While FAFSA filing rates are rising, many lower-income students are attending college without tapping into the full array of financial aid resources available to them.
Financial aid offices are buckling under rising demands and shrinking resources, impacting student services, according to a five-year report from NASFAA.
Early projections indicate that tuition discounts for first-time undergraduates during the 2024-25 academic year rose to 56.3%, according to this NACUBO survey.
College and university financial aid offices strained, underequipped and slower at assisting students with FAFSA requests since the Trump administration cut staffing at the Department of Education.
From "creative destruction" to "political theater," education leaders have expressed various viewpoints about the possible dissolution of the Department of Education.
Institutions will need to seek more partners in the private philanthropic space to help support student financial aid. Income-based loans are one way to maximize contributions, according to these nonprofit leaders.
Tennessee high schoolers' historic interest in community and technical colleges comes during a nationwide decline in undergraduate enrollment among first-year students this fall.