Fall into FAFSA and Financial Aid

Student Success Agency — October 2019

One of our awesome students doing a trust fall with his group at our annual summer camp!

With the FAFSA officially opening on October 1 and scholarship and college application deadlines approaching, October is an important month for us to help our students become knowledgable about financial aid! We can support our students and their parents by providing them with the knowledge, resources, and opportunities to submit the FAFSA and understand financial aid.

Don’t Fear the FAFSA!

We know it’s October but FAFSA completion doesn’t need to be scary! Don’t worry, our agents are supporting individual students with financial aid and the FAFSA as we speak!

We know you’re working hard in your school community to get your students and their parents to understand financial aid and the importance of the FAFSA, so here are some additional ways and resources to engage your school community in FAFSA completion:

• Remind students to “Talk to Their Agent” about applying for FAFSA! A lot of agents and students will actually complete this over the phone together while their parents are helping!
• SSA also has a FAFSA specialist (including specialized support for undocumented students) — tell your students to ask their agent for additional support if needed!
• Host a FAFSA or financial aid workshop at your school for students and their parents where you or another educator can be available to help them through the process and provide in-person support. CLICK HERE for information on setting up FAFSA and financial aid nights at your school.
• For equitable access, host a virtual FAFSA workshop or completion event through Facebook or Instagram Live! Parents and students can chime in right from home, the bleachers or ballpark, or even vacation, to ask questions and let you know they’ve completed their application.
• Host a completion challenge for seniors or college level students— everyone loves a good pizza or dance party! You can even post a visual in your school near the entrance or lunchroom as a reminder to students.
• Offer free or low-cost incentives for students who submit the FAFSA like the ones listed HERE.
• Send out social media reminders, and shout out students or groups who have completed their FAFSA! — Shout out to our partners at GEAR UP Nevada for this idea after sharing a picture of their students completing the FAFSA!
• Share online tools like the FAFSA4Caster that estimates eligibility for financial aid- this is great for juniors and seniors when planning finances for college. — Shout out to our partners at GEAR UP Georgia for sharing this with us! Thanks, Randalette!
• Lead a “Lunch and Learn” session for students to provide them with more information about how to apply for the FAFSA. — Shout out to our GEAR UP partners in Burke County for this awesome idea (they even provide cookies to their students! Who doesn’t love free food?!)

Shared from the “For High School Counselors” Facebook page.

• Get creative and make it fun! Send out memes, share funny videos, or even dress up like this counselor did to encourage your students to complete the FAFSA.
• Remind students and parents that if they have everything prepared ahead of time, completion of the FAFSA will only take 30 minutes! Check out THIS LIST and THIS GRAPHIC you can share that includes everything the student will need!

But First, Financial Aid

Financial aid literacy is important for students in all grade levels! It’s important that we prepare our students and their parents for the financial aid process early on so they can be prepared come college application time! There are even plenty of scholarships only open to younger grade levels to get a head start on saving!

CollegeBoard has a website for education professionals all about explaining financial aid. It has resources for explaining financial aid to your school community such as hosting financial aid events, finding local scholarships, and helping families. CLICK HERE for the link to the CollegeBoard Education Professional website!

Also, check out the Financial Aid Toolkit that has tons of resources for supporting students!

SSA Collaboration — FAFSA + Financial Aid Support

Do you have an upcoming FAFSA workshop for your students and their parents? If so let us know so we can have our agents promote this with their students and be ready to support their students through the FAFSA completion process!

Our agents begin discussing college costs and financial aid with their students as soon as they determine their dreams and goals. We have resources for our agents at all grade levels to support our students with financial aid. If you have any local scholarship, financial, or program grant resources you would like our agents to share with your students, feel free to send them at any time!

CLICK HERE to submit an event, scholarship opportunity, resources, or school calendar link for us to share with our agents. *This form can be submitted any time of the year.

Friendly Reminder — SSA Surveys :)

This is just a friendly reminder to please complete the two surveys (20 minutes total) below by Friday, October, 18th. These will help us gather school/program information and goals to create a school/program vision profile for you and our agents to utilize!

1. School/Program and Personal Info Survey (5 minutes)

2. School Vision Alignment Survey (15 minutes)

Thanks to all who have completed these surveys for us!

CONNECT WITH US- SSA Educator Facebook Page

We would love for you to join our SSA Educators Facebook Group HERE.

You can join from your personal, school, or program account, and the page is a space for our incredible educators of SSA to collaborate, innovate, share, and celebrate!

This is a great place to find even more FAFSA and financial aid resources that our other partners are sharing!