Alabama’s Birmingham-Southern College officials had a shock when they recently reviewed their financial aid spending: they discovered that they have been over-awarding financial aid to students for years, an error that will cost them millions of dollars.
Suffering the Consequences
While the college plans to honor the award letters given out to their students, the error will mean [...]

The elite private universities have often been forerunners when it comes to offering generous financial aid packages. In fact, back in 2007 over a dozen schools–including Dartmouth, Amherst, and Harvard–committed to fully-funded (loan free) tuition packages for students under certain income levels.
Many of these schools have reportedly doubled (or even tripled) their financial aid offerings over the [...]

The New Year is upon us, and that means that it’s time for families with a high school senior or college student to file the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA). If you aren’t sure what the big deal is, read on–the FAFSA is one of your most important to-do’s when it comes to [...]

More tough news for parents of current or soon-to-be college students: even with the economic downturn, college tuition and fees are still going up and up. The results of the latest College Board survey are in, and it could mean added financial stress for many families.
Cost Up, Aid Down
I’ll break the bad news first (don’t [...]

The financial aid system is constantly going through changes, but even the overcomplicated Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) never seems to give schools a perfect picture of how much aid a family really needs.
Since he took office in Fall, President Obama’s administration has been working on some of the larger problems in higher education, [...]

Budget cuts are the name of the game for most states this year, but some of them are coping with their multi-billion dollar shortfalls by shifting funds away from student financial aid.
Taking from the Poor
Budget plans from New Jersey to California are focusing on funneling financial aid reserves back into the general budget–reducing and sometimes [...]

In a time when student aid is more crucial to higher education than it has been in decades, the Obama administration is making some big changes in the Education Department.
New Blood
One of the latest changes is the addition of student aid expert Robert Shireman to the Education Department team. Recently appointed as the deputy secretary [...]

There’s no getting around it–times are tough–and families with college-bound students are really feeling the pressure. As parents we want to help support our children, but with the inescapable and constant news about the failing economy, it is hard to see the light at the end of the tunnel.
Updating Outdated Information
Many of you are in [...]

President Obama’s new $825 billion economic stimulus plan is set to go to the House next week for consideration, and it could be a great boon to struggling students.
In addition the funding that would be sent to state governments and national foundations for health and science, billions of dollars would be allocated to help higher [...]

It seems like every day brings unhappy news about the recession–but happily, today is not one of those days for college-bound students! That’s because colleges across the country want to help cash-strapped families by bringing them some good news.
Helping Hands, Far and Wide
With even the admissions process being affected by the recession, college officials are [...]