Government programs impose eligibility requirements to balance the goals of improving welfare while minimizing waste. We study the impact of eligibility monitoring in the context of Federal Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) submissions, where students may be subject to "verification" requirements that require them to confirm…

Financial aid offers are the primary tool colleges and universities use to communicate eligibility for federal, state, and institutional financial aid programs to their prospective and current students. Institutions of higher education develop their own financial aid offers, taking into account many factors, including the format of the educational…

For years, financial aid administrators and others have debated the nature and structure of need analysis. As it developed, need analysis was based on commonly accepted definitions and basic principles of economics. Beyond the fundamentals of need analysis, there also developed expertise about exercising professional judgment (PJ) in reviewing…

This article is the first of a three-part series based on the book, Basic Guide to Financial Aid. The contents within are abridged from the publication, with additional emphasis on the impact federal student aid administration has on non-financial aid professionals in higher education today. It should be noted that this information is not…

This study describes students' experiences applying for and maintaining financial aid at a community college in Southern California. Through individual interviews and focus groups, we examined the interaction points between students, institutional actors, institutional policies, and state/federal policies. We theorize that interactions between…

Despite substantial investments in financial aid programs, the available aid often falls short of covering the total cost of attendance (Hanson, 2023). Today, college expenses represent 30% of the annual median family income, pushing many students to rely on loans to finance their education (US Census Bureau, 2023). Among student loan borrowers,…

Generally, need-based financial aid improves students' academic outcomes (Nguyen, Kramer & Evans, 2019). However, the largest source of need-based grant aid in the United States, the Federal Pell Grant Program (Pell), has a mixed evaluation record (Bettinger, 2004; Rubin, 2011; Marx & Turner, 2018; Park & Scott-Clayton, 2018;…

Despite Hispanic-serving institutions' (HSIs) growing number and ongoing institutional diversification, appropriations to Title V, capacity-building grants, has plateaued. Considering these trends, we constructed a unique dataset of Title V non-applicants, applicants, and recipients from 2009-2017 to examine how equitably these federal funds were…

After decades of frustration with increasingly complex college financial aid policies, a nationwide shift toward "free college" programs has gained momentum. New York State joined the free college movement in 2017, when Governor Andrew Cuomo announced his goal to make public higher education tuition-free for most students during his…

People who are impacted by the criminal justice system ("system-impacted") face barriers when seeking financial aid to pay for college. Between the late 1960s and the early 2000s, Congress created laws that prohibited incarcerated students and students with certain criminal convictions from receiving federal grants and loans. This paper…

Generally, need-based financial aid improves students' academic outcomes. However, the largest source of need-based grant aid in the United States, the Federal Pell Grant Program (Pell), has a mixed evaluation record. We assess the minimum Pell Grant in a regression discontinuity framework, using Kentucky administrative data. We focus on whether…

To meet the demands of its current and future workforce, Colorado needs to increase postsecondary attainment. To do this, we must help more students find affordable pathways to postsecondary education so they have the confidence to enroll. One way to increase enrollment in higher education, particularly for low- and middle-income students, is to…

In March 2020, Congress passed the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act, an economic stimulus package designed to address the nationwide economic crisis created by the global COVID-19 pandemic. In addition to providing payments to individuals, business loans, and support to state and local governments, the CARES Act…

Parenting while attending college is challenging in the best of times, and the pandemic is making it even more difficult. Yet more than one in five college students, including disproportionately large numbers of Black, Latinx, and Indigenous individuals, tried to make it work. Emergency aid in the form of fast, flexible dollars delivered just in…

This report summarizes FAFSA and ApplyTexas submissions by AISD seniors in 2019. FAFSA is an application to determine eligibility for financial aid whereas Apply Texas applications allow students to apply to postsecondary institutions in the state.