due to the CSS Profile, so we aren’t as dependent on the FAFSA as others,” the statement read.
