There are a lot of myths about who is and who isn't entitled to financial aid. And in the New York City public schools, there typically aren't enough people to help high school students navigate the complicated process.
To help clear some things up, WNYC spoke with Andrea Soonachan, senior director of college and career planning in the Department of Education. This is an excerpted interview.
Q: New York State's deadline is June 30. Why are you encouraging students to finish their financial aid applications in February?
A: FAFSA is open through the year, once it opens, but many schools (including CUNY) offer resources, such as work-study opportunities, on a first-come, first-served basis.
And when they send out their acceptance notices, starting in April, they're trying to build a class that has a balance of students and takes into account what their reserves are around financial aid. So the sooner the better, basically, for kids and families.
Q: Do all city high schools now have college planning offices and advisors?
A: We call them college advisors. And the majority of high schools have them. All high schools have a guidance counselor. But then the culture of schools varies widely, so lots of schools have advisory systems where they are doing small group work with teachers and with guidance counselors. Some schools have college offices led by a college advisor. All schools have a main point of contact, who leads the college work.
Q: It must be overwhelming. How do they manage so many students?
A: We've really focused over the last three or four years on scaling up the capacity of multiple adults in every high school to do this work, not pushing the burden heavily on one person who can somehow do that for hundreds of kids.
But 80 percent of all of our high schools have at least one trained staff person. About 50 percent have multiple, many multiple people trained. So we've got about 1500 people at this point who have been trained through that initiative. And we continue to roll that out and push that idea of having lots of people in your building do that work.
Q: What training do they need? Can any Social Studies or English teacher do this on the side?
A: Yes. Absolutely. Our six-day training [over the fall and winter] spends a full day on building a good college list, has two full days on financial aid where they walk line-by-line through what is on the FAFSA, and how do you answer tricky questions like which parent to put where. And a full day of evaluating the financial aid packages, a whole day on working with immigrant students.
Q: What are the most common questions that come up?
A: 'Which parent do I put on the FAFSA and what if I don't live with either parent?' Decoupling legal guardianship from who the FAFSA form considers who you should put on there, and decoupling the dependency on the tax form from the FAFSA form.
For students who are undocumented, we really made a big push around making sure staff are informed. What are kids' opportunities within their various statuses? To determine if the kid is truly undocumented and not eligible for federal aid. [There are also DREAM scholarships for undocumented students]
We have a live "Ask an Advisor" function on our NYC College Line website. There is also a FAFSA guide and the department's main financial aid page can also be translated into multiple languages.
Q: What stories you hear from the college planners about students and their issues?
A: Kids have myths and fears that they're not eligible for aid when they are, or it's not worth filling this out or it can be a lot more complicated than it is. Or myths like, 'I have to wait for my parents to complete their taxes from this year.'
Q: Why don't students think they are eligible for financial aid? More than three quarters of city students qualify for free lunch.
A: Money is hard for lots of kids and grown-ups to grasp. I think they don't have an understanding of, like, what's the average Pell grant. Kids who pretty much have what they need every day, they go to school and have a loving and supportive family, aren't thinking of themselves as low income. Especially if everyone around you is pretty much at the same level.
Q: The Department of Education has a new tool for tracking students when they apply for college aid. How does that work?
A: We launched a FAFSA completion data portal with the state, which means that staff can log into the state portal and see, in real time, data updated each night and see the completion status of their students. They can see who's completed or who's not completed with flags and go back to that kid and say you're missing this line or something is in error here.