Shawn Morrissey: [00:00:00] Good afternoon. Thank you for joining us for Ask an Expert, all your CSS Profile questions. My name is Shaun Morrissey. I’m the director of College Relations at MEFA, and we’re so happy to have Mike Goodwin from Williams College with us today to help with the questions. And we also have Meredith Clement, um, behind the scenes helping with questions as well.

So how to participate today, um, we do have the chat feature disabled. We do have the Q&A, um, enabled there where you can ask your questions. You can also use the live transcript feature if you want to see closed captions. We are recording this webinar, and we’ll be sending out a copy of the recording as well as the slides to everyone, um, after the webinar is completed

So just a little bit about the presenters today. Um, Mike [00:01:00] Goodwin’s the Assistant Director of Student Financial Services at Williams College. Um, I don’t know if you wanna say a little bit about yourself, Mike, and your background.

Mike Goodwin: Sure, yep. Um, hi, everybody. I think I’m glad to have you all here today, and thank you, Shawn, for inviting me.

Um, I’m the actually Senior Assistant, um, Director of Student Financial Services at Williams. Um, the… I’ve been there now going on my 10th year. Um, Williams is a small private liberal arts college out in the Berkshires in Williamstown. Um, beautiful area out here. Come out and visit

Shawn Morrissey: Thank you, Mike. And, um, I’m the director of graduations at MEFA.

I’ve been at MEFA for about four years, but do have about 30 years of experience in financial aid. So I’m happy to have Mike with us today to help answer some of your questions. Um, we’ll be going over some general questions that we received and questions that we received from the registration to start, and then we’ll also be asking your questions as you send them in to us.

Um, [00:02:00] some of those we’ll be answering behind the scenes, and then others we’ll be talking about, um, as well throughout. Just a little bit to make you familiar about MEFA before we get started. MEFA’s a state authority that was created in 1982. It was actually created at the behest of several colleges, um, in Massachusetts who petitioned the state legislature to create a body that can provide low-cost loans to families in Massachusetts.

Since then, we’ve expanded, um, to provide low-cost loans to families nationwide, as well as helping families plan, save, and pay for college. We have, um, 529 plans in Massachusetts, as well as, um… We have a lot of advice and, um, on our website, as well as webinars like this to help families plan [00:03:00] and save for college And we do have a QR code here that you can use to help you connect with MEFA and get information about planning and saving for college, as well as information about upcoming webinars such as just this one where you can, um, sign up for webinars, and you can use this QR code to sign up.

And now we’ll start with, um, asking some of the questions. So Mike, um, one of the questions that we often get about the CSS Profile is how is the situation handled for divorced families? Like, how do they report their information on the CSS Profile?

Mike Goodwin: Sure. So and, and that’s, that’s a great… I talk a little bit about the CSS Profile, and I’ll, and I’ll lead right into that question.

So the profile’s a separate application you do outside of FASFA. It’s used by 200 to 400 different colleges, universities, organizations, [00:04:00] scholarship, um, groups to kind of get a better sense of a family’s income and assets, really looking for a profile of the family. So in cases where parents are divorced, what’s different between the FAFSA and the CSS Profile is the FAFSA looks at the household the student lives in, so they’re gonna look at the income of the birth parent, and if the parent’s remarried, the step-parent.

The CSS Profile only looks at the birth parents, so there’d be the custodial parent where the household the student lives, and then the non-custodial parent. So both parents need to complete the CSS Profile. So a student will start the CSS Profile, will indicate that the parents are divorced, will share both parents’ emails, and then, um, the household the, the custodial parent where the student lives will complete doing this CSS Profile with the student, while a non-custodial parent will get access to the CSS Profile to [00:05:00] put in their information with the student’s College Board ID number connecting the two.

What’s important to know is that neither parent sees the other parent’s information, income, assets, and so on. Noncustodial, excuse me, new parents, so if a parent is remarried, their income is not, depending on the school, is not included or a small percentage of living allowance may be included into the, the decision-making and such.

Assets are split for just, you know, looking at the parents, they may be split in half. But the idea is that a cl- custodial, excuse me, the CSS Profile looks at the birth parents. In some cases, a noncustodial parent is not available to, to fill out the CSS Profile. It could be that they’re nowhere to be found, like they’ve, they’ve just left the family altogether.

They might be incarcerated. There may be a relationship [00:06:00] between the family and the noncustodial parent that creates an unsafe environment for people to reach out and have a conversation with them. In those cases, families can ask for a noncustodial waiver form, which is part of the CSS Profile, um, that they would fill out and give explanation to why we don’t have access to this parent.

And it allows for their, the student, um, to share a short little narrative, the, uh, you know, explanation of the relationship, and the colleges will decide if they want to waive that noncustodial parent or not

Shawn Morrissey: That’s great. Thanks, Mike. Um, another question is regarding assets. What needs to be reported for assets on the CSS Profile?

Mike Goodwin: Sure. Another distinction between the FAFSA and the CSS Profile is the FAFSA doesn’t ask about your home. The CSS Profile will [00:07:00] ask your home value, what you owe on your home. It may ask, in some cases, when you purchased your home and the purchase price of the home.

Um, that again, they’re just trying to put together this parent, this family profile. Um, the… Along with that, they’re gonna ask how much you have in cash and savings, checking accounts. I tell families when you’re filling out that information about how much do you have in your current savings and checking accounts, you need to look at that as a window of time, and the f- the form is asking you how much do you currently, as you’re filling out this form, how much do you have in those accounts?

What I tell families is look at that as how much do I have in my cash, my savings, my checking accounts the night before I get paid, meaning is the mortgage paid, is the rent paid, car payments are paid, insurance, utilities, is the refrigerator full of food? What is the least amount that you carry in your cash and savings and checking accounts?

And [00:08:00] use that number to report, because you don’t want to put the day you get paid, and all these accounts are full of money, knowing that it’s gonna be rolling out within the next week or so. Um, other assets that we look at are investments. So if you have retirement investments, the CSS Profile and the colleges that use that, that information are not going to use your retirement investments as an asset.

That’s your money. We’re not gonna touch that. However, outside non-qualified investments, so E-Trade, um, other, you know, stocks and stuff that you may be playing with, those are counted as investments. 529 college savings plans that you might have in place for your children to help pay for school, those need to be counted as investments as well, and you want to include those for all your children, not just the one you’re applying for college.

We’re looking at all of them. Um, when [00:09:00] schools look at your as- And then if you own a business, the value of the business and what you owe on the business. If you have another rental piece of property or a summer home someplace, the value of that, that property and what you owe on that property. When colleges look at your assets, they’re looking at adding these up, and they’re looking at 3% to 5% of those assets, and that’s what’s gonna go towards what’s called the parent contribution, how much you parents are gonna own.

We look at the asset contribution. We look at incoming c- contribution. Um, so I think when people look at their assets and they get worried about reporting them, $50,000 in investments comes to maybe- $1,000, $2,000, uh, in actual contribution. Um, the idea is to be honest and share what you have, uh, but do not answer questions that you’re not asked.

Don’t give answers that you don’t have to when filling out those assets[00:10:00]

Shawn Morrissey: Like, we have a couple of questions about how do you determine the value of your real estate. Like, what’s a good place to get that number from?

Mike Goodwin: I will… I’ll be honest with you, if we ever have questions, we go to Zillow, zillow.com, and some people say that’s an inflated number and so on. We don’t know, and I think, you know, sometimes families may be…

I know we, my own, my wife and I, we own a house. We may underreport what we think our home is worth. Zillow seems to be that, that common place to get that information. Your bank can tell you what you owe on your property, on your home. Um, you can pay for someone to come and have it assessed. You may look at your taxes.

You can find that information there. I don’t recommend having, paying someone to assess your property. Um, very seldom are we ever, I, and I’ve never known anybody ever to, if we ever have questions, to challenge what you put in there. Having said that, [00:11:00] if you say you own a four-family apartment building in, in Boston, and you’re saying it’s only worth $75,000, we’re probably gonna come back and ask you, “Can you tell us how you got that value?”

Um, and, and discuss that with you. Um, but that’s, you know, conversations to have with the offices that you’re applying to

Shawn Morrissey: Okay, this is probably, um, a more general question, but how do you determine which schools are requiring the CSS Profile?

Mike Goodwin: Yep, that’s a great question. Website. Go to your college’s website and the college you’re applying to, and go to their financial aid requirements, uh, section, and they will tell you if they just need the FAFSA or if they require the CSS Profile.

You can find the CSS Profile are gonna be more the competitive schools, schools with large [00:12:00] endowments. Um, you can do a Google search and even put in, “Does Boston College require the CSS Profile?” And you can get your answer there. On the College Board page for the CSS Profile, you can also search for your school, and it’ll list out the schools that, that require the profile.

You can find it there as well

Shawn Morrissey: Great. Thank you. Um, back to, um, assets a little bit. How do you report the value of a business? Um, how do, how would a family determine that?

Mike Goodwin: Yeah, I think, you know, it’s a good question. I think it would come down to, depending on the size of your business, if you have an accountant that you’re working with, um, they, they would g- be able to give you a value.

Um, I think when we’re looking at value of a business, you know, if you’re renting the property… My wife owns a print shop. She rents w- the property she, that she has a shop in. She rents a lot of her [00:13:00] equipment that she has, but she does own different types of things. So looking at the things that you own outright, um, and assessing a value to them.

I think if you’re a small consulting business that works out of your house, you’re not gonna have a lot of asset value, maybe a laptop. Um, if you own a construction business, uh, you know, then you have vehicles, you have trucks, you have machinery. Um, you might own an office building or something like that.

That’s where you’re gonna see a lot more of the assets. But if you ever have questions, I would say work with your accountant, um, and that should help you come up with that amount

Shawn Morrissey: Great. Thank you. And we’re having questions that if someone owns property in another country, does that still need to be reported?

Mike Goodwin: It does, yep. Yep, you wanna report if you have property in another country. Um, and it’s gonna be really on you to determine what that value is, ’cause we can’t [00:14:00] Zillow property in other, other countries, obviously. Um, so you’re gonna come up with that value, and if it’s in euros or another type of currency, then we’d ask you to convert it, um, and when you share that value.

If you don’t wa- if you can’t convert it, if you can’t convert it from euros to US dollars or whatever, you’re gonna share with us the value is in a different denomination, then we will do the conversion ourselves. But I, I would say I would look into a website that can convert, you know, money denomination so you get the, the actual number that you wanna share with us.

But it does need to be reported.

Shawn Morrissey: Great. Thank you. Um, we have a… We’re having questions about, um, biological parents who are divorced, but now they have a new partner, but they’re not married to that new partner. Does that information need to re- be reported for the non-married, um, partner? [00:15:00]

Mike Goodwin: That’s a good question.

I would say no. I would say no if you’re not married living with this domestic partner. Having said that, if you’re filing taxes together, then yes, you’re gonna wanna report them. So you may not be married, but you’re filing together. That’s a case where you’re gonna wanna report that, that, um, spouse, that step-spouse.

Um, and then so because on your taxes, we’re gonna need, we’re gonna wanna know who that other person is. We’re gonna want their W-2 information. We’ll talk about documents in a, in a while, but we’re gonna wanna know their income information so we can separate it from yours, um, and, and be fair about that.

Um, but if it’s, if it’s a just a domestic situation, not married, um, and you’re not filing taxes together, then I think, I don’t, I don’t think there’s a need to [00:16:00] report that person. If you ha- if you’re sharing assets, then when you report your assets, report your share of those assets

Shawn Morrissey: Great. Thank you. Um, now y- you brought up documentation, so can we talk a little bit about what documentation- Sure.

Yep … may be required, um, after you file the CSS Profile?

Mike Goodwin: So you’re gonna fill the CSS Profile, which is a… I just did it this morning myself just to kind of get a sense of it. It’s a very good tool. It’s a very simple tool. It’s just a very long tool. It’s a long form to fill out, and it starts with your student’s information, and then they will start asking questions about parents.

They’ll ask the student, um, a few more questions, then it’ll hand off to, to the parents, assuming the parents are married and living in the same household. Um, and then you’re gonna start filling in, in your information, um I’m sorry, Shaun. Remind me of the question. Oh, documents. I’m [00:17:00] sorry.

Shawn Morrissey: Document too,

Mike Goodwin: yes.

Yep, yep. So you’re gonna share… It’s gonna ask you questions about y- you’re, you’re gonna have your 2025 tax return with you when you fill this out, and it’ll take you line by line through your tax return asking you what your income was, if you have interest income, if you have dividend income, capital gains.

It’ll ask you all these questions, and all that’s gonna be found on your tax return. Once you complete the CSS Profile and you submit it, it’s gonna ask you to now upload your tax documents to what’s called the IDOC, I-D-O-C, which is the Institutional Document, um, Service. S- so College Board collects your tax documents.

And if you want, you can black out your Social Security numbers and birth dates, whatever you wanna do. Um, but you’re gonna upload your tax return, your W-2s, all the schedules. Um, many schools do not [00:18:00] want your state tax returns, so check with their offices, uh, as you do this. Um, and if you own a business, your business tax returns, your Form 1065s, 1120S, 1120, and the K-1s that come with them.

All these will be uploaded to College Board. They will separate it all out and then send your information to the colleges you’re applying to. We use that information to verif- to verify the information you shared on your CSS Profile. And when I say verify, it’s not that we’re trying to catch people.

Oftentimes people over report. Sometimes they… W- when you fill out the CSS Profile, um, even your tax return, you don’t include the cents. I had a family d- recently who included the cents on the tax return, so it was $150,000.35, but it came out as 1 million point 5, you know, s- and so on. So we use your tax returns to verify the information, make any corrections we need to make, [00:19:00] um, and then we have that, again, profile, right?

We want… Look at everything. We keep those as records. Um, once a student graduates, those are all done away with

Shawn Morrissey: Great. Thank you. Can you talk a little bit about, um, how families can report information that’s not asked, but if things have changed or they want to appeal a decision, how, how that process works?

Mike Goodwin: Sure. So one thing that sets a CSS Profile a- apart from the FAFSA is the FAFSA you just answer questions yes or no, you have your tax return pulled in from the IRS to the Department of Ed, and it fills in all the income information.

You put in some assets, and then you’re done. The CSS Profile allows, uh, has a section called special circumstances, and when, once you put in all your information and, and answer all the questions, it’s gonna ask you literally, “What do you want your [00:20:00] institution to know that’s not included in, on your tax return and your assets?”

And that’s where you share that, you know, the student’s grandmother lives in the household with us, or we’re supporting Grandma in a living facility and we pay $1,000 a month for her care. You might share that a parent lost their job six months ago, and that’s gonna impact our ability to pay for college.

You might share that a family parent is dealing with a serious illness, which is creating not only job loss but medical bills and so on. Again, it’s called a CSS Profile for a reason. We’re looking at a full profile of the family so colleges can make the best decisions to, to, to help you, to help you. Um, this is the place for you to give context to your family situation, and it’s incredibly helpful, um, um, for us to [00:21:00] know, to know these things as we go forward.

Shawn Morrissey: Great. Thank you. We have a lot of questions. I know you touched on this, but retirement accounts on the CSS Profile. Mm-hmm. We have a lot of questions around that, um, because they’re hearing from some schools that retirement, um, accounts are not included, yet they’re asked for on the CSS Profile. Yeah. So can you talk a little bit about that?

Mike Goodwin: Sure, yeah. So the, the answer’s really simple to that. The profile asks you, especially for first-year students, the CSS Profile has a, a version called C- CSS Profile Lite that most of your families are g- most families are gonna use when they apply. First year they’re gonna ask you about your retirement investments.

And remember, they also ask you about those non-retirement investments, and the reason that’s there is, A, getting a profile of how the family sits, but more importantly, make sure you’re not double counting your [00:22:00] retirement as an outside investment, as another investment. And we catch that quite often where families report having, you know, $2 million in investments, but nothing in retirement.

And we may go back to that family and see is this h- how you meant to put this, um, or ask questions to kind of get a better sense of retirement. So the form asks for retirement to make sure you separate what is your retirement and then what is your regular investments. Retirement is not used in decision-making.

It’s not used as an asset. It’s yours. Keep in mind, though, on your W-2 that you get annually from your employer, there’s a box 12. In that box 12 there are different codes, letter codes, that can tell us how much you’re putting in untaxed earnings towards your retirement. We do look at that. So if you make $80,000 a year, but we see [00:23:00] $15,000 as untaxed earnings that’s going towards retirement, we’re gonna count that as income, even though it’s going to your retirement.

What’s in your retirement we’re not gonna use as an asset, but we do look at your earnings, and untaxed earnings towards retirement still count as income. Um, and I know when people use the net price calculator, which I hope we talk about, Shawn, at some point, if you use the net price calculator, it asks you about those amounts, and families often miss that.

So when you do the calculator and you get a result, your actual award may be your, your, your, um, what you’re gonna pay may be more, your estimated cost, because you didn’t include that $30,000 in untaxed earnings. Um, but from a, from a, um, asset standpoint, we’re not gonna use your retirement, but we want to make sure you separate those non-retirement investments and don’t double count them

Shawn Morrissey: Okay, thank you. Um, could you [00:24:00] talk a little bit about the process for a non-custodial parent or a parent to create an account in the CSS Profile? Because I know it’s a little strange that when you’re creating an account, it looks like you’re a student, but the parent uses that same process. Can you speak to that a little bit?

Mike Goodwin: Yep. So when the s- again, when the student starts the, the… Ideally, the idea is that the student starts the process. They use their College Board ID, they begin the CSS Profile, and they’ll indicate that the parents are divorced or separated, and so they’ll share information about both parents, um, uh, usually in emails are, are the important things they look at.

The student will con- the custodial parent where the student lives, household the student lives, they’ll continue the CSS Profile. The non-custodial parent will receive an email saying that, “Mike is applying to Williams College, and we need your information for the CSS Profile. Please log in [00:25:00] here.” And you might have to start an account or, or something with a, you know, a password.

Um, but it sh- it’s pretty seamless. And then the non-custodial parent jumps in and starts filling in their information from there. Uh, if you have problems with that, you can always reach out to CSS Profile. There are all kinds of links for chat boxes or, or a phone call, uh, and they’re more happy to help you.

Um, or you can contact the college you’re applying to and say you’re having trouble, um, starting your account on the CSS Profile. It should be pretty easy to do. Um, I know that the r- recommendation I say with my, share with my parents is that non-custodial parents should be having conversations with the student to make sure that they’re on the right page and, and, um, and, um, help, he- help them kinda go through that.

‘Cause the student’s helping the parents in the household, ideally they can help the non-custodial parent as well if they need [00:26:00] it.

Shawn Morrissey: Great. And can the non-custodial parent start their section before the student does theirs?

Mike Goodwin: No. Student’s gotta start. N- even the custodial parent can’t start their section.

Student needs to start. Now, many parents just start, they do this ’cause they have the student information, they’ll start it anyway. Um, but the non-custodial parent can’t just start a, an application until the student invites them to, to be part of it. And again, that invitation, s- excuse me, College Board CSS Profile will invite that parent because the student’s indicated parents are divorced, non-custodial parent lives in a different household.

This is the email to contact them

Shawn Morrissey: Great. Thank you. And we’ve had a few questions about how 529 plans that are owned by the grandparent are reported on the CSS Profile.

Mike Goodwin: It’s my favorite question. It comes up every year we do this, and, [00:27:00] um, and it’s a great question. So this becomes a, um… Different colleges might look at it differently. This is how I explain it to my families.

If you have a grandparent who’s opened a 529 account for your student, or it could be children, it could be multiple children, and they’ve started a 529 account for them, the CSS Profile may ask about, um… It doesn’t ask about 529 plans, but it may ask about other resources and stuff. The rule of thumb is, my understanding is, that 529 belongs to grandma or grandpa.

It’s their account. It’s their asset, their resource. CSS Profile is not asking about grandparent assets or resources, so that’s their money. So you do not have to report that, and the student will have access to it, and that’s fine, [00:28:00] but it’s a grandparent’s asset. Colleges may say it’s a resource for the students to use, but I know there’s been a lot of conversation about maybe that’s another person’s assets.

It’s not the, the household family’s assets. So my advice would be you do not have to report it. Um, you might come ac- And, and if, if a college you’re going to finds out that grandma has this and whatever, you can go back and say, “Well, my Goodwin said this.” Um, it is a debate that goes on between colleges, but I think the prevailing thought is it’s the grandparent’s asset and you do not have to report it

Shawn Morrissey: Great.

Thank

Mike Goodwin: you I don’t mean to make it more confusing than it actually is, um, but it’s, it’s a, it’s a great question that we talk about at conferences frequently

Shawn Morrissey: Okay. And you talked a little bit about the Net Price Calculator. Yeah. Can you talk a little bit about how that works in conjunction with the CSS Profile? [00:29:00]

Mike Goodwin: So College Board, um, again, the company that really owns the CSS Profile, they do the Common App, which your student will probably be using to apply to different colleges.

They do the IDOC system. They also offer, depending on the colleges, uh, who they use it or not, have, uh, let me … They have the Net Price Calculator. Every college in the country has to have a Net Price Calculator on their website. I will say, ’cause I look at a lot of them, some are much better than others.

And when you start looking at schools using the CSS Profile, many of them have the College Board Net Price Calculator. So I love the calculator ’cause it gives you a chance to go in to put in your 2025 information from your tax return, to share your assets. If your student has a tax return, they’ll share their information, um, as well, and their assets, and it gives you an estimate of what to expect for their first [00:30:00] year of college.

Um, and that’s really, really helpful. The- issue with net price calculator, with all the net price calculators is that there’s so many different types of families. We’ve discussed families that are divorced. So if you’re divorced or separated, the household that the student lives in might do it with that parent, but to get the actual parent contribution, you need the non-custodial parent to do their own net price calculator to get an estimate, and then you- there’s gotta be some kind of conversation regarding what’s that total cost.

‘Cause the college is gonna look at custodial parent, non-custodial parent, both are gonna have contributions, add those two together for the total contribution. Um, the net price calculator is a great tool, but everyone has a little bit of fine print that says it’s really not designed if you have businesses, especially an entailed business that has a lot of, you know, its own tax return and, and different [00:31:00] things going on.

If you have multiple businesses, um, that’s where things get a little bit harder, and my advice is reach out to the schools you’re applying to and say, “We’re doing a net price calculator, but we have a business and I don’t see it just being reflected on the calculator. Can you help us with it?” And ideally they’re gonna put the time in to help you s- understand how to use that.

Um, my vi- I always say if you’re applying to schools, use the calculator to get a sense of what to expect. Um, uh, especially if you’re applying early decision, and those decisions are often binding. The one way to get out of those decisions is if the cost is prohibitive. So use the calculator to, to, um, um, make sure that the school is something that you can afford or, you know, at least work with.

Um, on the CSS Profile, this question’s gonna be there, Shawn, ’cause it comes up every year we do this. There’s a question on the [00:32:00] profile saying, that says basically how much can you expect from your parents to pay for college?

Meredith Clement: Mm-hmm.

Mike Goodwin: And basically the question is to the parents, how much are you willing to pay for college?

Most colleges are not gonna use that or hold you to that number, but what’s nice is that if you have the net price calculator, you’ve done it, you know what to expect, that’s the amount that you would put in there. And I know with my families that I work with, if the number we come up with, I will look at that number, and if they’re close, then that’s good, then that’s good.

If I come out and the family needs to pay $30,000 a year and they thought they were only gonna pay $1,500 a year, we have a big disparity there. Um, if they thought they’re gonna pay $90,000 a year and they’re only paying $30,000 a year, I’m very happy. Um, and so are they. So I think the calculator’s a good t- it, it, you know, it’s, it’s quick to use.

Some schools will have different variations of it, uh, but the [00:33:00] net price calculator is just something just used to kinda get a sense before you start getting, diving into all this, uh, the forms and such

Shawn Morrissey: Great, thanks. There’s another question. Um, are there specific questions for specific colleges that are asked on the CSS Profile? Like are there additional questions they may expect, and if they go in and add other schools, will they be asked additional questions?

Mike Goodwin: Yeah, no, that’s a good question. So you’re going to, when you fill out the CSS Profile, you’re gonna indicate, before you even get into a lot of the information, your student is gonna indicate the colleges they want this information sent to.

So it might be Framingham State, Merrimack, Williams College. Um, sometimes colleges are going to ask additional questions outside the C- CSS Profile. For example, do you plan to live on [00:34:00] campus or commute? Um, some may ask about, um, a GPA average, um, to see if the student’s in line for, for, um, any kind of additional merit.

Um, some schools I’ve seen ask the values of automobiles. Those are few and far between, but I’ve seen them. Um, again, trying to get a better sense of the family and what’s going on. Um, so yes, so some are gonna add, ask additional questions if you’ve… But they’ll be tied to the schools that you’ve listed.

So Merrimack might ask, “Are you gonna, do you plan to live on campus?” Where William and Framingham, Framingham probably doesn’t use the CSS Profile, but, um, Williams, it’s a four-year agreement that you live on campus, so we’re not gonna ask that question. Um, so yeah, so sometimes those additional questions will be there, um, and it’s just ’cause schools are trying to get the best information about you that they can.[00:35:00]

Shawn Morrissey: Okay, thanks. And can you add colleges after you complete the CSS Profile? Can you

Mike Goodwin: go back? Sure, yep. So when you do the CSS Profile, it’s, the cost is $25 for the initial school that you’re applying to, and then $16 for every college after that. If you’re a family that makes less than $100,000 a year, those fees are waived, and they know that because you don’t get charged until you submit the CSS Profile.

It’ll add up all the schools. But if you shared in your application that you made $100,000 or less than $100,000, then those fees will be waived. You can always go back and add additional schools. You can, and I don’t remember, I don’t know if things have changed or not, but it used to be there was a limit of schools you could apply to.

Maybe it was the FAFSA, there was a limit. You can, you can, as long as the school has your [00:36:00] information, you can cancel them from your list and then add new schools. Um, I only, I can’t… It’s been a while since I’ve looked at that in the profile. I don’t think there’s a limit. I think you can do as many as you want.

Um, but the, the idea is, you know, the, the cost and the fees, and just being aware of that and, and what that looks like. But if you make under $100,000, those fees are waived

Shawn Morrissey: Great. Thank you. What should a family do if their income has changed considerably since the 2025 taxes that are being asked for- Yeah … on the profile?

Mike Goodwin: Great question. So when you’re filling out the CSS Profile, you’re gonna submit your tax return, you’re gonna fill in your 2025 information. All of a sudden, and it’s gonna ask you how much did parent one earn, how much did parent two earn.

Then all of a sudden you’re gonna see that, you know, then you’ll go through all the other questions about your income and everything else. [00:37:00] Then all of a sudden you’ll see the question again, how much did parent one earn, how much did parent two earn? I did this today, and I’m like, “I’ve already answered that.”

I had to go back and double-check. The profile will ask you how much do you think you’ll earn in 20– for the 2020– in 2026. So you’ve already shared your 2025, now it’s asking you to anticipate what you think you’ll earn in 2026 for both parents. And then it’ll ask you, “What do you think you’ll make in 2027?”

And then you’ll share those numbers. So with that, what, what they’re looking for is if you, you’ve shared your 2025 information, there may have been a job shift, there may have been a loss of a job. If you know that’s happening in 2026, they have that information from you. You’ve shared the, the numbers with them, with them.

You’re also gonna share that in special circumstances that we talked about earlier, but Mom lost her job in February of 2026 and has not been [00:38:00] reemployed. But again, the term profile, the schools are really trying to get this look at, at their families, and they’re– so they’re looking for at least three years’ worth of information, in 2025, 2026, and in 2027, knowing that ’26 and ’27 are really just estimates at this point

Shawn Morrissey: Great. Thank you. When we were talking about, um, the documents that are required by schools, and you spoke about IDOC, are there schools that don’t use IDOC, and what would the process look like for them?

Mike Goodwin: Yeah. There, there may be. I, I really don’t know. Um, that’s something you’d wanna ask the colleges if they don’t ask, if they don’t require the IDOC.

Um, there may be other information they want. Um, I, I, I think those… I don’t know what those, who those schools are. Um, ideally, ideally, excuse me, many of the colleges you’re gonna be applying to using CSS Profile are having you [00:39:00] reapply each year. So you apply this year using 2025, and we use what’s just like the FAFSA, prior, prior year.

If you’re starting the fall of 2027, we’re looking at 2025 taxes, ’cause we know those should be done by now. Uh, although there’s still people, including myself, who are, who are doing their taxes in October. Um, the… I’m sorry. I get talking, and I forgot the question again, Shaun. What was the-

Shawn Morrissey: Um, schools that don’t use IDOC, will

Mike Goodwin: they require- Sure, yeah, yeah

so. Some schools will just have you do the first year, and they’ll come up with a number, and that’s the number for four years. Um, so you don’t reapply. They’re gonna ask for tax returns. Most private schools are gonna look for tax returns just to verify the information. If your school you’re applying to is not asking for the tax returns and stuff, I would ask, I would just clarify that with them, and then you don’t have to, I guess you don’t have to share with them.

Uh, but there might be [00:40:00] other ways they’re trying to get information from you, and I’d just be aware of that

Shawn Morrissey: Thank you. So the, the question about medical and dental expenses is that, um, what should be reported there? Is it just- Yeah … for families that have really high out-of-pocket expenses? Like, what should families include in that question?

Mike Goodwin: Sure. So yeah, and so it is a high out-of-pocket and what you’re paying outside of insurance.

Um, it’s not what you’re paying for insurance, it’s what you’re paying, it’s what you’re paying out of pocket. Having said that, if you’re self-employed and you’re paying your own medical costs, then make sure, again, special circumstances or put that number in the medical/dental line because you’re paying out of pocket for your health insurance.

You don’t have an employer who’s paying for that, so you wanna share that with, with them. Those people who use the, um, [00:41:00] the standard deductions, usually there’s like an amount that’s just general for families of, you know, uh, typical incomes and so on. And then other families use what’s called the Schedule A, where you break down your, your deductions, your standardized, um, numbers.

And on that form, Schedule A, the very first number, it asks for medical costs. What have you paid in medical, and those are usually gonna be higher amounts. That number is what you would use in the medical, uh, the medical/dental field, um, if you have a Schedule A that has that amount. Again, we collect your tax returns.

When we go through analyzing your information, if you don’t put it there, we’re gonna see that and we’re gonna add it there ideally. Um, the… Some schools are just gonna take, if you put $3,000, $4,000, $5,000, they’ll just accept it. When you start getting to tens of thousands, $20,000 or more, schools may request documentation, [00:42:00] um, regarding what, what those costs are for.

And then that’s again, a re- a reason to use the special circumstances to explain that, that if someone has an illness in the family, it has a ongoing cost. Um, or it might be if it’s a very private, um, reason for those costs, again, contact those, the financial aid office and have that conversation with them, and they’ll tell you the best way to, to follow up with that.

Shawn Morrissey: Great. Thanks, Mike. Also, um, should students list any scholarships that they earned on the CSS Profile?

Mike Goodwin: I guess they can if they want to. I don’t, I don’t think you need to because if you’re, if you’re applying, you’re filling the CSS Profile, you know, it opened October 1st for early decision students. You know, they’re gonna have dates, or in early action and so on, they’re gonna have dates by January, February.

And [00:43:00] even regular decision, you need to have everything in by a certain date. Most students don’t know what scholarships they’re gonna be receiving, and if they have, if they know they have one now but they may have three or four later, that’s just more paperwork and stuff. I, I… My advice is don’t report those scholarships, and other schools may disagree with me, but I wouldn’t report those scholarships until the student is accepted, and then colleges have a process where they reach out to students to ask them to share any outside scholarships they’re receiving, and then you report them then.

And usually, because a lot of those scholarships come in senior nights in May or June, um, or applications are, have due dates in March or April that, so they’re not gonna see those until late spring, early summer anyway

Shawn Morrissey: Okay, thank you.

Mike Goodwin: Now, Shawn, can I add to that though?

Shawn Morrissey: Sure.

Mike Goodwin: If your family has… If you’re a veteran family and you have Yellow Ribbon, um, program benefits or, or other [00:44:00] military type of benefits like that, share that in that special circumstances section. There might be, I think there’s a section for veteran families to, to add that as well, ’cause colleges are gonna wanna know that as they’re working through your, your, um, applications

Shawn Morrissey: Great, thanks. So when it comes to reporting, um, the values on assets, what kind of proof do, do families get to send into that? Do they take screenshots, like after they pay all their bills? They s- Are they going to have to send in, you know, account statements? What kind of information is usually- Yeah … asked for that?

Mike Goodwin: When you do the profile, it doesn’t ask for you to share any information, any, any bank statements or, or such. Um, individual colleges might ask for that. Um, I know where I [00:45:00] work, we don’t. The system is set up to be fair to families, but also there’s a bit of an honor system involved with this. So when you are reporting these numbers to us, um, we expect them to be valid numbers.

So, and I, I can’t speak for all my colleagues, but I know most, I know, who I know and I’ve spoken to and spare, spend time with, we do not wanna be chasing that paperwork down or put you in positions to have to find this information. Um, so you’re gonna share it with us and, and let us know. Um, I’ll share a little secret with you all.

Um, on your tax return, line 2B and 3B are your interest, um, that you, that you, you get from your checking and savings account, and then your, um, dividends that you get from your investments. And I’ve had families who have, with the two combined, maybe $60,000 in interest income and dividends, but then they report they have $500 [00:46:00] in their bank and no investments.

The two can’t really be true. Now, we’re looking at taxes from two years ago, right, 2025, when you’re applying for fall 2027, and maybe that money all evaporated, but that kind of dis- discrepancy between having all these dividends and interest income from your checking and savings accounts and saying you have minimal savings and no investments, that’s gonna raise a red flag.

You probably will receive an email from the school saying, “Can we discuss this?” Um, and kind of get a sense. Or some schools use a percentage that, um, then they’ll just come up and add those investments and, and, and, um, um, savings that are more in line with those reporting on a tax return. So I think this goes back to when you report your stuff, be honest, ’cause you don’t, you don’t wanna start this relationship off with a college that’s already got people asking questions [00:47:00] about reporting and such.

Sometimes mistakes are made, 100% understand that. Um, but that, that, do the best you can.

Shawn Morrissey: Thank you. There’s a, a follow-up on the medical and dental expenses. Do you include expenses that are not on tax returns?

Mike Goodwin: Um, yeah. I, I, you know, it’s

We’re looking at your 2025 income. When we start look- and then but we’re looking at your assets that you have currently today. When we’re looking at medical expenses, we’re really looking back at that tw- what you spent in 2025. Again, looking at that Schedule A of your tax return. So medical is really looking at 2025 expenses.

What’s hard for families is I’m putting out these medical expenses out today, so th- the profile, just like it does with your income, it [00:48:00] asks about medical expenses in 2026, expected 2027, and the colleges will decide how they want to use that information. Um, because maybe 2025 you had a great income, but the illness didn’t come until 2026, and that’s where the expenses are.

So what a lot of schools will have you do is share your 2026 information, your tax return, when that’s completed, and then we can look at that income and, and compare the medical costs to that and use it that way. I think, Shawn, we didn’t really talk about appeals and such, but I’ll just put a, a plug in.

If you do your 2025 and you look at your income and you know, and I just had a conversation this morning with a family, that 2026 is gonna be much less because you had a huge capital gains or you had a, a retirement distribution that you took that’s a one-time event, then colleges are wanna, uh … usually are very happy about when 2026 is done, [00:49:00] share that information with us on an appeal, and most colleges will use 2026 information in place of 2025 ’cause we want to give you the best deal that we can.

We want to give you the best aid that we can. So if you know 2026 is gonna be less, right now today you know your income is less, my advice to all families is get your tax return done as quick as you can, um, so that you can do these appeals, um, and have it done before the bills come out in, in May or June.

Shawn Morrissey: Great. Thanks. Can you talk a little bit about how schools look at financial need when it comes to admissions decisions, and if that affects what the admissions decision is based on a student’s financial need? Sure.

Mike Goodwin: Yeah. So there are two types of schools that looks at this. It’s either need aware or need blind.

And the difference is schools that are need aware might make their admissions decision based on your need for [00:50:00] aid. That doesn’t mean they’re not gonna accept them, it doesn’t mean they’re not gonna give you aid. But schools, there are some schools that have a limited amount of funds that they can share to, um, uh, to provide aid to, to families, so that’s the need aware.

My situation, I have two daughters who are two and through college and are adults and married and have great lives now. But when my oldest was applying to schools, she got wait listed at two very, very good institutions. But they made it very clear, “You’re on the wait list, we’d love to have you, but there’s no financial aid.”

So they’re so, they’re, so you can come, but you, we’re n- we can’t support you. So I think schools that are need aware are just going to use, if it’s a student who’s just kind of on the fence and we like them, but we’re not sure, well, they need a lot of money in financial aid, then the decision may, may skew that way.

Schools that are need blind, which are [00:51:00] a lot of the CSS Profile schools, are not gonna look at the admissions, admissions is not gonna look at the financial aid, and they’re two separate parallel processes, and your student is filling out the, the Common App and applying and doing the essays and doing all they need to do to sell themselves to get in while the financial aid office is looking what that family needs to support them financially to, to, to be successful at, at that institution.

Um, so it really kind of depends on the schools. My advice is always look at the deadlines. If you have a family that really is interested in financial aid and, and it’s important to you, look at your college’s deadlines, get your stuff in early, um, because if you wait till the very end or just meet the deadline or heaven forbid, miss a deadline, then those funds may not be available to you.

So get them in early. Doesn’t mean you have to apply early decision or, or early action, but you just want to look at the schools, and every school has its own dates and own processes. Look at [00:52:00] those, become familiar with them, and make sure you hit ev- all those deadlines long before the deadlines to get yourself in good position

Shawn Morrissey: And if you are applying early decision, but the aid is drastically different from what you expected, how do you address that?

Mike Goodwin: So yeah, again, this is the, the, I… You know, my world where I work at Williams, the net price calculator. You’ve done the net price calculator, um, and, and you feel comfortable with that number, and then the school comes up with a very drastically different number, that’s where you make phone calls to the offices and say, “You know, this is, you know, Mike’s dream school.

It’s where he really wants to go, but the cost is not there. We did the calculator. We came up with this number.” And kind of put their feet to the fire to look at what they were looking at. Families with businesses, this is a big important piece to remember, [00:53:00] families with businesses, you can write off things like use of your car, depreciation, if you use your home as an office.

You can write all these things off, utilities, because you use your home. You can use these write-offs to ha- to help with your tax liability, which is great, but not all families can write… I can’t write my car off to go to work every day. I work from home today. I can’t write my home office off on my tax return.

So out of fairness, those c- those costs that you’re writing off, those are paper costs, are gonna be added back. So when you do the, the calculator, you’re not really gonna see those things unless you’re aware of it. Um, so I think those… So when the costs that are different, that’s could be the reason why.

That, and I always tell the story, I had a family who we did the calculator, and they came out, and they were very happy, and then the award came [00:54:00] out, and they got no aid, and they looked at the CSS Profile and found out that they had a house on Cape Cod, a summer house on Cape Cod that they never told me about when we did the calculator.

So make sure you know all your properties. Don’t forget the summer home or anything like that. That’s what… The calculator is a great tool, but you gotta make sure you’re counting everything, and that’s where, again, accountants, financial advisors, MEFA, FASFA Days, any of these opportunities to get help with, with understanding your costs are, are really, really helpful

But you can always appeal. You can always put in for an appeal to look at things.

Shawn Morrissey: Okay, thank you. And a couple questions about do you report raises on… Like, if you have an, if you’re anticipating a raise or you know that your union has a step up each year, does that need to be reported on the CSS Profile?

Mike Goodwin: So again, you’re gonna use [00:55:00] 2025 information. You have the tax return, you have those numbers. It’s gonna ask you about ’26, what ’26 looked like, and then what 2027 looks like. If you know you’re in line for a raise or promotion, that should be part of your anticipated income for those future years. Um, I would not put in special circumstances that I’m expected a pay, a bonus or whatever next year of $20,000.

Do not answer questions you are not asked. So I don’t think you need to share that. Again, 2025 information is already laid out. If you know you’re in line for something for 2026, then you just put the anticipated amount in. We’re not gonna use 2026 to make a determination on your aid for this year, ’cause we’re all using 2025 information.

We don’t know what the end of 2026 is gonna look like. A family could lose a job, that promotion could be wiped out because of changes, [00:56:00] all those kinds of things. So we don’t wanna use anything that’s anticipated at this point. Um, and I don’t think you need to share anything more than what you know that my income’s gonna be up in 2027, and this is what I’m expecting it to be, or 2026.

Shawn Morrissey: Okay

For, um, you, you talked about VA benefits. If a student’s expecting benefits from both their father and stepfather, how, how is that reported or how should that be reported? Yeah.

Mike Goodwin: So remember, the stepfather’s not gonna count ’cause we’re only looking at the birth parents. So stepfather might have benefits and such.

I would say contact your school that you’re interested in and see if they would do anything with that. Um, if it’s a FAFSA-only school, then that probably would be taken into account. But if it’s a CSS Profile school, they aren’t gonna look at the stepfather unless the stepfather’s [00:57:00] adopted your student, and so they’re legally adopted by them.

Um, if the parent has these benefits, check their websites, but I would, I would just go to the school because every school has their own unique way of dealing with, with, uh, VA benefits. Um, and it’s, it’s a great benefit to have. But some families, you know, I’ll be honest with you, there are some families who have like the Yellow Ribbon who want to use that, uh, that program, but their jobs and their income are so high that they, the, the program’s not gonna make a difference.

Um, so I’d check with the school and ask them. Um, I, I struggle with our own school’s policies trying to figure it out, so I would say by all means check with the school and see how they deal with it

And my struggle in my school just because it’s confusing and I just, it’s hard for me to follow it sometimes. So go ahead, Shawn. I’m sorry.

Shawn Morrissey: Yes, thanks. Um, so we’re almost at the hour now. We [00:58:00] have, like, a minute left. I don’t see any other additional questions out there. Meredith, um, is there anything that we missed that you saw in the questions that we should address?

Meredith Clement: I think we covered most everything that we weren’t able to answer right in the Q&A, so thanks, Mike. Great job. So much good information- Yeah … and so many questions. Thank you. So this was fabulous.

Shawn Morrissey: Thanks so much. And again, we’ll be co- sending out a copy of the recording to everyone within the next day or so.

So if you missed a question, you’ll be able to listen to that, um, during the recording, and we’ll send that out as soon as we can. And thank you for joining us. Also, if you have additional questions, um, you can contact MEFA. We do have, um, a contact number, and you can use- All of our information on our website at mefa.org.

You can give us a call, and we can help you out with that. We can also set up one-on-one appointments if you have [00:59:00] specific questions that you need help through. And thank you again, Mike, for sharing all your great expertise with us today. Um-

Mike Goodwin: My pleasure.

Shawn Morrissey: Thank you … some valuable information. And thank you.

Mike Goodwin: Good luck, folks