This story was co-published with and supported by the journalism non-profit the Economic Hardship Reporting Project.
When I was a high school senior from a very poor family, years ago, the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) represented my only chance to go to college. This year, the disastrous rollout of the new FAFSA has derailed the college plans of many low-income students, in some cases possibly killing their college dreams forever.
“Oh God, this is really bad,” Zenia Henderson, chief program officer at the National College Attainment Network, tells me as she reviews the most recent data tracking FAFSA completion rates. “These numbers are not good. And now I'm really sad.”
Just how bad has the FAFSA rollout been? FAFSA completion numbers for the high school graduating class of 2024 are down nearly 11% compared with last year. The numbers are lower across the board, but stats are especially grim for the students who need support the most. According to the National College Attainment Network, the completion rate is down nearly 13% nationwide among low-income students, due to students being unable to access or submit the form and the backlog causing delays in FAFSA processing.
In some areas, the figures are even more troubling. I live in a high-poverty area of Pennsylvania. At our district’s public high school, FAFSA completion rates are down by almost 30% this year, compared with the same time last year. Says Henderson, “The impact on low-income students, and what we know as first-generation students, it is huge.”
I grew up in poverty, and I was the first in my family to go to college. Living on my own since age 16, I had no financial support from family. This was back in the days of the paper FAFSA, when you completed the form by hand, snail-mailed it in, and waited weeks for a letter informing you what (if any) financial aid you could receive. Meanwhile, your entire future — or at least your college dreams — hung in the balance.
You no longer submit the FAFSA via snail mail, but for many students this year, the uncertainty and rising sense of anxiety and panic have likely been very similar to what I experienced.
A disastrous rollout was compounded by ongoing issues
The new FAFSA has been in the works for more than three years. In December 2020, the FAFSA Simplification Act was passed by Congress as part of the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2021. Although the FAFSA for the upcoming school year has been available beginning on October 1 for the past few years, the schedule was pushed back this year due to the overhaul of the form.
After some uncertainty about the timeline, the Department of Education finally announced, in mid-December, that the new FAFSA would be available by December 31 — stressing that the initial release would be treated as a “soft launch.”
That soft launch was plagued by problems from the start. Says Ellie Bruecker, PhD, director of research at The Institute for College Access & Success, “Even when it was technically available, you had thousands and thousands of families unable to access the form at all, with the website crashing, kicking families and students out of the form when they were halfway through completing it.”
One of the first major issues affected students from “mixed-status families,” in which at least one parent is an undocumented immigrant. The FAFSA, at that time, wouldn’t allow parents to submit their information without a social security number, which is granted only to US citizens, permanent residents, and foreigners with work visas. “Those students who are legally eligible for financial aid couldn't fill out the form because of the parents' residency status,” says Bruecker.
Meanwhile, an array of other issues piled up and dragged on through spring and into summer. The Department of Education eventually announced a temporary fix for the issue affecting mixed-status families, but not until late April, and by that point “the damage may have already been done,” Justin Draeger, president & CEO of the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators, said in a statement.
Delays + missed deadlines = lost opportunity
Traditionally, May 1 is known as “National College Decision Day,” or the deadline by which many colleges require acceptance students to commit and accept their offer of admission.
This year, because the FAFSA delays meant so many students still didn’t have their financial aid package as May approached, dozens of colleges and universities pushed their deadlines back to mid-May or even early June.
Students from families able and willing to pay the full cost of college could commit to a college without being held back by FAFSA issues and delays, but for many low-income families, financial aid packages are a critical part of the decision-making process.
Even with the extended deadlines at some schools, many low-income students who were still waiting on financial aid information at the start of summer eventually just ran out of time. For many, now it's too late. Says Henderson, “If they have yet to submit a FAFSA successfully, and have it processed, the chances have really dropped for them.”
In education circles, there’s a phenomenon known as “summer melt.” This refers to high school seniors who plan to continue their education and apply or enroll at one or more schools but don’t end up attending college. Summer melt is a particular problem for students living in poverty, with some estimates putting their attrition rate at up to 40%.
Summer melt happens every year, but the FAFSA mess means the number of low-income students who fell off the academic radar since graduating this year will likely be much higher than usual, although actual numbers can’t be determined until the fall semester is underway.
Sadly, once a student is lost via summer melt, the odds of them returning to school and successfully earning a college degree significantly decrease.
Bad timing and lack of funding was a recipe for disaster
Experts say a perfect storm of simultaneous events and challenges contributed to the FAFSA rollout mess, but also point out that Congress deserves a lot of the blame for failing to provide the support and resources needed to pull off such a major undertaking.
“I think that it is, by and large, a product of the fact that the Department of Education, and specifically the Federal Student Aid Office, was flat-funded by Congress,” says Bruecker. “They were asked to do this absolutely massive overhaul and not given any additional resources to do that. They were asked to do that on a really tight timeline. And they were asked to do that at the same time as the FSA was managing millions of student loan borrowers returning to repayment after a three-year pause.”
Yet it seems like lawmakers may be setting the stage for another stressful financial aid season this year. Despite the lingering FAFSA problems that schools and students continue trying to navigate — the Federal Student Aid 2024–25 FAFSA Issue Alerts page still shows more than a dozen open issues — Republican lawmakers in both the House and Senate have proposed legislation requiring the FAFSA be available on October 1 every year, even though officials from both parties have voiced concerns that the Department of Education is behind schedule.
That means the college dreams of students for whom a college education represents a brighter future and possibly a way out of poverty could be at risk again this year. Let’s hope lawmakers and education leaders can work together to find a way to ensure that doesn’t happen.
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