Monetary support directors react to FAFSA investigation

9 months in the past, Kiely Fletcher, admissions director and vice chairman of enrollment administration on the College of Illinois at Chicago, woke as much as some disconcerting information: Processing for pupil federal support types, an important precursor to schools’ monetary support packaging procedures, could be delayed by months, throwing her complete spring schedule into disarray.

Because the rollout of the brand new Free Software for Federal Pupil Help continued stumbling alongside, the intestine punches stored coming, from additional processing delays to calculation errors that added to her workplace’s substantial workload. Fletcher mentioned she and her friends felt blindsided nearly each week by a brand new setback. She puzzled whether or not they have been as shocking to the division as they have been to her.

So she was each dismayed and relieved to examine findings from a Authorities Accountability Workplace investigation, detailed in a congressional listening to Tuesday, that appeared to verify her worst fears. The GAO discovered that the division “failed to fulfill promised deadlines and supply schools with adequate discover of modifications” all through the applying cycle.

“It felt like we have been being gaslit by the division,” Fletcher mentioned. “This report confirmed quite a lot of our suspicions that there was no approach they couldn’t know.”

For these on the institutional facet of the FAFSA disaster, the report has introduced some readability to a chaotic and complicated 12 months.

It felt like we have been being gaslit by the division.”

—Kiely Fletcher, College of Illinois at Chicago

“The entire thing was like one lengthy unhealthy dream,” mentioned Brad Barnett, director of economic support and scholarships at James Madison College. “The listening to actually validated quite a lot of what we within the monetary support world have been going by way of … it principally codifies that no, we weren’t imagining this—issues actually have been that unhealthy.”

The flip facet, Barnett added, is that the Training Division’s failures at the moment are extra stark. He was notably disillusioned to be taught that the division knew it could probably must delay the launch in August 2022, but it waited seven months to announce it.

“It’s somewhat disheartening to search out on the market was a lot occurring behind the scenes that we didn’t find out about,” Barnett mentioned. “There was clearly an opportunity to be extra clear that [the department] didn’t capitalize on.”

Kim Prepare dinner, CEO of the Nationwide School Attainment Community, mentioned the report’s findings additionally mirrored the experiences of college-access professionals at state businesses and nonprofit organizations who helped college students and households—usually low-income, first-generation candidates—navigate the rollout.

The GAO report discovered that within the first 5 months after the FAFSA launch, 4 million of 5.4 million calls to the Training Division’s name heart went unanswered, a jaw-dropping determine that defined the difficulties NCAN members reported whereas troubleshooting types for college students.

“Individuals could be on maintain for hours,” Prepare dinner mentioned. “Typically they’d schedule conferences with college students or dad and mom who wanted assist filling out the shape, solely to spend your entire time on maintain.”

Studying From the Previous

After a grueling 12 months spent responding to lawmakers’ scrutiny and public anger, the Training Division is charting an optimistic course by way of the subsequent FAFSA cycle. The division delayed the launch of this 12 months’s type from Oct. 1 to Dec. 1 to place it by way of rigorous testing, one thing they did not do earlier than final cycle’s rollout.

They’ve additionally labored to partially restructure the Workplace of Federal Pupil Help, which is liable for the FAFSA, in hopes of enhancing venture oversight, in response to a memo written final week by FSA interim chief working officer Denise Carter and obtained by Inside Increased Ed.

Barnett is utilizing this transitional interval, whereas the mud from final 12 months’s FAFSA is settled and earlier than the cycle begins once more subsequent month, to replicate on what JMU’s monetary support workplace might have executed higher. On Friday he’ll meet together with his staff for a FAFSA debrief, the place they’ll take inventory of their method to the FAFSA debacle and formulate a plan for the 12 months forward.

I wish to look forward, however we have to be taught from the previous.”

—Brad Barnett, James Madison College

He mentioned the possibilities of an improved rollout this 12 months hinge on the division’s willingness to do the identical.

“I wish to look forward, however we have to be taught from the previous to make the long run higher,” Barnett mentioned. “I hope the division is doing one thing related proper now … This testing interval [in October] is the time for them to realize again among the belief they destroyed over the previous 12 months.”

Prepare dinner mentioned she felt reassured by the division’s method to the 2025–26 FAFSA to date. The primary section of testing, which begins subsequent Tuesday, contains six scholarship and entry organizations, 5 of that are NCAN members, and from what she’s heard, the division has been way more proactive and clear in speaking in regards to the rollout.

“The [GAO] report is a reminder of the place we have been 5 months in the past,” Prepare dinner mentioned. “My inbox is a reminder of the place we at the moment are.”

Fletcher, whose establishment is collaborating in section two of the FAFSA testing by way of partnerships with Chicago excessive colleges, mentioned she’s working with division representatives to facilitate traces of suggestions on the brand new type within the lead-up to the Dec. 1 launch.

“Our anticipation is that we’ll be extra of a full accomplice with the division,” she mentioned. “I’m optimistic that this 12 months, it received’t be a one-way road.”