Education

EDU News Curated by Kiosk: FAFSA delays and other higher ed news

FAFSA Is Live, More Relevant, But Has the Damage Been Done?

From Kiosk: The delay in the rollout of the FAFSA (Free Application for Federal Student Aid) form impacted the last college admissions cycle. The disruption caused delays in admissions decisions, financial aid planning, and increased stress on both institutions, prospective students and their families. While the technical issues seem to be resolved, the impact of the delay has amplified frustrations with the broader higher education system and weakened the trust in the Department of Education’s ability to manage critical processes.
View the full article from Kiosk.

 

FAFSA Delays Upended Private College Enrollment

From Inside Higher Education: “The botched rollout of the new Free Application for Federal Student Aid led to major changes in the size and makeup of private colleges’ incoming classes this fall, according to a new survey from the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities. Nearly three-quarters of private nonprofit colleges and universities said that delays and technical issues with the new FAFSA had a significant effect on the composition of their incoming classes this fall. Twenty-two percent of respondents reported classes with fewer financial aid recipients, and 11 percent reported less racial diversity than in 2023.”
View the full article from Inside Higher Education.

 

Fewer 18-Year-Olds Enrolled in College This Fall

From Inside Higher Education: “Bill DeBaun, senior director of NCAN, said the magnitude of the decline among recent high school graduates is ‘very large and very discouraging.’ He noted that a number of factors may have contributed to the declines, including the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2023 decision to ban affirmative action, drops in the number of high school graduates in certain regions of the country and a relatively strong economy that may be enticing high school graduates to enter the workforce instead of attending college. But he believes the botched FAFSA rollout is the No. 1 culprit. He said June data tracked by NCAN found that FAFSA completions among high school seniors fell 11.5 percent year over year.”
View the full article from Inside Higher Education.

 

Students still dealing with drama from last FAFSA, despite positive new data

From The Washington Post: “Despite the tumultuous rollout of the redesigned application, Education Undersecretary James Kvaal said that the number of students on track to receive a Pell Grant — aid for undergraduates with exceptional financial need — is higher than at this point in any of the past six years. Ten percent more students are poised to receive Pell because of changes to the FAFSA formula and 3 percent more students are poised to receive federal aid this year.”
View the full article from The Washington Post.

 

The FAFSA Is Live, Tested, and ‘Already Working’

From The Chronicle: “So far, UNC has received about 2,800 processed FAFSAs. ‘The good news is they look fine — they look accurate,’ Feldman said. ‘With the FAFSA opening earlier, it seems like a much more reasonable time frame for us to get aid offers out to our prospective students. I hope this will give families more confidence that it’s up and stable.’ But Feldman said she isn’t ready to celebrate all the way. She is concerned about a few aspects of the federal-aid process that still aren’t working properly, like the ability for colleges to submit corrections in bulk to students’ FAFSAs. The department recently announced that institutions would not be able to make ‘batch corrections’ — a process that saves financial-aid offices a lot of time — until as late as the end of March.”
View the full article from The Chronicle.

 

Senate Passes FAFSA Deadline Act, 2025–26 Form Officially Launches

From Inside Higher Education: “The U.S. Senate unanimously passed the FAFSA Deadline Act less than a week after the House unanimously passed it. Now the legislation heads to President Biden’s desk. The bill would mandate that the Education Department launch the federal aid form by Oct. 1 each year; currently the deadline is Jan. 1.”
View the full article from Inside Higher Education.

 

Fafsa: short-term pain on enrolments, but hope of long-term gain

From Times Higher Education: “The form allows applicants to see the difference between the ‘sticker price and the net price’ and understand exactly how much a college education will cost, she (Laura Perna, professor of education at the University of Pennsylvania) added. …Professor Kelchen (professor of education at the University of Tennessee-Knoxville) said that the changes – which allow the Fafsa form to handle much more complicated family situations – will help disadvantaged students.’The question is, are the long-term gains ever going to make up for what happened for this cohort and also the reputation of the Fafsa, which already was not great among the general public?’ he asked.”
View the full article from Times Higher Education.

 

The FAFSA Change Behind Colleges’ Pell Progress

From Inside Higher Education: “Congress overhauled the formula determining Pell eligibility as part of the law making over the Free Application for Federal Student Aid. That revised formula was meant to expand eligibility to a much wider share of low- and middle-income families, as well as open the grant to incarcerated students, who were previously blocked from participating. According to the Education Department, that effort paid off to the tune of 560,000 more Pell-eligible students—a 7 percent increase from 2023–24 and nearly twice the number predicted in a report from the State Higher Education Executive Officers Association last October.”
View the full article from Inside Higher Education.

 

In other news…

 

95% of Black, Latinx and Indigenous students highly value HE

From University World News: “Ninety-five percent of Black, Latinx and Indigenous students believe that their degrees will help them reach professional goals … Higher education is highly valued, but there are barriers to success. … Despite federal financial support, these students have experienced economic hardship: between 24% and 35% of each group said they had ‘skipped meals because I had to cover other living costs’ and about 30% of each group had foregone doctor’s visits they could not afford. Yet, these students, drawn from 48 of America’s 50 states and two territories, responded positively to the statement: ‘Attending college has helped me explore my career interests.’”
View the full article from University World News.

 

Trump’s Vision for College Accreditation Could Shake Up the Sector

From The Chronicle: “Trump and his allies have floated a number of changes, such as barring accreditors from requiring that colleges adhere to diversity, equity, and inclusion standards. Republicans have also proposed creating new accrediting agencies that promote conservative values and allowing state governments to take on the role of accreditors. … the report (Project 25) contends, is that accrediting agencies force colleges to adopt DEI standards that may conflict with private colleges’ religious missions and fail to uphold standards for freedom of speech. The solution, the authors argue, is to limit what accreditors can require only to what is contained in federal law.”
View the full article from The Chronicle.

 

College Completion Rates Trending Up

From Inside Higher Education: “Fewer college students are stopping out before finishing their degrees, according to data the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center released. The report found that students who started college for the first time in 2018 had a six-year credential completion rate of 61.1 percent—a 0.5-percentage-point increase over those who started in 2017. It’s the highest six-year completion rate of the 12 cohorts tracked in the first annual ‘Yearly Progress and Completion’ report.
View the full article from Inside Higher Education.