You may have heard things are changing with the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA).
Don’t freak out! These are good changes, especially if you’re ready for them.
- The first day to file your FAFSA has moved to Oct. 1.
- The FAFSA will collect tax information from an earlier tax year.
So if you plan on attending college in the 2017-18 school year, you can now submit the FAFSA beginning Oct. 1, as opposed to Jan. 1, 2017, which it would have been under the old format.
The new start date won’t push up the deadline, either, as students will have from Oct. 1 through June 30, 2018 to file.
And when you file that FAFSA, you will be using income information from 2015, which is the tax return submitted to the IRS this past year. That means no more estimated income that has to be updated at a later date.
Because your tax return will already be filed, pulling it from the IRS to the FAFSA is quick and easy.
Check out the illustration below (click to enlarge it) for details on how it’s done.
For more information on the FAFSA and financial aid in general, visit www.sc4.edu/financialaid, or join us for Financial Aid Night at 6:30 p.m. Monday, Oct. 24, in the SC4 Fine Arts Theatre.
