MOCAN – Missouri College & Career Attainment Network

Increasing equity in college and career for Missouri students

Affordability

10 Things to Know About the 2024-2025 FAFSA

by

The 2024-2025 FAFSA will bring big changes that will impact your seniors and their families as they begin the application this fall. Here’s what you need to know as you’re planning for the upcoming school year:

  1. The 2024-2025 FAFSA form will be available December 2023. The significant changes to the form have delayed its opening from the usual October 1. No specific date has been announced yet. In future years, the form open date will return to October 1.
  2. The Federal Student Aid (FSA) ID will be more important than ever. Students and parents are highly encouraged to create an FSA before beginning the form (including parents without a social security number). FSA IDs can no longer be created and used on the same day.
  3. Questions are different. There have been questions removed, added, and reordered. The questions on the 24-25 form are more aligned with the federal income tax form.
  4. The Parent included on the form could be different. For dependent students with separated parents, the parent who provides the most financial support must be included on the upcoming FAFSA form. In previous years, the form required that the custodial parent’s information was included. In most cases this will be the same parent but could differ for others.
  5. There are significant terminology changes. All of us will be challenged with changing the terminology we have used when referring to the FAFSA. Our colleagues at NCAN have compiled all the New Jargon we must all learn to use.
  6. Direct Data Exchange (DDX) will replace IRS Data Retrieval Tool. The IRS Data Retrieval Tool is being retired and replaced by Direct Data Exchange. With DDX, IRS will share federal tax information with the Department of Education and colleges listed on the FAFSA. Every contributor on the form is required to consent to DDX or the student will not be eligible for federal financial aid.
  7. Student Aid Index (SAI) will replace Expected Family Contribution (EFC). The Student Aid Index (SAI) will be used to determine eligibility for financial aid. The SAI can be as low as -1,500. The switch in the formula is expected to increase the number of students eligible for the Pell Grant.
  8. Financial aid eligibility could decrease with SAI formula. While it is expected that there will be an increase in the number of students eligible for the Pell Grant, there will be some students who see a decrease in financial aid eligibility. This likely due to the SAI formula not including siblings in college and requires the net worth of all businesses and farms, regardless of size. More to come about net worth!
  9. Fall preparation is key! Fall is a great time to prepare students and parents for what’s to come. Host FSA ID Creation Events and make them aware of the information required for the FAFSA. Missouri’s priority deadline for state aid is February 1st with a tentative filing deadline of April 1.
  10. Support will be available. MOCAN and its partners are offering in-person and virtual workshops this fall and spring. All Fall events are currently posted on our Events Page. NCAN, uAspire, and Federal Student Aid will all have resources available for professionals as well as students and their families.

MOCAN’s Response: Supreme Court Rejects Student Loan Forgiveness

by

If we needed a reminder that the higher education system is inequitable and in need of reform, the U.S. Supreme Court delivered it this week. Today’s decision rejecting President Biden’s student loan forgiveness plan is insult to the injury caused by yesterday’s decision effectively ending affirmative action in college admissions.

Approximately 40 million people would have benefitted from student loan forgiveness. People who are struggling financially, postponing investments like buying a house or saving for retirement. Disproportionately, these are also people of color.

Today’s ruling underscores the need to prioritize making postsecondary education affordable for low-income students and BILPOC students, those who can most benefit from the economic stability and social mobility a degree brings.

A Missouri college graduate with a Bachelor’s degree earns about $27,000 more per year than a peer with a high school diploma. That same student, however, borrows an average of $24,000 to pay for that Bachelor’s degree. Students need and deserve a path to an affordable college degree, one that doesn’t come with substantial debt.  

Higher Education = Higher Earnings

by

How do we make postsecondary education more affordable for Missouri students?

In February, MOCAN convened colleagues in its Network of Networks to develop priorities for increasing affordability for Missouri students. This month we are convening school counselors, college/career advisers, higher education professionals, scholarship providers, and partners to talk about affordability and share our draft plan. We know implementing the strategies will require all of us working together!

Plan components include:

  1. Ensuring Missouri is ready for the new Better FAFSA – coming this December!
  2. Helping students identify a best financial fit earlier in the postsecondary planning process, starting in 9th grade
  3. Preventing financial aid award displacement so students benefit fully from the scholarships they receive
  4. Educating scholarship providers and donors on student financial aid gaps so they can better meet student needs
  5. Promoting the value of postsecondary education as an investment in your future self

A postsecondary credential is the surest path to economic mobility, but first we need to make sure Missouri students can afford it. We are honored to work alongside our partners!

Award Letters Are Arriving, Do Your Students Understand Them?

by

Bill DeBaun, Senior Director of Data and Strategic Initiatives

With College Decision Day rapidly approaching, students might need help navigating financial aid offers. These offers, often referred to as award letters, should spark conversations about college affordability between students, families, and the professionals who help them along their postsecondary pathways.

While financial aid offers foretell an exciting new next educational step, the offers have a reputation for being overwhelming and confusing. New America and uAspire analyzed over 500 financial aid award letters and found that many of the letters used convoluted jargon, omitted the complete cost of attendance, and left students confused about next steps.

With the right information, understanding and comparing financial aid offers from colleges and universities is a job that students and their families can realistically tackle.

Award letters all contain the same basic components, they typically include information about types of aid offered and an estimated cost of attendance. With that information, students can find the price they will actually pay, or the “net price.”

Broadly, there are four types of aid: scholarships, federal and state grants, work-study, and loans.

  • Scholarships do not have to be repaid. Students should pay attention to whether or not scholarships have yearly requirements, such as maintaining a certain GPA. It is also crucial to know if each scholarship is a one-time award or if it is recurring.
  • Federal and state grants also do not have to be repaid. These include grants like the Pell Grant, the Federal Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grant (FSEOG), and state-specific grants. Eligibility is typically determined by the information students submit on their Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA). Students who receive these grants will have to fill out the FAFSA every academic year to maintain their eligibility.

  • Federal work-study is money that the student earns. These funds might be included in the financial aid offer as just another grant, but work-study dollars are actually earned through part-time employment on- or off-campus. The student will have to apply for work-study positions, and work-study aid is not guaranteed from year to year. Read this awesome post from the Department of Education to learn more the 8 things you should know about federal work-study.
  • Loans have to be repaid with interest. They are either subsidized or unsubsidized. For direct subsidized loans, the U.S. Department of Education pays the interest on these loans while the student is in school and for the six months after they leave school. For direct unsubsidized loans, interest begins accumulating while in school, and the student is responsible for this interest.

When talking to students about loans, stress to them to only take out as much as they need⁠— it’s not necessarily best to take all that is offered. For example, if the student only needs $5,000 for food and housing, but $7,500 is offered, they should only take $5,000. Students may be tempted to have the extra money in college, but they should know that they will eventually have to pay back those loans with interest, which will be far more expensive in the long run.

The award letter should show the itemized offers for the fall, the spring, and their total for the academic year. Encourage students sure to ask themselves these questions when reviewing offers:

  • Will I automatically receive this aid each year?
  • What are the eligibility requirements to continue receiving recurring awards?
  • When do I have to accept or decline these award offers?
  • If loans are offered, do I want to accept them?

Once students have added up how much money a college is offering, they should compare that against the included cost of attendance estimate.

Total Cost of Attendance = Direct Costs + Indirect Costs

  • Direct costs: These are charged to the student by the university and often include tuition, room and board, and fees. This is an estimate of what the student will owe the university.
  • Indirect costs: These are the student’s estimated expenses such as books and supplies, travel, and other personal expenses. Actual year-to-year costs will vary. For instance, the student may choose a less expensive housing option or might have higher travel expenses.

Once students know the financial aid offers and the costs of attendance, it’s time to find the net price if it was not included already. In New America and uAspire’s study on award letters, only 40% included a net price – the remaining out-of-pocket costs.

To calculate the net price, subtract the student’s financial aid total from cost of attendance. This is the amount that the student will actually be responsible for. A few ways to close these gaps include paying with savings or taking out additional loans.

Luckily, there are wonderful resources out there to help students and families crunch the numbers and weigh all of their options. Check out these three free tools:

If, at the end of their calculations, a student finds that their financial aid is still lacking, they might consider writing a financial aid appeal letter to ask the school to potentially grant more scholarships or loan and grant options. SwiftStudent is a great resource which helps students through this process.

When deciding where to enroll, the bottom dollar is not the only thing to consider. Encourage students to research potential schools’ graduation and retention rates, along with how their net price stacks up against other students’. The Department of Education’s College Scorecard is a wonderful resource to make those comparisons.

If students and families feel that they’ve hit a wall, encourage them to reach out to a college’s office of financial aid to get answers.

Running the numbers, doing the research, and comparing schools is not the most exciting work, but it is well worth the excitement that accompanies the final product: making a decision about the future that students and their families can feel good about.

April is Scholarship Deadline Month!

by

April is deadline month on My Scholarship Central. 108 scholarships are currently open and accepting applications. 75% of those scholarships are due in April, with many deadlines on April 15 and 17. There are some scholarships that are open in May and June, but very few are open through the summer. We know it is a busy time of year with prom, finals, AP exams, and graduation. However, we want students to have enough money to go to their best fit school. Don’t wait until after graduation – now is the time to apply for scholarships! Visit myscholarshipcentral.org/apply to start your application.

This year will be My Scholarship Central’s biggest year – in terms of student users, awards made, and total dollars awarded through the site. There are already more than 10,800 students applying for scholarships this year. Students who complete multiple, high quality scholarship applications ahead of the deadline see the best success on My Scholarship Central. You don’t have to be the valedictorian or class president – you just need to take the time to carefully and throughfully apply to scholarships you qualify for.

We are always looking for more scholarship organizations to partner with! If you know a scholarship from a non-profit organization for students from Missouri or the surrounding metros, we would love to talk. Email Kaitlyn Venta at [email protected].

Scholarship Providers in Kansas City

Hispanic Heritage Month Spotlight: Hispanic Development Fund

by

As Hispanic Heritage Month comes to an end, MOCAN is highlighting a program doing great work with Hispanic and Latinx students in Missouri, the Hispanic Development Fund. The mission of the Greater Kansas City Hispanic Development Fund is to improve the quality of life of Latino families in Greater Kansas City by engaging the Latino community in Philanthropy to build stronger communities through grantmaking and scholarship support.

In 1983, the Hall Family Foundation approached leaders in Kansas City’s Hispanic community with an innovative idea for them to control philanthropic resources for their own community. The concept had never been attempted before: to give leaders in the Kansas City Latino community resources for them to decide philanthropic priorities in their own community. Through the leadership of Tony Salazar and others in the community, the group rose to the challenge of investing the initial funds contributed by the Hall Family Foundation. 

The Hispanic Development Fund, or HDF, soon proved the concept could become a reality. In 1986, the Hall Family Foundation made a pledge to further support the fund by helping create an endowment. Over the ensuing years the HDF leadership through hard work and perseverance continued to raise more endowment funds, many from within the Latino community. In 2006, HDF, as a result of its growth and success, became a regional affiliate of the Greater Kansas City Community Foundation.

In 2022, HDF awarded scholarships to 415 scholars, totaling $900,000 in awards. Their Family College Prep Program annually serves more than 1,000 students through college campus visits, family college night, FAFSA/scholarship workshops, and one-on-one college advising.

What started as an initial investment of $100 going towards 100 students in 1984, has grown to one of the country’s largest Latino focused scholarship funds. With nearly 5,000 alumni across the globe and over $7 million in direct scholarship support provided, the HDF Scholarship Program continues to impact the lives of our students and their families.

John Kearney, Executive Director of HDF, shared a few reasons why supporting Hispanic students with scholarships is important:

  1. Hispanics are the fast growing demographic in the United States and contribute to our economy and communities in so many valuable ways.
  2. Although Hispanic students have made significant increases in college-going rates over the past decade, there is still work to be done in supporting Hispanic students in college completion, especially bachelor degree attainment.
  3. 77% of our 2022 HDF Scholars are first-generation college students who need financial and college-going support.
  4. 15% of our 2022 HDF Scholars are undocumented and in a state like Missouri, need significant financial aid to overcome the barriers to post-secondary education put in place by our state’s legislature.

To learn more about the Hispanic Development Fund, you can visit their website and read their annual report.