##VIDEO ID:j6KO5TGf8SE## good evening everyone it's officially 7 o'clock so I think it's a good time to get this uh presentation started um thanks for joining us on this rainy evening on a Wednesday um for those have not yet had the pleasure to meet my name is Jason Sabino I'm the director of School counseling here at watch Young Hills Regional High School with us this evening I'm I'm thrilled to be here with our school counselors to welcome you all to this uh to this financial aid presentation just last week we had our postsecondary planning night for students and parents for the class of 20125 where we spoke on a variety of uh aspects of students navigating the college application process from their interest to their acceptance to to the schools that they they're fortunate to go to next year um tonight we are pleased to be joined by Mr Doug Wilson uh from hea he's a hea representative and also the director of financial aid at Keen University and he's going to review variety of the aspects of the College financial aid process including those who should apply for financial aid my quick tip is most everyone and uh speak to also the anticipated release of the FAFSA this upcoming December uh and also his experience with the revisions from last year and anything else I'm sure that Doug has feels it worth sharing with you all uh it is important to note that this year uh through the state of New Jersey it is a graduation requirements for everyone in the class of 202 uh 2025 5 through 2027 to complete the FAFSA or submit a waiver for an exemption from for this requirement we will be sending something out from our offices from the school counseling offices on how to complete this or notify us that you've completed this requirement when it gets closer to the actual release of the FAFSA in December uh if you have any questions in the meantime feel free to reach out to May or school counselor uh I just want to stress that um if you're not a parent on of a current 12th grader on this call there's still information on this call that you can definitely benefit from hearing twice three times or four times each year I pick up a few more tips and insights into the process uh coming up to 20 years now so just a couple house housekeeping items uh obviously we're here on Microsoft teams webinar there is a Q&A that you could ask questions uh and we will review them at the end of the presentation and follow up with any uh questions you might have at the end of it uh that Doug does not hit on or that we can follow up with you individually if it's a more uh specific question related to you uh this webinar will be recorded and posted on the school counseling portion of the website for later viewing so if you have any questions or you feel the need to you know not be able to take as much notes as you hope tonight depending on where you are just know this will be recorded and posted for either yourself or anybody else you may know uh on our website afterwards that being said if you have a question you don't want to have asked that you want to have on the recording we will at the end be mindful of that and try to cancel the actual um that portion of the recording so that you can ask questions uh during the end of the webinar without further Ado I'd like to formally introduce and welcome Mr Doug Wilson hey thank you Mr Sabino and thank you to the group course let me make sure I'm not muted after five years I never get this right but thank you and good evening everybody um it's great to see you virtually um one thing I actually post a um a photo of an actual audience whenever I'm giving a virtual presentation so that we have the illusion of a full house but it's great to have you wherever you are going to spend a few minutes talking about the financial aid process now if you're thinking ahead of time I'm not going to qualify for anything what's the point um well one as Mr Sabino mentioned it's going to be a requirement for high school graduates going forward and it's something that any family should consider because in addition to need-based a there may be also opportunities for non- need-based assistance where the fafs or other forms may be required I'm getting a little ahead of myself but first of all this program is brought to you by the New Jersey assist higher education Student Assistance Authority hea I'll be using that acronym throughout the presentation Works in conjunction with financial aid administrators such as myself to provide this information including Fafa workshops at some point when the FAFSA becomes available again I'm not going to go over the details of the graduation requirement as he also mentioned that there there are waivers in some cases even if your student is not immediately thinking of attending high school it's not a bad idea to complete the application to see what what your student may be eligible for in federal state and institutional resources and the financial aid office if you've ever visited a college campus or if you will it's it's a department that assists families in administering federal state and institutional funds that help on your students education we go over all resources that are available to your student based upon your individual situations whether it be for a semester a year or for the next three to four years we also some schools have part of institutional monies some bigger than others and they use that in conjunction with federal state funds in order to create a packaging award for eligible students both by need and by Merit financial aid comes from many sources the biggest one being the federal government there's also the individual states New Jersey being one of them the colleges and University as I alluded to have resources as well to help you pay for your child's education and there are also outside sources I'll be speaking about um external scholarships a little later on in the presentation there may be something available in your own backyard if any of you are part of a Civic organization or your employer may offer some sort of tuition remission program that's something to look into starting now financial aid can be broken down into four basic types the first two are Gift Aid which are grants that are awarded based on financial need based on Federal and State formulas grants do not have to be repaid nor do scholarships which are based on Merit more so than need Merit can be academic could be based on Talent such as art Athletics or or Community activity of that student in addition to Grants and scholarships and your own resources some families may need to consider borrowing money to help pay for their education the federal government state of New Jersey and many private lenders offer some sort of loan assistance to help pay for your child's education I'll speak to about a couple of loan programs later in the presentation in addition to loans and grants if necessary the concept of paying your way through college is not dead many students um throughout the year actually work on campus or near campus in administrative and academic departments through hourly hourly wages to pay for part of their education through federal or institutional work study programs if you've ever navigated or if your student has navigated a College's website including emmissions our suggestion is that you navigate to the financial aid site or Admissions and look for something called a net price calculator where if you have your fser information or not you can actually do a calculation to get an estimate of what your student might qualify for from federal state and even institutional assistance to pay for your students direct cost direct cost being tuition and fees and room and board if they're planning to pay to live on campus if you use the net price calculator NPC will'll be based on full-time tuition rates for whichever College um your students thinking of attending I want to describe briefly some of the federal programs for which a student might qualify based on need the most basic one is the Federal Grant used to be called the basic Educational Opportunity Grant the awards vary depending upon the fam's strength or their ability to pay for the child's education and it's based on a federal formula that's established by Congress the maximum award for the current year 20242 is $739 for those students of the highest need another Federal grant that may be available at the students campus is Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grant seog depending on how much school's been allocated from the federal government they can award up to $44,000 per year for undergraduate students some schools also participate in What's called the teach grant program if there are any aspiring aspiring teachers your student um during their junior or senior year they may qualify for for a grant of up to $3,700 per year under the condition that after they graduate or that within 8 years after they graduate from college that they teach and in certain areas in certain fields for a minimum of three to four years depending upon what's on the the written agreement these are federal grants and there are also some grants from the state of New Jersey might be a little hard to read um it's a little hard for me too but I'm going to go through each Grant in a moment to qualify for any state grants or scholarships the student would first and foremost have to complete the faf Serv for some students they may have to complete an alternative application which I'll speak about later on now the flagship Grant from the state of New Jersey is tuition Aid Grant or tag to qualify for tag in addition to financial need which I alluded to earlier the student has to file a FSA or for certain students the New Jersey alternative financial aid application there's a citizenship requirement student has to be a US citizen or what's called an eligible non-citizen or you're classified as a New Jersey dreamer the student has to be a resident of this state at least one year prior to the beginning of that upcoming semester to qualify for tag or other state programs with with a few exceptions the student has to be enrolled at least full-time for semester based College usually that's 12 or more credits in an eligible degree program in addition to that the student has to meet the state's deadlines as far as fafs of filing if they have to provide additional documents they have to adhere to those deadlines in a timely manner now as I said before some State programs are Avail available for full fulltime students there are also part-time awards for New Jersey residents if your student is starting at the County College level there's a part-time tag and also the Community College Opportunity Grant Seco which I'll top of that a few minutes and also eof speaking of which the educational opportunity fund it's not a financial aid program per se but it does offer financial assistance to students during the admissions um process are determined to demonstrate educational and economically disadvantage and that's determined again during the admissions process for more information about eof if you or if you know somebody who might qualify for that program many colleges have a standalone eof office who specialize in the financial and also the academic assistance that eof program offers to its students so that they can obtain their col education another program from state of New Jersey is the governor's Urban scholarship or Gus if your student is within the top 5% of their graduating class at the end of their junior or senior year they could qualify for up to $1,000 from Governor's Urban scholarship they attain at least a 3.0 GPA at the end of their junior year and if they reside in one of the designated municipalities uh Warren is not one of them but if um a student is at resident of one of one of the nearby um one of the um municipalities listed they may qualify for Governor's Urban scholarship going back to County College if your student wants to start at the County College level state of New Jersey also offers NJ Stars for students who rank in the top 15% of their class at either the end of their junior or their senior year to qualify for renewal of tag excuse me NJ Stars student has to maintain a grade point average of 3.0 or higher while they're enrolled at their Community College and they're eligible for up to five semesters of full-time tuition from the NJ Stars program if the student receives NJ Stars at the County College level and then transfers to a private or public institution in New Jersey in a four-year degree program there's a sister program called NJ Stars 2 where eligible students can receive up to $2,500 per year for up to two years for families whose taxable income is less than $250,000 and to maintain eligibility for NJ star two at the Junior and senior level the student would have to graduate with at least a 3.25 excuse me maintain a 3.25 grade point average for students entering County colleges or vocational institutions within the state of New Jersey there's another another program available called NJ gives available to women and minority students which pays up to $2,000 for the specific program some of which are listed on the slide construction supervision solar energy or even architectural engineering technology there's a separate application on the hea website which I'll allude to a little later on I spoke earlier about the ccog college um County College Opportunity Grant that started in New Jersey about 5 six seven years ago maybe 10 years ago within the last 3 to four years New Jersey opens it do to additional funding for students at the junior senior level in a four-year College again for the ccog the student will qualify for full tuition fees at their their local Community College tuition fees minus any federal state grants for which they receive if their family's income is $65,000 or less now ccog and another program which I'm going to talk about in a minute also have three tier programs so tier one the family's income is less than 65,000 they're fully covered for tuition and fees tier two the fames adjusted gross income is between 65,000 And1 and 80,000 ccog will pay for one half of the ma the maximum w at the County College and for families between 80,000 one to $100,000 ccog will pay for onethird of the maximum a at the County College at the junior or senior level at a public institution in New Jersey whether the student transfers or starts um during the freshman year at the War year Institution New Jersey also has the Garden State guarantee which also has three tiers for a families again whose income is $65,000 or less they're fully covered by GSG for full-time enrollment minus any federal or state grants for which they qualify tier two will um will pay up to up to $7,500 excuse me me the family would pay no more than $7,500 per year and GSG would pay the difference for incomes between 651 and $80,000 for families with incomes over 80,000 but no more than 100,000 that's tier three GSG will make sure that you don't pay more than $10,000 in approved tuition and fees I said for this and other programs you the student would have to be enrolled full-time for this program and make satisfactory academic progress and GSG just like ccog is available at public fouryear institutions within New Jersey some schools also participate in a 30 3+1 degree completion program which is a collaboration between a County College and a four-year public College within New Jersey basically during the student completes two years at the public two-year College then transfer it's to a four-year public College in New Jersey there are assess tuition fees based on the County College amount during their third year and then during the fourth year they're charg the the full amount based on the four-year colleges tuition and fees I mentioned before some families may need to consider borrowing money if they don't have enough res resources Grant scholarships or their own money to pay for their expenses think of this as an investment toward their toward your education some of you in the audience may have borrowed so you can speak on that or you may have know somebody who's who's borrowed Federal Direct Loan to pay for their education when you the student receive any Aid offer from your college it may include a loan offer of up to $5,500 from the Federal Direct Loan program of which 3,500 is subsidized meaning you're not paying any interest while you're in school remember the loan is just an offer you can choose to decline it or request a lesser amount if you have other resources which be great otherwise this loan is available now if you've done your research families you know that $5,500 in most cases is not going to cut as far as paying all their tuition so after you've looked at other resources there may be supplemental loans for which you the parent can consider borrowing on the student's behalf or the student can borrow if if they have good credit if they don't have good credit they might need a co-borrower one such program if you look to your far right is the federal plus loan parent loan for undergraduate students if you mom or dad decide to borrow some monies or maximum Monies to help pay for your child's education this loan is available at the federal level I'll give you a couple of websites at the end um including student a.gov where you'll complete the FAFSA or if you the parent decide to apply for a plus loan you can also log in at student.gov to complete that process state of New Jersey as I mentioned a little earlier also offers a loan program called the NJ class loan which is available at fixed and variable rates depending upon your APR and those are the federal and state programs the best thing to do is to check with the individual colleges and universities to find out what supplemental what institutional programs they have in order to supplement the existing existing Awards so now I'm going to jump into the application process the biggest one of course would be completing the FAFSA at student a.gov I'll talk a little bit about CSS profile and then for any dreamer students there may be the New Jersey alternative application before we get into the FAFSA some institutions private institutions mainly in New England may require students to complete the CSS profile in addition to the FAFSA because depending on upon the school which may have large amounts of endowment money they'll use a slightly different methodology than the federal one to award these institutional grants and scholarships some of the questions on the CSS profile are similar to to the FAFSA and it's customized based upon the college and based upon the programs which is students applying there is a small fee to complete the application um earlier later I'm going to talk about scholarships and scholarship scams um basically you want to avoid um paying any cost to apply for any scholarships most legitimate um agencies are not going to charge a fee I can tell you the CSS profile while they do charge a fee this is a legitimate agency if you need to complete the CSS profile well check with your college or university to find out whether it's required you go to CSS profile. collegeboard.org to begin the process if you have any questions you can contact the customer support center at 8442025776 be considered for federal state and institutional funding the FAFSA has to be completed prior to every school year and usually it's available October 1st prior to this year October 1st being next week however there have been some changes in the FAFSA starting this this current year and because of that the Department of Education is actually opening the FAA process to a limited number of students at limited institutions starting October 1 but for everybody else the department of Ed has indicated that the FAFSA will be available starting December 1st and if you remember nothing else I tell you remember this website student.gov where you go to complete the FAFSA sign a promisory Noe or apply for a plus and so many other things as you complete the FAFSA both you the parent and you the student under the federal formula the processor will calculate what's called a student aid index which is colleges use to package each student for federal state and institutional assistance the information on the 2025 26 FAFSA in other words for current High School seniors who will be starting College in the fall of 2025 as I said that application will be available December 1st when you're completing income information the information will come from What's called the prior prior year so in this case it'll be tax year 2023 as you're completing the application when I say you I'm talking about the student and the parent everyone would have to consent to release their federal tax information to transfer directly onto the students FAFSA otherwise you will not be considered for federal or state assistance student a.gov is multifunctional in addition to completing the FAFSA you the parent and you the student would go to the site to create what's called an FSA ID which will be your electronic signature to open a FAFSA certify a FAFSA and if you decide to apply for Plus for example you can eign that application at student.gov so even though the FAFSA is not available now something that you the parent or you you the student can do now is go to student.gov and create the FSA ID so that you have your signature ready by the time the faps is available so that' be one less thing that you'll need to complete so who needs to complete the FSA ID or needs to have one of course the student applicant and the parent parent for federal and state purposes would be the students natural or adopted parent so no legal Guardians no foster parents no older siblings has to be the um natural or adopted parent or stepparent if the student is living with um one of their natural parents do both parents if the student lives in a two person household need to apply for an fsaid not necessarily if the student's parents are married and they file a joint tax return in 2023 only one parent is required to eign and provide consent on the FAFSA otherwise if they filed separately or if the parents are not married but living in the same household and you're providing both parents information then each parent would have to contribute separately and provide separate consent with their own FSA ID now there are some parents who do not have a social security number oh let me just backtrack to qualify for federal student aid at the very least the student has to meet certain um citizenship requirements and have a Social Security number that being said a parent might not have a Social Security number in the past that parent would have to print a signature page and mail it to the federal processor but starting this year the federal government has has modified the fsid process so that parent Parents Without Social Security numbers they can also verify their identity and apply for an FSA ID account and be able to contribute an eign their students Fafa I mentioned before transferring information or providing consent to provide your federal tax information onto your students FAFSA now that includes your student even if your student didn't didn't file a tax return in 2023 because they weren't required or didn't work they would still when they log in need to provide consent to transfer the FTI onto the FAFSA and by them not filing the FTI would actually be blank but nevertheless the student needs to provide consent likewise for you parent if you or your your spouse or partner did not file a federal tax return in 2023 or were were not required you still need to provide consent as you're completing the FAFSA and again if the parents are married and file a tax return in 2023 only one parent is required to file it or to sign the FAFSA as you're completing the fafs set both the student and the parent section this is what you can expect to see when you're asked to provide consent in order to complete the FAFSA process there was a time like a year ago where the student and the parent would pretty much have to be in the same same session order to complete this the FAFSA but starting this year students and parents can actually log in on separate browsers on separate sessions to to begin the process and provide consent and provide their individual information basically the student would start the section invite the parent or parents once they're done the parent can then log in from wherever and provide their consent and their information will be linked to their students faic as I mentioned before for federal student a the student has to have a valid social security number they have to be accepted or enrolled for at an eligible program of study at a eligible college or university so as your students completing the FAFSA one of the questions they're asked is whether or not um they've completed high school or they they will have completed High School make sure they do not check none of the above because by checking none of the above that disqualifies them from receiving any federal or state assistance if they anticipate graduating or having a high school diploma or the equivalent by the beginning of fall of 20125 make sure they select high school diploma or GED or whatever the case may be as I said before the student has to be in an eligible degree or certificate program there are also citizenship requirements I spoke about the student has to be a US citizen Natural Born or naturalized or what's called an eligible non-citizen which includes permanent residents refugees paroles ores and other individuals now you notice I did not include dreamers or undocumented students they wouldn't qualify as um eligible for federal student aid nor can they complete the faf set however some states will allow students to apply for State funds even if they're not an eligible non-citizen but they are a dreamer in that particular State and New Jersey is one of those States so if you or if you know of somebody who qualifies as a New Jersey dreamer the student they'll be asked to complete the New Jersey alternative financial aid application for State funding and later on I'll give you the website in order to complete that application what you see here is a summary of what the student and the parent can expect as their completing the faf I'm surprised they fit it all on one one screen but the first section would be the students demographic information after they've created their FSA ID some of their in their identifiers name social security number date of birth will be autop populated few things that they'll have to enter manually including their college plans for the upcoming year whether or not they will have a high school diploma make sure they check yes they the student will have to provide consent again even if they didn't file a 2023 tax return they need to provide consent if there are any circumstances that need to be addressed for example for some reason the parent is unable to provide information or is unwilling to provide information that needs to be addressed on this application parents when you log in you'll be providing your identifying information maybe one or two of you actually logging in keep that in mind as I said before when you get to the income section you will need to provide consent to transfer the federal tax information onto your students FAA now there are some areas or some items that you'll have to enter manually the tax status a Jus GRS income tax paid and other items will be transferred manually or automatically from the IRS you'll need to manually enter asset items such as how much you have in savings and checking how much you have in certain Investments or if you own a business you need to report the net value of that business when you get to that section also if you the parent or one of the parents receive child support that will be included as an asset in the asset section so be prepared for that once you the student and you the parent have signed in provided consent and submitted your your respective information this is what this is what you're going to shoot for um the FAFSA submission summary indicating that your fast has been processed and the information has been sent to the college or colleges that you listed on the application on that summary it'll also give you an estimate of how much you might qualify for from the Federal pel Grant and also Federal Direct Loans or even work study that information is going to be forwarded to your home state New Jersey and also to the college or colleges that you listed on the FAFSA you can actually list up to 20 colleges and universities to which you were want to send the information and students no you don't necessarily have to be accepted to a particular College in order to list it on the FAFSA so if you're applying example to ruter but you haven't received an offer of admission yet you can list ruter and when ruter receives the information your information will be in suspense until you've been offered admission or you accept admission at that point they'll have the faasa data and they'll be able to proceed and determine your eligibility from there so keep that in mind for New Jersey residents after you've completed the FAFSA the information as I said goes to the state of New Jersey you the student will be asked to create a separate account from the federal government at njfams does.org that's where you'll view your eligibility for tuition a grant you'll also see a to-do list and if you're selected for State verification for example if you need to provide additional documents it will be available on that portal after you create that separate user ID and password and this is just for the student not the pair a minute ago I mentioned something about verification some students are selected for a process from the federal government or even the state government to verify the information that you reported on the FAFSA is accurate information including tax information and even family size now for the most part if you're providing consent um to transfer your federal tax information onto the FAFSA that part has already been verified you may need to provide something else to the college or their third party servicer such as um completing a form listing your family members to make sure that the number on the form list um matches the number that you reported on the fa set or you may need to verify something else such as citizenship so from this point forward if there are any students or the call or parents passes on to your student all email correspondents from the colleges from Department of Education the state of New Jersey they're going to be addressed to the student not to the parents of but to the student now at the college level um you may also be asked to sign a fura release once the student is enrolled to college but that's a um separate discussion for financial aid purposes everything is going to be directed to the students so make sure that your student reads all their information and responds in a timely manner by not responding or delaying the process it could delay the process and also um risk forfeiting their federal or state Grant eligibility for which they might have qualified New Jersey dreamers as I said before you wouldn't complete the Fafa but you would complete the New Jersey alternative financial aid application to qualify as a New Jersey dreamer for State Grant purposes the student will have to have attended at least three years and graduated from a New Jersey high school and meet other requirements for state aid the application the um New Jersey alternative financial aid application is available again at njfams does.org and that user ID or password that I mentioned you have to create that's where you go to complete it for everybody this is a screenshot of what you can expect to see when you go to haa.org or njfams does.org to create a user ID and password or to log in in general to check your state Grant eligibility or to follow up with any additional documents that you have to provide here's another screenshot of the to-do list of anything that you you the student would need to provide in order for the state of New Jersey to determine your eligibility for federal excuse me for State assistance so make sure you the student are reading everything carefully if you receive anything from heaa that's not spam that's coming from the state of New Jersey and that's determining your state aid eligibility so please do not ignore it or check your check your spam box periodically let me take a deep breath so we've spoken about Aid programs and the application process I want to spend a few minutes talking about the cost of attendance earlier I mentioned net price calculator which gives part of your cost of attendance tuition ran board that's only part of the story students parents make sure that every year that you're budgeting for for an entire year or at least a semester at the very least colleges will construct a standard budget or cost of attendance based upon the average tuition fees and housing costs for students at their institution now the cost of attendance in addition to tuition room and board excuse me tuition housing and food would include a budget for books and supplies those can be quite expenses Transportation coming back and forth um whether you're living on campus or or if you're commuting daily to the campus for any any expenses related to your education miscellaneous any loan fees at some point if you the student decide to study abroad uh one semester or enroll in a co-op or residency program during your junior senior year probably you need to incorporate those costs into your cost of attendance if any student has a disability and there are expenses such as Transportation or otherwise related to your ability to pursue a higher education make sure that you contact your financial aid office so that those additional costs are factored into your cost of attendance when they're constructing your package for each year earlier I spoke about the saai or the student aid index which is what colleges use to determine eligibility for need-based assistance and also that's what colleges use to determine Federal pel grant eligibility generally after you complete the officer or made Corrections you'll know right off the bat whether or not you qualify for a PBR and approximately how much you qualify for based upon your financial need not every student or every family is going to fall into the same category if there are two families of equal wealth or equal incomes it's very it's quite conceivable that one family may qualify for more need BAS assistance that another but wait if they're equal why are we getting more because one of the factors when the federal government and the state government um formalizes everything or develops their formula it's based on not only income but also the number of persons in the household and some some degree assets so that can be consideration that's why in this example we're giving the Jones and the Smiths um have identical incomes but different family sizes that's why they have different Pelin eligibilities because even though they have more income one family has higher need because they have more well in this case more malous to feed the S is universal no matter what type of institution you attend that being said your eligibility for need-based assistance may vary depending upon what type of institution that you attend for a particular year a particular semester for example at a community college where tuition fees are generally much lower than at at a four-year public institution this family I believe the um Smiths U may not qualify for any need-based assistance they might be offered an unsubsidized loan but no pelant and no subsidized loans on the other hand a family with the same s but they attend a public four-year institution where the price tag is a little higher for tuition and fees they may actually have unmet need that they did not have at the community college level because of the higher cost same thing if they're attending a private institution as opposed to a fouryear public institution where the price where the tuition price tag is slightly higher than that now that's not to say that the more an institution cost the the more unaffordable is because remember depending upon the institution and what they have they may be able to to level level the amount to make your tuition fees or your contributions equivalent to what it might be at a forear institution as I mentioned before the fafo will be available for 2526 starting December 1st of this year year that's for current seniors so for current Juniors all these states that I'm giving you now just Advance everything by one year so for the 2026 27 school year mark your calendars for October 1st 2025 or maybe even December 1st 2025 to complete the 2627 FAFSA for your students um freshman year being fall of 2026 after the student complete sa FAFSA and they've been admitted to colle University that's when the colleges start sending out eight offers which will outline your eligibility for federal state and institutional assistance whatever the school is aware of that usually comes out early in the calendar year after you filed the FAFSA or definitely after you've been admitted to the colleger university starting in June or July hopefully you've been admitted you've made your decision and you received an aid offer that's when you receive your bill from the BOS office or the student Accounting Office whatever the school calls it it'll have a summary of your tuition room and board for that particular semester false semester and if you qualifi for any financial aid um need-based or non- need-based that will be subtracted from your direct cost and then if there is still a balance then you the student yes the student would need to make arrangements to finance that balance so families if there is a balance after after you've received financial aid and you're unable to pay it within once one semester most if not all colleges have a payment plan option for which you can enroll at a nominal fee usually about $40 where you can pay the students unpaid balance in installments of 3 to 5 months for a particular semester that'll be around June July or even August well August is when bills are due and then the semester begins in August or September I think we're almost done no we're not but just a few things to um keep in mind remember mark your calendar December 1st for any seniors to complete the FAFSA for 252 when it becomes available make sure if your school requires you to complete the CSS profile that you do that as well make sure that you the student are adhering to any deadlines from the federal government the state government and also from your particular college or university regarding financial aid you can still share the information with your parents but all the information is going to you the student and again as a reminder for juniors on the call your senior years is just around the corner and then so is your your college year so do not procrastinate make sure a year from now that you're getting ready to complete the 26 27 fafs so when the time comes Mr Wilson this might be a good chance please to break it up a little bit I'll throw a question at that's was posted initially earlier on in the presentation uh I know that the counselor spoke to this a bit last week during their presentation about the college application process as it relates to early decision however with the fact that many schools we were giving their early decision responses in December and January even though um the FAFSA won't be able to be submitted until December how do you how do you advise the you know the students on the call that might be getting decisions back early decision back you know around the same time that they'll just be submitting to FAA how does the how do how do the colleges look at that and and do you have any insight in that from from your from your where you sit yeah we did have some insight this um this first year of the um of the new FAFSA because of the delay um not not certain about early decisions but definitely um um National decision day was actually pushed back from May 1st to June first in in many cases best thing to do is check with that individual college or university I mean in general um I mean you need to work out the finances but if a college is is offering you admission to their institution and they have a program that you the student are interested in definitely need to consider it and then follow up once once the FAFSA is available schools safe to say schools know that you know with the FAFSA being delayed again this year that they're you know students are going to have to have that information before they can make an informed decision on on whether they could afford the school I know for early decision there is an element of that where they speak to the commitment piece if they accept the the offer and they have to resend their their applications to other schools or or not apply to other schools depending on that but but I do know that uh you know it's it's a bit it's been the last two years a bit stressful for students and families having to make these decisions with delays with getting back or or colleges being able to process their financial aid information yeah and that was a um that was a common concern among among families during during our spring open open house and scholarship reception events um this past year um students were admitted they had no idea what their their financing was going to be from from need-based assistance the only thing we could do is encourage fafs of filing and tell them about the programs for which they might be eligible and also refer them to the to the calculators for a guesstimate of their eligibility I mean it's not it's not the actual amount but it's and colleges are take are taking that to consideration as they're planning these events and as they're aware of the um the FAFSA environment that's a that's a great reminder though the the the calculator at least to get an estimate to get an idea that would be helpful to families so Jo I'm not sure if you hit on that or you already hit on that but just having the resource for that I know a lot of colleges have that posted links in their own financial aid uh postings on their individual College websites but that's an important Resource as well gotta all right any other questions I I'll save the rest for for at the end here all right I mentioned before eight offers this may be one format that you'll see from the from the particular College this is the state of New Jersey version there's also a federal shopping sheet or college Finance ing plan which has a actually a similar format to this which separates your direct cost the students direct cost from whatever they qualify for [Music] from Grants and scholarships to come up with the net price again you have the net price calculator students and parents that you can um start calculating and guesstimating your eligibility now but once the school has your actual FAA data it'll actually be summarized on a sheet like this very similar to this and if there is a gap there will be other options on the on the state shopping sheet or the federal shopping sheet telling you about your um options for work study or even Federal loans if you choose to do so I mentioned before scholarships that are available from the colleges and universities and also within your own backyard if you're part of any Civic organization El club or whatever look into those opportunities that are available to you or any church every every dollar helps once you the stop student are in college as I mentioned before there are job opportunities through work study or other employment programs another Employment Program where you wouldn't receive a paycheck per se is something called um the resident assistance program or ra if if you live on campus in a residence hall there are individuals called Ras who assist students um acclimate to the college experience and answer any questions they have regarding um academic Assistance or Residence Life and they're located in basically every building as compensation for being an RA They will receive a stien for their um for their room and board with the housing and meals I should say so that's something you the student might want to look into in your sophomore subsequent year if your school has ra opportunities I also mentioned before um co-ops or internships um in a future semester if you're sophomore junior or even senior year make sure you include those costs into your um to your budget or your cost of attendance now for scholarship searches check with the college or university uh you can also go old school go to the local library check with your your high school they also have resources as far as um what's available from various scholarship agencies and something that was not available to myself or probably to many parents when we were in high school the worldwide web there's so many opportunities from from the state and companies such as web.com where students can literally just provide information and receive information not scholarships but information about scholarships for which they may qualify and they can apply so that being said students and parents as you're navigating all these sites be wary if any if you receive any unsolicited phone calls emails from individuals or agencies offering to find Financial ass assistance and they charge you a small fee or if they ask for um your bank um pin or your routing number or anything of that nature that should be a red flag most legitimate scholarship agencies are not going to charge you a fee again the only exception would be the CSS profile through the um college board and something that many of your parents may have already invested invested in some 16 17 years ago um College savings once your child was born or adopted um the NJ best program if you've invested in the um program here in the state of New Jersey hopefully you've invested wisely and that money has grown exponentially in addition to the that funding from the savings plan the student may also qualify for a scholarship one time for between $2,000 and $6,000 per year so you should look into that as you're investing or go directly to hea's website for more information regarding NJ best if you know of somebody who's about to become a parent or has a young child um it will behoove them to invest in their child's education at this point it's well worth the investment in addition to the FAA being available there are resources to help families to complete the FAFSA in case you have any questions colleges and universities they may have FAFSA workshops virtually or on campus the state of New Jersey they have webinars throughout the year after the FAFSA becomes available so again Check hea's website for any dates now the webinars for hea are available both in English and in Spanish so check that website periodically and also check College's website periodically and there are Publications available from the state of New Jersey for information regarding NJ class regarding tag ccog Garden State guarantee and the other state programs that I mentioned and some more that may be available that I didn't mention so remember you remember nothing else remember these two website student a.gov and haa.org for New Jersey residents any questions regarding state aid or the financial aid process we encourage you the parent or you the student to contact hea's customer care service um during weekdays and also go on to their website for more information regarding the state programs they can also answer questions regarding federal aid to some degree and that concludes the presentation we'll open The Floodgate to any questions or comments that families may have this time thank you Mr Wilson I know it's a lot of information while we're waiting for questions to come in but it's immensely valuable as I mentioned I hear it every year and I always pick up something new a new tip especially a father or three myself uh definitely can pick up some tips along the way here um I as I mentioned for this portion going forward if there are questions that come in that are U anybody's looking to ask that may be more individualized we could always follow up with you uh but if you do have something for the general good we can certainly answer it now um we did answer any of the questions that were already in the chat there was one most recent question about how to create the FSA ID um I'm not sure if you have any specific tips on that Mr Wilson but I did I did found a resource that was posted on student a.gov that I I shared for uh anybody who has questions about how to create an FSA ID any any challenges with that you've you've encountered over the the years um no well again the the biggest challenge this past year has been um parents without Social Security numbers at the beginning of the f um um process you recall about a year ago um we were insured pretty much that um it would be a seamless process for those families but there are a few hiccups along the way but um for the most part I believe if um processor has um fixed that issue so the resource that you provided should be sufficient other than that it's pretty straightforward creating an fsaid um whether or not you have a Social Security number and again the student does have to have a Social Security number in order to apply for an FSA ID and I know there are Alternative forms in for the state of New Jersey for those students that do not have uh that information right there is a way to to apply still to the dreams act and some other other ways on the state websites correction yeah yeah the um New Jersey alternative application for New Jersey dreamers yep all right and definitely we have again we have these links as part of our packets and information that we post as well but it'll be great for anybody who needs this information anything posted these links we'll make sure we WE Post both the actual PowerPoint so that those hyperlinks are active as well as the recording all right so thank you for your time uh I know that the school counselers are on the call here as well and again last week they had a chance to go over the college process just a general reminder for every any student who's on here who is a class of 2025 or parent we do ask that you reach out and schedule a meeting with your your child counselor uh at least 2 weeks before any application deadlines to make sure that they have everything needed to make sure they could help you with the submission and finalize uh to get them out by your child's deadlines for for college uh hopefully there's also a number of parents uh and and students on the call here for the class of 2 26 and and and possibly even younger because again it's good information to hear so that when you're ready for the process you can you can hit it hit the ground running uh hopefully next year uh the fast we'll be ready for the traditional October 1 deadline but I guess we'll we'll have to wait and see on that Mr Wilson right all right thank you everybody again December 1st is the is the start of with this the FAA will be open and uh I do have Mr Wilson's contact if uh you're open to any any follow-up individual questions that we may get over the next couple days would you be open to that sure okay great thanks everybody and thanks again Mr Wilson and the counselors for being on the call and for all the parents to take the time to be here tonight I hopefully you found it valuable okay have a good night everybody thank you