How Hoosier students and families can navigate FAFSA
INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — Navigating the Free Application for Student Aid (FAFSA), along with scholarships and loans can be difficult for students and families, especially if it’s their first time applying.
Phil Schuman is the executive director for financial wellness and education at Indiana University. He’s been working for the university for nearly 11 years and back in 2012, created the Office of Financial Literacy to help students better focus on how they can prepare financially for college. Schuman said the university wanted students to equipped to manage their finances and navigate any challenges while they’re in school, since money can be a top reason for students to drop out or not finish degrees.
Schuman encourages families and students for all economic backgrounds to fill out FAFSA, even if they don’t think they’re going to qualify for any type of aid.
“As a just in case. We see a lot of family’s who come in and say ‘Oh, we didn’t fill it out because we didn’t think we’d be eligible for aid.’ You never know so you should fill it out, because it’s the most important step somebody’s going to take in determining how their college experience is going to get financed,” Schuman said.
He said FAFSA allows a university to understand each student’s financial situations and helps them determine what they’re going to qualify for.
An aid package is what FAFSA will give to a student after filtering out personal information, applied scholarships, grants and assessing needed loan amounts.
Schuman reminds students and families that just because FAFSA generates a certain amount of loans, it does not mean that one is obligated to take them out.
“Let’s just you were offered $5,000 in federal student loans. It’s not a binary system. It doesn’t mean you have take $5,000 or $0. In the system, when you’re accepting your aid offer, you say you only want to borrow $2,000,” said Schuman, “The most important thing is if you have questions about FAFSA reach out. It’s not the most user friendly. Contact the financial aid offices for the schools you want to attend. Even if you feel intimidated by the process, their job is to help out with those conversations and make it easy.”
Every year INvestED Indiana does over 700 events. This year they’re set to do 800 events with over 200 schools across Indiana distributing their “2022-2023 Education Planning” guide.
Each year they help over 10,000 individual Hoosiers apply for FAFSA.
“We work with schools across the state and any family that calls us to get them the answers, get them the help they need,” said Bill Wozniak with the organization, “After you file sometimes there’s a mistake or a correction has to be made and that’s okay, but if you miss a deadline for the school, or the state or the federal government whatever that deadline is, often times your completely out for that financial aid.”