Andrea Keenan : [00:00:00] All right everyone. Good afternoon and welcome to this. Awesome MEFA webinar, um, for high school counselors, MEFA Institute webinar. Um, we are presenting today on counseling families with unique circumstances in the financial aid process. Thank you so much for joining us. We’ve got a great lineup of panelists slash presenters today joining us from Boston University, Bentley University and Wheaton College, and I’ll let them introduce themselves in just a, a.

A minute or so. Um, and I’m Andrea Keenan, a member of K 12 services team here at MEFA. I’ll be moderating today’s, um, MEFA Institute webinar. Um, just a few housekeeping items. We are recording this webinar w, which will be made available on demand after, um, the session concludes. Um, if you want to, um, edit any audio settings, um, the.[00:01:00]

Sort of bar the bottom of your screen will allow you to do that. On the left hand side. The chat feature is disabled for this MEFA Institute webinar. So if you wanna communicate with, um, any of us, um, presenters, panelists, or ask a question, please don’t. Use the chat feature as it’s disabled, but use the q and a feature instead and just type it in.

Um, in, into that box you can use the live transcript feature if you wanna see closed captions, and then of course the red leaf button if you need to exit the webinar. Um, so again, thank you so much for joining. I’m gonna turn it over to our presenters, um, which, uh, who will introduce themselves and say a little bit about their institutions as well.

Carla Minchello: Um, I can start. My name’s Carla Ello. I’m the director of Financial Aid at Wheaton College. Um, I’ve been in financial aid for a very long time. Um. Uh, I don’t wanna say how long, but a really long time. Mm-hmm. And, uh, I’ve worked at several different [00:02:00] schools. Um, I actually used to work at Bentley with James and, um, I’ve also worked at Framingham State, so a little bit of experience at a public school.

Um, and I’ve worked at, um, assumption University as well, and I’ve been here at Wheaton for three years.

Andrea Keenan : Thank you Carla

James McGehee: ihi. I’m the Director of Financial Assistance at Bentley University. Um, I’ve been at Bentley for 10 years. Uh, as Carla said, we used to work together here at Bentley. Um, and before that I worked, uh, at Auburn University in Alabama and La Grange College in Georgia.

So, um, sort of a wide variety of experiences with different school types, um, in different locations. Um, and for those who aren’t familiar, Bentley is a business college. We have about 4,500 undergraduate students.

Rebecca Cassely: Great. Thank you. I am Rebecca Caley. I’m the director of financial Aid here at Boston University.

Um, I’ve also been an aide for quite a number of years. Um. [00:03:00] I think I have a chair that you get when you’re here for 25 years, and I have that chair. So that’s just, um, I started my career in admissions, so I have a tiny bit of experience in that side of the, um, house. And also I’m married to a, um, school counselor, so I.

Uh, uh, hear a lot about what you all do and I definitely respect the work that you all do. Um, Boston University is a four year private school, a research institution, about 16,000 undergraduates, and we have a, um, robust financial aid program that we meet full need of all admitted students. And this year we’ve rolled out, we are not packaging student loans as part of our, um, initial award.

So we’re excited about that. It’s the first year, so we’re meeting need without loans.

Andrea Keenan : Amazing. Told you it was a great lineup. Uh, thank you everyone. Um, just a reminder for the attendees here, um, I will be moderating the q and a, um, section. So as you’re asking questions, please don’t hold them till the end.

[00:04:00] Just type them in and, um, as appropriate, I will, um, elevate them as we go through, um, the presentation. So let’s get going. All right. So, um, just a little bit about MEFA. Um, we are a state authority. We were created by the Commonwealth, Massachusetts in 1982. We love helping families plan, save, and pay for college.

And we especially love partnering with school counselors through our MEFA Institute and to bring you programming, uh, like this one. So please check out the MEFA Institute also. Um, we have so many great webinars coming up, but also on demand. Today we’re going to cover, um, just a lot of information around different types of special circumstances and financial aid appeals where we’ll talk a little bit about independent students, um, different situations they might find themselves in as well as undocumented students.

And then finally non-traditional parent families. Um, so again, if we don’t cover something you’ve been wondering about, please drop it in the q and a and we’ll do our best to, to get [00:05:00] to your question. All right, so let’s get going here. Um, team, I’m gonna pass it over to you.

Carla Minchello: Who, anybody wanna start? You want me to start?

Rebecca Cassely: Sure. Carly, you start.

Carla Minchello: Okay. Um. So, you know, basically I would say that every school has a different process when it comes to appeals. So students really kind of need to check with each school they’re looking at in the financial aid office to find out what types of things they’ll consider on appeal, what documentation is required.

Um, and you know, you can see there’s a few different kinds of professional judgment, uh, appeals on the. Slides. So basically when it comes to appeals and doing professional judgments has to be done on a case by case basis. So schools will have some policies about what they will consider, but we can’t do sort of a blanket judgment on all students.

Um, and a school does not have to consider a professional judgment or do an appeal. It’s up to them. But the types of things that [00:06:00] we would typically wanna know about would be a change in income, um, or assets. Um, unreimbursed medical expenses. Um, uh, some schools will consider household expenses, some won’t.

I think that one’s a little bit more, um, borderline. Um, and then if somebody has a change, like in their household size, like if somebody’s moved in with them, a family member or something like that, that might be something you wanna talk to the school about. Anybody else wanna add anything to this?

Rebecca Cassely: I’ll just add that.

Um, so most school, I would think most schools students should receive a financial aid offer before they submit an appeal. So that in, in my office we say you, you have to have an award to appeal. So you, you can’t appeal something that you don’t have if you send. Documentation in advance of your award. We consider that when we’re giving you your initial award.

So sometimes it gets to be a little bit confusing. So an appeal is after you receive an [00:07:00] award, I think merit, we, we sometimes in the financial aid offices receive appeals from merit scholarships and in at bu, those are determined by the admissions office, so they’re a little bit different. The appeals we review are for need.

Based scholarship. Um, so at BU we require the CSS profile from the college board and the fafsa. And so what we do have a forum at bu and I think most aid offices would say it needs to be a change or something different than you reported on your aid application. So this year on the FAFSA and CSS profile, you report 2024.

Income. Um, if, if that was an outlier year, you had the family had a large, uh, capital gain, something that’s not recurring, that might be a reason to appeal. Um, but if it’s a very recent job loss, we understand that that’s stressful and it really, that impacts your family if, if a parent unexpectedly loses their job, but it might not be something we can consider right away because.

Right now it’s [00:08:00] 2026, right? So if they have their 2025 tax return already filled out and they just received, you know, uh, that their job lost, it’s too early to RAC 2026. So it really depends also where you are in, in the calendar and academic year about what we can consider.

Andrea Keenan : One of you just very quickly speak to just initiating, uh, appeals.

I know there, it, there isn’t one blanket answer because different schools initiate things differently. But, um, do you have any sort of advice as counselors are coaching students, uh, to potentially pursue this?

Rebecca Cassely: Uh, we have most schools, you all have portals. We have a a, a port applicant portal.

Andrea Keenan : Mm-hmm.

Rebecca Cassely: So I, that’s where the source of truth is at bu like that’s how we want, it’s secure. So I think that’s important that emailing, especially like tax returns with social security numbers is not the way to go. So advise families, and I understand this is hard too because [00:09:00] students, they’re playing event land.

We in and bu they’re gonna have three different logins and three different passwords for three different portals and we’re all gonna do it a little differently. But I think websites, which. I love websites. I think they’re, they’re an under utilized resource, but websites and then, um, which hopefully give you good information.

And then the login of a portal is how we ask students to submit appeals.

Andrea Keenan : Great. Um, so a little bit about logistics here. Good segue.

Carla Minchello: Yeah, I think Rebecca already talked about the timing a little bit, and that will vary I think by, um, I think it’s, I think she’s right. It’s most common for most of the offices I’ve worked in that you’d prefer to get the appeal information after the family has a letter.

Um, and that’s has an award letter. And that’s partly because families often assume that they won’t qualify for as much as they do. So we sort of like them to see what they’re gonna get first. But there are some things that, [00:10:00] um, you know, families are more likely to tell us about in advance. That would be like if somebody lost their job, um, or took a pay cut and they already know that their income is changing, then some of those will consider in advance.

Um, as far as like, when it come, usually people will initiate appeals with us by emailing us or calling us. Um, we also have an applicant portal. Um, but we typically, usually somebody will contact us first to find out what’s required. We have an appeal form. We’ll usually send them that and then ask them to, based on, ask them to send that back to us with a letter.

And based on what the, the term, based on why they’re appealing, we’ll usually request additional information and then we’ll want them to upload that to our portal.

James McGehee: With, with both Rebecca and Carla, I, I think the timing, generally speaking is best after you have a financial aid award. So you can, we can discuss, um, how your more recent circumstances. The students more recent circumstances impacts the award [00:11:00] they already have. Um, and we can show how that changes with those circumstances changing.

Um, and you know, we’re also looking at, um, what potentially the families. Circumstances are gonna look like not just this year, but all four years that the student is gonna be here and trying to figure out, um, how we can best support them over that time and make sure that they’re thinking about, uh, what the financial aid looks like, what the cost looks like beyond just the first year, because it’s an important consideration, um, that this is, you know, a four year investment.

Andrea Keenan : Thank you.

So now we’re gonna go into a little bit more detail about each of those categories we saw in the previous slide. So I guess if you three have any tidbits or advice or anecdotes or anything to add to give texture to the following a few slides, that would be awesome.[00:12:00]

Rebecca Cassely: Right. I get so, like we had said this year’s FAFSA and AM CSS profile uses 2024 income. If that isn’t typical of the pa, the family’s other years, if something is an outlier, definitely that’s what we wanna hear about. Um. Like create a lottery winning. I, I don’t see those very often, but that would be cool to see, like if they, um, we might move that to their asset, but we can definitely, if it’s a year that’s not recurring, that’s what we like to look at.

Um, I just reviewed an appeal recently, a family that had business income and they said, oh, you know. Year was was high and they were included. That’s what we’d wanna look at. Okay. It was the 2024 an outlier, but they included several prior years and what their income did was kept going up. So we thought, isn’t that what it should do so we can look at it?

And I just thought, you know, that wasn’t. [00:13:00] Anyone can appeal is what we say, but, and it’s helpful what they include and what we might see. So I think that’s the caveat. We may not be able to approve all appeals, um, but if a family feels they need more financial aid, that’s when they need, how our offices, et cetera.

James McGehee: I add to that, sorry.

Carla Minchello: Oh, you go ahead, James.

James McGehee: I would add to that that uh, sometimes families will tell us they had, um, bonus or overtime pay and, um, that that may not occur again in the future. And there’s not a lot that we can do with may not. Occur. Like we have to kind of assume that that is gonna be something that recurs in the future until we know that it doesn’t.

So what, that’s sort of one thing to keep in mind with the increases in income that, you know, that may stay the same from year to year. So we can’t necessarily consider that.

Carla Minchello: Yeah. And one other thing I was gonna mention, when it comes to job losses, um, [00:14:00] you know, a lot of times we, we hear from families the minute they lose their job, and that’s completely understandable because they’re stressed and they’re losing income.

But it’s very hard for us to do adjustments on that immediately after it happens. We, you know, we would really need to know if the family’s gonna receive severance. If they are, their income might not actually change for a while. Uh, we need to know if they’re getting unemployment. And sometimes we don’t know those things for a little while after.

The job loss has happened, it’s also possible that the parent will find a new job. So, um, I wouldn’t be surprised with those types of appeals. If, uh, a school asks you the family to wait a little while before submitting documentation of that, before they’re able to actually make adjustments on it.

Andrea Keenan : Yeah.

Okay.

Yeah. So now we’re sort of talking a little bit about, uh, federal, uh, federally independent students. And this category of students as they’re applying their process might look a little different than a dependent [00:15:00] student. So, um, who would like to take this slide?

Carla Minchello: Well, I’ll, if nobody, um, I was actually dealing with a student in this, uh, situation earlier today. So, um, the things that are listed on this slide are really the, the types of things that sort of make us. Student, um, automatically independent. But several of the items on this list, a lot of times schools will require documentation of it.

Um, so for example, at at my school, most of the schools I’ve worked at, if a student puts down that they are in foster care, an emancipated minor, or in legal guardianship, um, we’re gonna wanna see documentation of that. Um, and sometimes what happens with legal guardianship, and I was dealing with a student in this situation earlier today, we requested the court documentation and when it came in, it was pretty clear that the student is in the custody of her aunt, but the aunt does not have legal guardianship of her.

So I reached out to the student. [00:16:00] They don’t have any other court documentation. It looks like it’s a custody arrangement, but the student does not have contact with either of her parents anymore. She’s lived with her aunt since she was very young. So what we’re going to do is collect some additional documentation to do something called a dependency override.

Since the parents are not available, that requires a little more documentation than the things that are listed on the slide. So, um, you know, I’m requesting a letter from the aunt. Um, and then typically I would request a letter from a third party who might know about the family situation. That could include a school counselor, it could include, um, a therapist, somebody from the Department of Children and families, a, an attorney, whoever they may have worked with.

For the custody or, or whatever situation. Um, we do typically need some additional documentation to do dependency overrides. And then another thing that we typically need documentation of is unaccompanied homeless youth. Um, sometimes that documentation comes from the high school. If you have a McKinney-Vento officer who can give us a [00:17:00] letter regarding that.

Um. Other times, uh, we have situations where we get, we collect documentation that shows that the, it is not safe for the student to live with their parents and therefore they might be couch surfing or living with friends, um, and don’t have a stable place to live. So we would need documentation of that.

But sometimes a student is considered an unaccompanied homeless youth because of things like that.

Andrea Keenan : Thank you. Anything else to add before we move on?

James McGehee: I would also say for, um, for institutional aid, for schools like Bentley that require CSS profile, even if a student is federally independent, we may still be looking to collect parent or potentially guardian information for that student, for the CSS profile and that.

It’s a very individualized basis. We don’t have sort of a blanket rule there. It’s more we would look at the student’s circumstances and see what’s appropriate in that case. You know, they may be, um, [00:18:00] uh, living with, uh, a relative who is taking care of them, and we might want more information about that situation.

Andrea Keenan : Thank you. And we actually have a question that just came in for legal guardianship. Could a notarized letter from parents in another country allowing a relative to act as a legal guardian work for independency?

Carla Minchello: Nope. Actually, um, I had to, we get a lot of these, so I had to look this up a while ago and I believe that.

Um, it, it needs to be a court ordered, um, legal guardianship, I think in the United States. So I don’t, ’cause it’s because it’s a state thing. I don’t think that it’s valid in another country. Um, so typically when that happens with us, um, we won’t accept the notarized letter. It’s, it’s really not a legal guardianship.

It’s more like a, a parent saying that they’re, they give someone in the United States guardianship of their child or custody. Yeah. Um, so what I’ve done is gone back to the, to the student and if they have contact. With their parent in the other [00:19:00] country, there’s nothing to prohibit parents in foreign countries from completing the FAFSA or the CSS profile.

So we, unless the, the parent is unable to be reached by normal means, we would typically ask the parent to contribute to the FAFSA and the CSS profile In that case, um, if the student no longer has contact with their parents, then we would follow the steps, um, to collect documentation to see if they’re eligible for a dependency override.

Andrea Keenan : I think too, as a little note, when I was a counselor, I had this happen with a student, um, whose parents were in Colombia, and we, she was able to get information about how much dad made ev, um, yearly, his yearly wages, and we couldn’t, um. Converted that from their currency to US dollars, and that’s what we used in the CSS profile.

Um, so I hope I did that right. Um, but

Carla Minchello: yeah.

Andrea Keenan : Yeah. Is that, that

Carla Minchello: sounds right. Do,

Andrea Keenan : do you see that a lot happening? And, and, um, would you collect, uh, I guess for James, um, and for [00:20:00] CSS profile schools, any additional documentation for verification in that case?

Rebecca Cassely: So there is an international CSS profile that you can enter it in the currency of the country, and so that’s helpful.

Um, we, we do have, um, a for if we need to see the tax data or like the country’s tax data, we have a, like a cover sheet to help the family understand what we’re looking for. Um, but they could be required to provide a little bit of additional documentation. Especially we understand the expenses are different, um, and so we might want to make sure that that’s being considered accurately.

Andrea Keenan : Thank you. And one question, uh, just came in as well. What if a student came to the US alone at 18 and have no financial support from parents in their previous country, student pays all their rent, insurance, et cetera. Would that be a similar situation as the last. Question that

Carla Minchello: that would also re, you know, if the, if the student [00:21:00] still has contact with their parent, um, them being self-supporting is not enough alone.

For them to be made independent on a federal basis. Um, you know, when it comes to CSS profile and independency, that’s up to the school. Um, but you know, what we would do is we, if the students for the fafsa, if the students still had contact with their parents, they would have to be a contributor, even if they’re not planning to.

To pay for the student’s expenses. And that’s, you know, that’s really true of any parent that’s a contributor to the fafsa. Them contributing to the FAFSA does not mean that they support the student or that they plan to pay for the student’s education. Um, but usually if the student does not meet one of the criteria that’s listed on this slide, the parent information is still required on the.

Rebecca Cassely: Yeah, that’s such a good point. We, we hear like, okay, well, but I didn’t, um, report them as a dependent on my tax return and like mic drop. And that’s not like, that’s, that’s not even a, um, that’s not a reason to [00:22:00] not be reported as a contributor on the fafsa.

Andrea Keenan : Thank you. Um, alright, so, um, who would like to speak a little bit about the provisional independent student status?

Rebecca Cassely: We see requests. So it’s, um, often a student. Um, and Andrea, I think you said that the for dependency override is the. Maybe we don’t wanna say that language, but, well, I guess we do say the language, but students that aren’t able for whatever reason to, to provide their parents, um, information. So we have had many students that the parents may not support the student’s lifestyle or, um, they might have religious differences or there there’s many.

So those are the students that we are going to need to work with individually in a case. By case basis and think about what documentation they can provide. And they’re really difficult committee reviews, um, that we do. And we, we have a committee at BU that we review these, so to make sure we’re treating students [00:23:00] equitably, like, and whatever they can have.

’cause sometimes it’s hard to prove a negative. So like, like Carla mentioned, um, like. If they’ve been to a therapist or a school counselor can provide a letter of support. Sometimes we’ll see like text messages that, um, from the student or e um, if there are in, in extreme circumstances, a police report.

But oftentimes it starts with a, um, letter from the student and then we can help them what, what kind of supporting documentation we can, they can potentially su, um, provide so that we can help them. And we’ll, we’ll have a, we, we won’t require the parent information on either the CSS profile or the fafsa, but they’re difficult cases

Andrea Keenan : with the, with the student, um, that was referenced in the previous question.

Potentially be a candidate for a provisional independent student status of their alone here in the us. Um, and self-supporting.

Rebecca Cassely: That’s not a [00:24:00] reason that it, it has to be like a danger or they cannot get the information. That’s an important distinction to make. Yeah. If they came to the us, that’s brave and amazing, but that doesn’t mean that the parents aren’t the first responsibility to pay for college.

That’s, um, so that’s what we’re looking at. If they, they don’t, it becomes the school and, and the federal government. And, um, so that’s what we’re really making sure we’re reviewing. I

Andrea Keenan : think that’s, that’s just a good point, I think to clarify, um, because there are so many students, um, with different circumstances and it’s important to know kind of that line.

Um, yeah. Thank you. Yeah. Anything else to add here, Carla or James? Okay, great. Um, so now we’re gonna talk a little bit about undocumented students, which is another huge category, um, and given, you know, immigration patterns and, oh, sorry about that. Um, and also what’s going on, um, just there’s, there’s [00:25:00] so much talk about this and we have so many students who find themselves undocumented, um, who that want.

To attend college. And, um, so important to stress that undocumented students can be admitted to and attend college. So there’s no federal law that prohibits undocumented students from applying and attending college in the us. Um, but it’s really important to understand the students, um, that you might work, be working with and their status.

Um, so if they’re completely undocumented, then they’re not eligible for federal aid. And then there is that category that. Um, we know as eligible non-citizens, and so if they are, um, not a citizen or a current resident, they might have another status that makes them an eligible non-citizen. So that information is, you know, readily available.

We can drop some resources here in the chat. Outside of that. List of statuses that are eligible non-citizens. [00:26:00] There is, there are other potential statuses that, um, do give students legal immigration status here in the US but that don’t qualify them for federal aid. So it’s really kind of important to know that list of eligible non-citizens statuses, because sometimes the students might think they’re undocumented, but actually they might have TPS temporary protected status.

So that’s a great thing for them to know about. But it still doesn’t make them eligible for federal aid. So it’s just interesting, um, I think to understand that sometimes it’s not a one size fits all. Just be because a student might not know their status. It, it might, uh, mean that once they self-disclose to you, then you can ask a f some follow up questions to truly determine whether they are eligible.

Eligible or not for federal aid. Um, but it’s really exciting time here in Massachusetts right now, um, because this category of students may be eligible for certain state financial [00:27:00] aid. Um, and we’ll dive into the, that. What certain students, um, means because it’s not all undocumented students, unfortunately, in Massachusetts, but it is a, a huge portion of them that might be eligible for state financial aid.

Um, please check with each financial aid office, um, for institutional aid opportunities, um, and. I will let our presenters chime in on this bullet point because they might have some additional insight to share from their, um, their side of of things. Um, but just also wanna mention that private scholarships might be available for undocumented students and we have some resources, um, in the next slide, or.

Next two slides that you can, um, peruse if you’re trying to help students, um, think about different funding solutions. Um, this link here, um, from Ask us How to Support Immigrant Students is, is a great link. So after the presentation, as you’re reviewing the materials from this, uh, MEFA Institute webinar, [00:28:00] please um, check that link out.

Um, it has a lot of great information. Um, so for my panelists, um. Do you have anything to add here, especially regarding, um, institutional aid opportunities for undocumented students?

Rebecca Cassely: Uh, I’ll just, so unfor at BU we don’t offer need-based, um, scholarship to undocumented or international, but there are merit scholarships available. Um, but I just wanted to highlight, I think this is where the Federal Student Aid website does a good job oftentimes. S the school, the student or a school counselor will call a financial aid office and say like, oh, does my student qualify for it?

And there are so many statuses that we’re like there, you know, as different asylee statuses and refugee that are changing. I go to that website and that’s how I get my answer. So I think that that’s the source of truth that you should use to see if the student could be an eligible non-citizen to complete the fafsa.

Um, it’s, that’s where we [00:29:00] get the information.

James McGehee: Is similar. Uh, we offer merit scholarships to undocumented students, uh, but not need-based aid. And, uh, yeah, I agree with Rebecca. There are so many different, um, eligible non citizenship statuses. Sometimes it’s confusing even for us as financial aid officers. Um, but that’s where we’re going to look is at, at the federal website to see what their advice is on those statuses.

Andrea Keenan : Thank

Carla Minchello: you. Yeah. Um, I’ll just say that, um, so at, at Wheaton we do offer, we offer merit scholarships to most of our students, uh, including undocumented students. We do have some need-based grant that we will give to undocumented students too. Um, but typically when a, a student contacts us and we find out that they’re.

Um, ineligible to do the fafsa. We typically would treat them as an international, you know, in the same way that we treat international students when it comes to awarding need-based aid. And we’ll collect the same [00:30:00] documentation that we would collect from an international student. Um, I do wanna mention the, um, the Massachusetts application for.

Uh, undocumented students. That’s the masa because we’ve had a lot of confusion with school counselors at our school, um, thinking that the MASA is like the fafsa, that is something that gets sent to schools that we can then use to determine an undocumented student’s eligibility for aid. And that is not the case.

Um, it goes to the, to the, to the Commonwealth, to the state scholarship office, and they determine. What if a student qualifies for state aid based on that, but schools don’t receive those results the way they do a fafsa, so we can’t use that MASA form to determine aid eligibility. Certainly not at a private school.

So if your students are applying to private schools in Massachusetts. They wanna reach out to the private schools to see if they award aid to undocumented students. And what type, when it comes to the state schools, um, state schools have a lot of, um, state funded financial aid. Things like tuition waivers, [00:31:00] uh, fee grants.

The Mare plus, uh, different programs that undocumented students may qualify for some of those, and there may be more of that available at the, the public schools than at some of the private schools in the state. So just sort of keep that in mind. Even with the need-based state that we offer here at Wheaton, we are not able to meet full need for students.

So there’s, there’s still gonna be a gap. Uh, for some of our students, and sometimes it’s very hard for our undocumented students to meet that gap because they don’t have the same ability to borrow private loans that some of our domestic students have. So,

Andrea Keenan : yeah. Thank you. Yeah, it’s, um, definitely I think this particular, um, subset of the student population, um, could have its own, you know, series of webinars.

Um, so thank, thank you for chiming in about the Mafa. And you know, it’s, it’s great that we have the ability in Massachusetts to have a form like that, but it’s a point. Really well taken about how schools use it or don’t use it. [00:32:00] Um, so thank you for clarifying that, Carla. And yeah, just a little bit more though about, uh, state aid in Massachusetts.

Um, I think it’s important here to highlight that when the tuition equity law passed a few years ago here in Massachusetts, the state, um, created a status known as the high school completer status. So this status was created to help verify a student. Um, the amount of time the student’s been in Massachusetts, been a student in Massachusetts to help determine whether they would qualify or not for the, the state financial aid.

So now we’re talking about what Carla was saying about, uh, tuition waivers, um, grants, everything from the state scholarship office, um, the high school completer status. Is really important for high school counselors to know about. Um, and so these are some of the pieces to keep in mind. Um, students in order to qualify for the state aid, have to have attended high school in Massachusetts for at least three calendar years.

So should have three [00:33:00] years, um, in their transcript. Um, if your student is just below that, I would encourage you to reach out, um, to, to the schools and to even osfa, um, to inquire whether, you know. Whether the student’s right on the cusp there, there might be some aid available, um, but obviously can’t promise anything.

Um, they students have to have earned a high school diploma or, um, the equivalent. So, um, the high set. Or GED in other states, they have to be able to provide documentation to prove these pieces. So a copy of their diploma or their high set, um, or a copy of their transcript to, um, verify the three years of high school attendance.

Um, there is also an affidavit and an eligibility form. Um, there’s a lot more information on mass.edu. Slash tuition equity. And I will also shamelessly plug, um, uh, another recent nefa Institute webinar that I presented called Supporting Students and Families with [00:34:00] unique Immigration statuses in the post-secondary planning process.

Um, it’s definitely, um, a great resource if you’re re if you have a PO population of students that, um, are finding themselves tr trying to, um. Fill out a FAFSA or maybe they’re not eligible or trying to figure out what their next steps are, if they’re not eligible, please tune into that webinar. Um, and the QR code is is right there.

And in that webinar, I really do encourage students to be creative. Proactive and really focused with solutions. And I think that’s where you all come in. A lot of times you are their trusted adult and they come to you, they share pieces of their story and it can be really, um, discouraging sometimes to feel like they’re different from their peers, perhaps or not filling out a FAFs and they.

I think they don’t have the same access to pieces. And so really up to you as a trusted adult to encourage them to not lose hope, to stay very creative. Sometimes [00:35:00] their path is a little bit more windy, um, but they can certainly, um, make it to, to where they want to. Um, just takes a little bit more proactive, uh, planning.

Um, I would love for our panelists to just maybe one of you to just say a few words about, um. You know, if, if a student’s undocumented can and trying to contact the financial aid office, what’s like, what are some tips? Like, do they just pick up the phone and call? Do they ask for certain people at your office?

How, how would you coach counselors to empower students to ask those questions of your offices?

Rebecca Cassely: Yeah, I, um. I know calling’s probably scary unless they’re, um, but I, I do think doing a little research on the website and seeing if there’s information provided, um, and maybe sending an email and, and, um, to the, to the general office just to get the [00:36:00] general information. I think, uh, that. We all work in financially ’cause we want to help students and I know Kyla and James are, and so it is hard for us as well if, if, um, you know, at BU we wish we could support all students.

Um, right now, even in the landscapes, even, you know, budget-wise it’s tough. So completely understand. It’s a difficult conversation and it’s even harder when we. Don’t have many resources to offer. So I think like doing a little bit of research what I can offer, and I’ve seen some, um, I think this is something that needs to be brought up in ninth grade, um, to check student, even if a student thinks they have a social security number or.

They’re not sure or what’s their, because we see students that are applying 12th graders and it’s all of a sudden this emergency and they don’t have the documentation. I saw it. I was working with a student recently that, um, actually is a US citizen born abroad and he never got a social security number [00:37:00] and now he’s applied to Boston University.

Don’t tell him, but he’s being admitted, but he doesn’t have a social security number, so he can’t file the fafsa. Um, and my heart, I’m like, ugh. Like. It’s really late and that’s, as we know with the federal government, it’s not very fast. So just have, maybe thinking early in the process is a good way to go.

It’s hard to start thinking about it in 12th grader. So making plans, what, and I know things can change with, with laws, but I think it’s important to start this earlier than than 12th grade. That’s,

Andrea Keenan : thank you. To

James McGehee: that point, um, you can sign up for an FSA ID earlier than your senior year of high school. So if the student wants to log in earlier and check like, do I have my social security number in order?

Am I all set with this? They could work on that before they get to their senior year. Good

Rebecca Cassely: point.

Andrea Keenan : That’s a great point. Thank you. Um, these are just additional resources. [00:38:00] Um, all panelists, or sorry, all attendees will receive a copy of these slides, so please, um, you know, wait for those and that way you’ll be able to click into all these links.

Um, we have, um, a section here on non-traditional parent families and I did wanna, um, elevate a question that came in at the beginning of the presentation. So if, um, one of you wants to, um. Speak to that as part of this slide. Um, so one of the attendees is hoping that, um, you will clarify how applicants who have recently lost a parent can prepare to document their change in guardianship or especially uncertainty and guardianship and financial circumstances.

Um, so I, you know, it might come up or if not, if one of you could address that at, at some point, that would be great.

Rebecca Cassely: So I, I think it depends where you are in the [00:39:00] process. So if you, if you’re going to file the FAFSA right now, and that’s a very sad situation. Um, a parent’s passed away that. That should be report like there, you can’t use the, um, the data exchange maybe, and I might not be the one with Carla or James May be better at the FAFSA information.

I know CSS profile, there’s no, um, talking with IRS, so you can just exclude the, um, the parent, the deceased parents’ income. We might ask for a tax return, but we don’t want to include that parent’s income. Um, if. It’s a non-custodial situation. So if the, if the biological or adoptive parents weren’t married and they filed a joint tax return, we can take out that one parent’s information.

Um, if it happens after you complete the, um, applications for the CSS profile, that’s where you wanna get in contact with the, um, our office. So for us, it depends when that sad situation happens, maybe.

Carla Minchello: Yeah, and [00:40:00] I’m not sure on whether it was like, you know, from, based on the question, I’m not sure if it’s referring to a case where a student no longer has a parent where they’re an orphan.

Mm-hmm. Um, or if it’s where, um, the parents were married and one parent has now died, or maybe the noncustodial parent has passed away. So. The treatment is really going to vary and what the school will ask for and do is gonna vary based on the individual situation. So I would encourage the counselor and that student to contact the financial aid offices at the schools they’re they’re looking at, so that they can sort of walk them through what information would be needed to, to do the, the best thing for the student.

Um. I’m at a school that just uses the fafsa and if we had a, a married couple where one parent passed away, we would probably collect, as Rebecca talked about, a copy of the tax return and then W twos and separate out the income and just use the surviving spouse’s income. Um, but if it was an a non-custodial parent who isn’t on the FAFs.

It wouldn’t affect their, their eligibility for aid, [00:41:00] unless that’s the parent that was on the fafsa, but at least not at my school. It might at a CSS profile school. Um, but I still might want that family to, to send us the information because we, we still might wanna consider that as an ability to pay issue if there’s not another, if there’s a parent that was going to contribute and now no longer can.

So

Andrea Keenan : thank you. Yeah. And if, um. One of you wants to touch upon some of these, uh, bullet points, that would be great as well.

James McGehee: Yeah, I think. The tool that I would most recommend, uh, for counselors and for families is the FAFSA Parent Wizard. Um, it’s a really simple tool. It’s like four questions. Um, and it will help the student walk through what parent they’re supposed, parent or parents.

They’re supposed to include on their fafsa. So it, I think it makes it really clear and easy who you’re supposed to include. Um, so for example, if the parents, um, [00:42:00] are not married to each other, but they live in the same household, that’s a situation where sometimes families will think they only have to report one parent.

Um, but actually legally they have to report both parents on the fafsa and the parent was there. When you walk through it, it’ll explain that that’s the case. Um, and then. As we’ve sort of touched upon here and there, um, for divorced or separated parents who are living separately, um, there is a specific custodial parent whose information will be used on the fafsa.

Um, but for schools like Bentley and bu, um, we may. Want information about the non-custodial parent. So a lot of CSS profile schools ask for that non-custodial parent to fill out some separate information if there is, um, no contact or, or a reason why that parent can’t complete that information. Most schools also have a waiver process for that.

Andrea Keenan : Thank you.

Alright. [00:43:00] Doesn’t change in assets.

Rebecca Cassely: Assets are so right. So the CSS profile, you report your and the fafsa, you report your assets at the time when you’re filling out the application. I think, um. I, we prefer that you don’t go in and like, oh, I just, you know, I bought concert tickets. Oh, we better go update the information, what we have in our, um, savings account.

That’s not the way, um, financial aid applications should be updated. I think a change in asset. I don’t believe you should update the aid applications. You should reach out to the financial aid officers, um, offices with any documentation you have, and there might be another way we can consider your, um, emergency or, or what out, out of pocket.

But I think that’s an important word too, is what we’re looking for is out of pocket, um, and what you’re needing to pay. And again. Like we, we’ve said before, things feel really stressful as [00:44:00] soon as it happens. So like a job loss or you know, a tornado hits a family’s home and they’re calling the financial aid office the next day.

Understandable, because you’re worried how you’re gonna pay the bill, but. You know, we need to wait documentation, what the actual costs are, what that might mean. And if it was something that wasn’t included in the financial aid applications, we might have to get creative. So having that conversation and thinking like, okay, what were we, what were we using to assess your eligibility and what can we have a little leeway with?

So I think it’s important to have, reach out to the financial aid offices instead of just changing the application and reducing the amount you reported as assets.

Andrea Keenan : I talk about this.

Sorry, I don’t think we [00:45:00] can hear you. I don’t know if someone’s trying to chime in here.

Carla Minchello: Um, I I can tackle this one. Um, so these are, so these are some of the things, um, that might be considered on appeal, but that will vary quite a bit from school to school. So this is the sort of thing where like some schools will consider it, some schools won’t.

So private elementary or secondary school tuition. Some schools, uh, do an allowance for that all the time. In our case, we would typically only consider that if the student had to attend a private school because they had some sort of special need, um, you know, whether that be medical or, um, educational and couldn’t attend a public school.

So, and we would then collect documentation of the cost, um, and we would wanna see that the family paid the cost. Um, so we might consider that. Medical and dental bills are very common, but one thing that a lot of people don’t realize is that in order for it to change eligibility for aid, it typically needs to be a very large amount.

Um, you know, like if somebody just has like some orthodontics bills, [00:46:00] uh, for a couple thousand dollars, it, it really needs to be. Usually it’s sort of like seven to 10% of income for it to even make a difference. And sometimes even then it’s, it doesn’t really change your eligibility for aid very much, but that will vary depending on the school as well.

Um, and then childcare, nursing home expenses, and student loan payments. Again, some schools will consider those, um, and some schools might not. So this is where reaching out to the school that the student’s really interested to see if these are things they’ll consider on appeal would be a good way to go.

And then you’ll also find out from the school what kind of documentation they want to see, uh, to back up these expenses.

Andrea Keenan : Thank you. Yeah. And this is another one that, um, gets asked a lot too. Change in family size.

James McGehee: The Patha is really, and the CSS profile are a snapshot in time. So they’re capturing your family’s circumstances at the time that they’re completing the form. Um, so [00:47:00] after that time, somebody might move into the household. A sibling might come back from being gone, there might be a new baby. All those are changes that the family is feeling.

Um. Generally speaking, relatively minor in the financial aid formula. They’re not having usually a huge impact, um, to the overall financial picture. Um, but it’s certainly something that. We would encourage you to talk to the school about, have the student talk to the school about, um, I think the two bigger ones here would be a divorce or separation or a remarriage.

That’s, that’s a bigger change generally to the family’s financial circumstances. Um, and one that we would definitely want to have that conversation as an aid officer with the student and their, their family about, you know, what that looks like and what we might be able to do.

Carla Minchello: Yeah. And for, um, for stepparents, just real quick, because I know that people always ask this, um, [00:48:00] certainly for federal methodology and the fafsa, we cannot remove a stepparent.

Um, they are counted, they are part of the equation. Their income is counted. We can’t do it without them. Um, you know, CSS profile schools, if they’re looking at non-custodial income, they might be looking at things a little bit differently. So they might have some flexibility with institutional aid. But it, it doesn’t matter if they have a prenup, it doesn’t matter if they file separate taxes for the fafsa.

The stepparent is always gonna be part of the equation.

Rebecca Cassely: Good point.

Andrea Keenan : Yeah. Cost of attendance adjustment.

Rebecca Cassely: So cost of attendance adjustments typically occur when like the student is attending, like this is, and typically it increases the student’s eligibility to borrow a loan. Um, that’s what it does. So we have, all schools have to publish and have on their website the standard cost of attendance. That includes build expenses like tuition and if they’re, if they have on campus housing, their room and dining [00:49:00] plan.

But then there are. Estimated expenses for things we’re not going to bill a student for, but we know that they’re going to incur that like books, um, and supplies. And so there’s a standard cost of attendance and if a student, um, ex. Is spending more, that’s when they would submit a cost of attendance, budget, appeal, we call it, or an adjustment.

Um, so just an example of Boston University, we, um, allow for a thousand dollars, $500 a semester for books and supplies. So if a student, um, spends more than that, we want to see documentation of their buying books each semester in a, in, um, excess of $500. So. Sometimes students start it and realize, oh, I actually only spent $400.

So it’s important to know what’s already in the cost of attendance and then a student can submit, um, and a reach out and we call it an appeal to increase their budget. Travel is something if a student’s coming from California, we have a standard amount that that’s definitely [00:50:00] something we can consider.

What we don’t do is look, the student says, oh look, I spent this much on this flight. In that flight we have a a, a table we use because it’s not, oh, well you waited till the last minute to buy your flight, or you that. That is not what we’re allowing for. We want to make sure we’re we’re being equitable.

And so, um, I think most schools will have information on their website about this, but it’s typically to allow students to borrow a little bit more to help, um, finance their education.

Andrea Keenan : Thank you. There. A question just came in. Can students ask for appeals throughout the school year or is there, do they have a window for that?

Rebecca Cassely: I’ll say I’m passionate you. So we have really, um, we’ve really made an effort to be a little more strict about this at Boston University. So federal wise, they can, a special or unique circumstances we can hear about throughout the year and we can see in, [00:51:00] but federal aid is limited. There’s the Pell Grant.

There are, um, federal student loans subsidized and unsubsidized and, and then some campus-based programs. So it’s very limited. Um, but we can review those throughout the year for our Boston University need-based scholarship and appealing. We want to have an appeal. And I think James really highlighted on this while that.

We want the family to make their enrollment decision based on the, with the financial aid award in mind. So we want them to consider amazing. I got in, okay, can I make it work for four years? This is my financial aid. What does that mean? Do I have, am I going to borrow or do I have savings? Do I have a five 29th or before?

Submit that enrollment deposit. We want a financial aid to be part of the decision. So we try to limit appeals to before they submit their enrollment deposit, because after which many do the. They’ve, you know, there, there’s lots of heightened emotions and maybe it’s something we can’t [00:52:00] consider, but they’re like, well, we have to, we’re coming.

So we really want to be part of the, um, enrollment decision. And an appeal might make it more financially feasible to attend that school. And that’s what we wanna do. And a denial of an appeal might make another option, um, more, more doable for the family. So that’s what we try to strive for at bu try to

Andrea Keenan : Thank you.

All right. So what’s typically not considered in appeals? I know some of you touched upon this a little bit earlier, but if you have anything else to add here, um, please do so.

Rebecca Cassely: Yeah, I love hearing about pets, but we don’t, we hear a lot about pet expenses and I a hundred percent agree, but we don’t expenses. But,

Carla Minchello: um, the only, the only one of these that, um. That we’ve really considered is, is funerals sometimes because it’s, it’s a non-discretionary expense, typically. Like you can’t, you know, you can’t control if somebody [00:53:00] dies and you have to pay for a funeral.

So we have considered those on occasion. Um, if it’s like an immediate family member and we have documentation that the family had to pay for the wedding. I, I mean, not the wedding, excuse me, the funeral. We do not consider wedding. Um, but, and then, you know, like sometimes people will send us documentation of like their, their expenses if they have like a high mortgage or a high car payment.

But that’s really, it’s really hard to consider because everybody has those types of expenses. They’re not really unusual circumstances and there is some choice involved in, you know, what you pay for these things in your life. Um, sometimes on rare occasions, um, we will consider and have considered it.

Some other schools I worked at. If somebody has a, a lot of education, previous education, loan debt, either for themselves or for, um, family members, uh, pre, you know, older siblings, et cetera, um, you know, not, there’s not always something we can do with that. It really has to be sort of an unusual situation.

Uh, we had a family this year that appealed because, uh, they’re, they had. [00:54:00] Plus loans for their previous children and, and also for themselves. They had some student loan debt and it had been paused during the pandemic. And then when the pause ended and they went back into repayment, didn’t realize it or couldn’t pay and went in, actually went into default on their student loans.

So that’s going to affect their ability to borrow loans to send their child to our school. So we did consider it an appeal for institutional funding. There’s not really much you can do with this for federal funding. You know, these are sort of like if the school will consider it. To give some additional institutional funding.

Andrea Keenan : Thank you. And then here’s our last content slide. Um, you know, many times there is a gap between what the family needs and what the amount of aid they get and therefore they might appeal and, and go through other, um, channels. But I wonder if, um, you have here, I guess any words of wisdom or tips about how to approach conversations with financial aid office, um, any guidance.

To [00:55:00] offer the family resources to help bridge gaps.

Carla Minchello: Definitely talking to the school is, is a good start. Um, you know, a lot of, a lot of financial aid offices will offer phone zoom or in-person appointments. A lot of us also now provide either online portals or award offers that sort of outline the estimated cost after financial aid. And it’s sort of.

Stunning to me. How many families don’t even look at that or read it. You know, we, we we’re under sort of a mandate from the government and from a lot of people to provide this information, but then when we do, it’s, it’s a little disheartening how few people actually look at it and read it. Um, and I know it can be confusing, but we sort of map it out for our families and so often they don’t even look at it.

So we will, when we meet with them, we will go through it all with them again as well. Um, but also when it comes to appeals, you know, it’s, it’s certainly okay for people to ask for more money, even if they don’t have a [00:56:00] typical appeal reason. Some schools will consider those, some schools won’t. Some schools will only consider specific reasons for appealing.

But at my school, for example, you know, we’ll pretty much let anybody appeal. It doesn’t mean that we’ll give them money. Um, but we’ll consider pretty much anything. And one of the things that we didn’t really talk about, but we get a lot, is competitor financial aid offers. Mm-hmm. Um, that’s a top reason why people will, will appeal because they just got a better offer from a competing school.

You know, if it’s a school that costs a lot less than us, like a state school, it’s difficult to compare sometimes. But we will consider a competitor. Award appeals. Doesn’t mean we’re gonna match the award, but we might try to bring it closer. And in order to do that, we really need the family to send us a copy of the, the offer letter from the other school.

Sometimes it’s hard to get them to do that. So, um, just another thing, when you’re working with families that, um, if a school will consider that. You know, encourage them to provide the information because we wanna see it and see if we can do anything with it. So [00:57:00]

James McGehee: important too, to. When you’re looking at those offers, make sure that you’re comparing apples to apples.

’cause I think we all present the information a little bit differently. So you, you might be looking at a, a bottom line cost. That’s not actually the bottom line cost, you know, does it include the loans? Um, some schools, package plus loans or other, um, you know, potential opportunities for financing. Um, so you just want to make sure that that’s.

You are looking at the same level for each school. Um, ’cause sometimes we’ll we’ll get an a competing offer and we’re like, well ours is actually less expensive than this one. Um, so just making sure that you’re looking at the right figures. Mm-hmm.

Andrea Keenan : Rebecca Carla James, thank you so much for sharing, um, so much of your expertise with us today.

Um, I encourage our attendees to register for upcoming MEFA Institute webinars complete our lessons, um, as. Especially if you’re a school [00:58:00] counselor. Um, we can earn PDPs by completing our Mefa Institute webinars. Um, and then please share Mefa resources with families. Um, and of course, as always, connect with us on social media.

Um, really appreciate when, um, folks, you know. Just add to the community dialogue, um, on these platforms. Um, so again, thank you to our amazing panelists and thank you for all the work you do, um, especially as students and many of these counselors, seniors are applying to, to your colleges. Thank you again, everyone.

Rebecca Cassely: Yep.

Carla Minchello: Thank you.

Rebecca Cassely: Thank

you.