Ruth Santana | Staff Writer
The FAFSA application history of late disbursement leaves students with no other choice but to wait anxiously to see what will happen this time around.
With the myriad of glitches and technical issues, FASFA did not distribute loans and grants to many students on time. This was expected after the release of FASFA’s last rollout in Dec. of 2023 with the new application form.
The fact that we are still feeling the repercussions of the last update is astounding.
Many of us rely on federal grants to be able to attend college, so to send out a half-baked product to the people who need it the most seems ridiculous.
The Government Accountability Office has been investing the latest rollout of the new FASFA and found that the Federal Student Aid office had not tackled key issues before releasing the new form and rushing through preliminary testing.
The Department of Education released a report highlighting how they will proceed in lieu of failures in the past. However, issues in oversight, technical delays and the number of defects found, 55 so far, shows that this is a complicated issue that could take a while to solve.
With the release date for the 2025-2026 FAFSA form mirroring the same delays as last year, students can’t help but worry what will happen and if they’ll be able to pay for classes on time.
No one wants to take out loans and when students do, it’s usually because they have no other choice. Owning too much student loan debt can derail future objectives like buying a house or delaying career goals.
The new form is supposed to help us receive aid, but so far it has only caused chaos.
A survey conducted by Ellucian showed that 59% of college students considered dropping out due to financial stress and 61% stated it negatively affected their education.
Financial aid makes all the difference in how a student’s academic journey will look like and the late disbursement of these fund only make things more difficult.
This mix of technical and communication failures not only disrupted college and universities financial aid timelines but also the livelihood of students.
Some undergrads use financial aid to help cover rent, food and other necessities and without that money it’s a struggle to get by.
This latest application process is meant to be more streamlined, with forms being processed in one to three days, fewer questions, direct data exchange with the IRS and a new formula to create student aid packages, but the execution is horrendous.
While students wait for the application to open, the fear of the crisis that began in 2023 is still there.
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