Major changes and improvements are coming to the 2024 – 2025 Free Application for Federal Student Aid, or FAFSA, form, creating delays at the federal level. As a result, the new FAFSA form will not be available until mid to late December. Associate Vice President of Student Financial Planning at Monmouth College Jayne Schreck explains how this impacts students planning for college:
“For our current students, it is not going to impact them very much, but for families who are sending off a student to college next year, who are seniors in high school right now, they are really anxious to learn about the cost of college and the financial aid that might be available to them to help cover that cost. This year we will condense that timeline a little bit and they are not going to have their financial aid packages until late January, early February for most schools and then they have fewer months to make those final decisions and make plans accordingly.”
To prepare for the launch of the new FAFSA form in December, Schreck reports steps that should be taken now:
“One of the first steps immediately that needs to happen is that in order for a family to submit the FAFSA, they have to have an electronic signature that is recognized by the federal governement as their legal signature. It is called an FSA ID number and they can go ahead and apply for that now on the website, studentaid.gov. You create an account or create and FSA ID and both the student and their parent or if the student is married, the student and their spouse, will need an FSA ID.”
For more explanation on the changes coming to the FAFSA form, listen to Schreck’s podcast below:
Launch of the 2024–25 FAFSA® Form | Federal Student Aid
Apply for Financial Aid • Office of Student Financial Planning • Monmouth College
