How has the FAFSA been for Pittsburgh students so far this year?

When Ron Gilbert went to college, he never had to deal with applying for financial aid. He was a student-athlete at Duquesne University in the ’90s whose knowledge of the financial aid process ended after he committed there.

When his 17-year-old daughter, Camille, started looking for information about securing financial aid, he needed help. That’s how he found himself sitting in Point Breeze on a recent, very chilly Wednesday evening.

The Crossroads Foundation, a Pittsburgh nonprofit that supports educational access, hosted a FAFSA workshop that showed families how to fill out the Free Application for Federal Student Aid. Completing it is an important step in getting money to pay for college.

Aaron Chapman, a college admissions counselor for Crossroads, said it was more important than ever to make sure families are confident in filling out and submitting the form — especially after a tumultuous rollout last year in which he said he was “left with egg on my “face.”

The federal government reviewed the application last year. The renewal meant that the form was released late and riddled with errors.

As a result, colleges were behind in getting financial aid packages handed out, leaving many students struggling to make enrollment decisions. Some chose not to fill in the form at all. In Pennsylvania, 52.5% of the Class of 2024 submitted the FAFSA – a decrease of 9%. from the previous year.

Camille Gilbert was a junior at the time. She saw these challenges play out over social media and in person. One of her friends, who is now in college, was “definitely stressful,” she said.

“I thought, ‘I’m praying for you.'”

Now that it’s her turn, she’s nervous. But this cycle — which began Nov. 21 — is shaping up to be different, according to local higher education advocates, high school staff and university administrators. Where frustration and anxiety once shadowed the FAFSA process, cautious optimism has taken root.

Chapman, for one, hasn’t let any concerns coming into this cycle derail his plan to help families get the most help they can. He has learned that it is best to “roll with the punches” and be prepared to deal with them. Should problems arise, however, he will act as a stress ball for college worries, ready to alleviate them as they arise.

“My goal is to make my families’ and my scholars’ (lives) easier,” he said.

Secondary schools make use of partnerships

For many families at Urban Pathways 6-12 Charter School, Downtown, obtaining financial aid is key to being able to pursue higher education. When it is interrupted, things can become precarious.

Jason Kerr, the college and career coordinator at the school, started his job in August, so he didn’t witness how the last FAFSA cycle affected Urban Pathways’ students. Nevertheless, he entered this year prepared.

Kerr talks to every senior every day in her class about life after graduation. They review the importance of financial support and the options for obtaining it are often shared. Before Thanksgiving, he made sure students had accounts set up so students could easily log into the system when FAFSA opened.

Nearly half of the senior class of 21 students had already started filling out or had filled out the form by Dec. 10, helping out during a school-sponsored FAFSA night. So far, no hiccups have been reported, he said.

“From our perspective, it seems to have gone very well.”

Baldwin High School also held a well-attended financial aid night in November. At both events, the Pennsylvania Higher Education Assistance Agency was represented. The agency was involved in one of the beta testing rounds of the latest FAFSA form, and some students in the state were able to complete a version of it before wide release.

“Students come in with a lot of good questions and really legitimate concerns … They want to set themselves up for success.”

One of the agency’s access partners, Wendy Dunlap, serves as the point of contact for school districts in five contiguous counties. During the beta test round, she found that students and parents filled out the form faster, and “the logic behind the application itself” made more sense than it did last year.

And she is happy about that.

“I think everyone involved in creating access to higher education has always wanted to have an easier application process for students and families.”

Colleges adjust strategies

US Department of Education said on Dec. 12 that it had received more than 1.5 million FAFSA forms and had already begun sending information to colleges so they can begin packaging financial aid offers. By comparison, the department didn’t start doing this in the last cycle until March.

That processing delay hurt LaRoche University’s first-year enrollment this fall, said Chip Weisgerber, vice president of enrollment management. There were 15 fewer first-year students this fall compared to 2023, a significant drop for a university where first-year students typically number around 150.

As we go into this release, LaRoche administrators have made themselves available to prospective students, including at a fall financial aid open house session that attracted more families than the past two years, said LaRoche Director of Financial Aid Robert Clemens.

“Now people are really opening their ears, opening their minds (and are) ready to dive in and address this.”

At Carlow University, administrators acted quickly to extend the university’s decision deadline by a month in a bid to meet students where they were during the failure, according to administrators.

Ultimately, enrollment increased 4.6% in the fall, giving the university its largest student body to date. Administrators believe this is a testament to their responsiveness.

For this admissions season, Carlow invested in a “more robust” net price of attendance calculator for the university, said Mollie Cecere, vice president of enrollment management and corporate partnerships. It takes into account family size, income, housing expectations, GPA and more to estimate how much financial aid a person can receive.

Now, “before (students) ever get the FAFSA, they can really get a picture of what it’s going to cost them to go to Carlow,” Cecere said.

Financial aid packages for students accepted to Carlow and LaRoche universities are expected to be released early next month.

Organizations maintain outreach

Chapman of Crossroads also helps students evaluate their options when they start hearing back from colleges in the spring. He enters each financial aid offer into a spreadsheet and shows families “the right number.” Then they talk about what it all means. His goal here is to help families understand the cost of attending each college.

Similarly, Billy Rutherford, a Pittsburgh Promise college and career coach affiliated with the Pittsburgh Millions 6-12 University Preparatory School, said he has noticed growing stress around student loan debt, which has “led to a lot of really good conversations about affordability and scholarships and loans and kind of long-term financial planning.”

“Students come in with a lot of good questions and really legitimate concerns,” he said. “They want to set themselves up for success.”

That’s why it’s so important to educate them about the FAFSA, especially because many of his students don’t realize how the form opens the door to financial aid, Rutherford said.

He has set up meetings to fill out parts of the form with families, has met at a student’s home to ask questions and will also call or text parents.

He and the other Promise coaches review their roster of seniors weekly to make sure they are on track.

“I do a lot of productive nagging,” he said

Chapman also took this approach. He heavily promoted the FAFSA workshop Crossroads held earlier this month through emails, text reminders and face-to-face encouragement. Per As of Dec. 11, about 11 out of 36 Crossroads seniors had filled out the form.

Will this increase when students return from winter break?

“Oh no, no,” said Chapman. “I intend to finish them by December 31st.”

Maddy Franklin reports on higher ed for PublicSource, in partnership with Open Campus, and can be reached at [email protected].

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