Please note that this transcript was auto-generated. We apologize for any minor errors in spelling or grammar.

[00:00:00] And I started the CEO of Mass Edco on behalf of MEFA, mass Edco, uh, and our sponsors, MEFA and Webster five Foundation. I wanna welcome you to our webinar financing, a post-secondary education from start to finish. Originally it was gonna be from soup to nuts, but I was showing my age, so we went to start to finish.

Um, a little bit about mass edco. Uh, we’ve been around for over 50 years. Uh, we are primarily federally funded, uh, and our agency was founded to provide education and career readiness services for low income first gen students who are, um, underrepresented and marginalized. We serve about 12,000, uh, youth and adults throughout the state through our programs, which include Talent Search, educational Opportunity Center, and uh, partnership with, uh, the state with, uh, gear Up.

Back in, uh, 2018, uh, the [00:01:00] state of Massachusetts passed a bill, uh, to take a look at, uh, working with our school districts on financial literacy. Uh, and while there isn’t a mandate, uh, in terms of curriculum, you know, we’re seeing a slow and steady increase in the amount of financial literacy that’s being offered in our schools.

Uh, but I think we know that it’s probably not enough yet. As a matter of fact, in Worcester there was a survey of one of the, uh, needs that students saw, and one of the top three needs was for additional financial literacy. And obviously in the work that we do, uh, you know, we’re particularly interested in how to help students, uh, both, uh, those traditional age and older, uh, to make sound academic, career, and financial decisions as it relates to a post-secondary education.

So we hope you enjoy today’s webinar. It should be thorough. Uh, hopefully you’ll walk away with a few more nuggets, uh, that you may not already [00:02:00] have. Um, and, uh, we’ll be taking questions at the end. I’m gonna turn it over to Julie, our moderator, uh, to introduce our panel and we’ll get going. Thanks Julie.

Thank you so much, mark. And I’m Julie Shields. Rina, the director of college planning, education and training at MEFA, and I will serve as your moderator today. So we are so lucky to have this terrific knowledgeable panel to cover this topic of financial literacy. So you’ll hear from aah. Joseph, who is MEFA Pathway program manager at MEFA and my colleague.

You’ll heal hear from Dr. Tim Pointin, who’s associate professor at UMass Boston. You’ll hear from Bill Smith, who’s assistant Vice President of Student Financial Assistance at Stonehill College. Um, you will hear from Mark who you know now is the CEO of Mass Edco and from Ebony Marcala, who is the director of [00:03:00] financial aid at Boston College.

So because we have a, um, a large panel and so much to cover, we are going to hold questions until the end. But please put your questions in the q and a and I will keep track of those. And then we will have a discussion, um, after the panel presents all of all of their information. And with that, I will, I I will also tell you I am recording this and afterwards we’ll we’ll follow up.

We’ll send the recording, we can send the slides, and we’ll send, uh, a document with a lot of follow up links about the things that we’re gonna talk about today. So with that, I will turn it over to the panel and please include your questions as they, as they come up so you don’t forget them. And we’ll, we’ll make sure to have that discussion at the end.

Thanks. So Aila, good morning everyone. Thank you so much for joining. Uh, so I’m gonna go ahead and share my screen.[00:04:00]

So for, for my piece of this morning, uh, I really wanna focus on what you can do to start early with students. In terms of financial literacy. So to start, I have a little bit of a story. Uh, prior to joining mefa, I worked in Springfield Public Schools. Uh, I worked with US Aspire as a college affordability advisor, and then I oversaw Springfield Public Schools College financial aid advising program.

So my first year working with students with US, aspire, uh, I had a senior, and this is probably a familiar story for many folks who are working with students. Uh, we were looking at some of her financial aid offers. You know, she had her heart set on one particular college. Uh, some background on this student.

She had a zero EFC, um, so not a lot of, um, financial wiggle, wiggle room for her family. So she had a gap of about $30,000 to attend this school. She was already planning on taking out her federal student loans. Uh, and so she kind of just said, oh yeah, I’ll just get another loan [00:05:00] for it. No problem. I was like, are you sure?

Um, let’s call dad. Let’s bring dad in on the conversation. Uh, so we called dad and she’s like, yeah, dad, you know, we can just take out another loan. No problem. And dad was like, who’s gonna take out another loan? Not me. Um, so he was like, Ms. Joseph, tell her, explain to her. Uh, and so this is a really common scenario that many of our seniors face, not just in Massachusetts, but across the country where we’re asking students to, you know, figure out what college they’re gonna go to, but also understand that financial piece.

Uh, and so for many students, that’s challenging. You know, for many students, they haven’t even really looked at a budget yet. Maybe their only experience with financial literacy is attending like a, and those became very popular, especially. And they’re wonderful, but there’s a lot more that we can do with our students to introduce this concept to them much earlier.

And so really what we wanna do, especially with middle school [00:06:00] students, is start to provide little nuggets of information that they can build upon as they move throughout their years in school. So that way as a senior, when you’re talking about, you know, what your college bill will look like, they’ll have a better understanding of what it means to take out a student loan, what repayment will look like, what your life finances will look like post-college.

So to do that, uh, as part of MFA’s suite of resources, uh, MEFA offers MEFA Pathway, which is a cost free college and career web planning portal. Um, it’s a wonderful tool, very similar to, um, other planning portals that some high schools might have. Uh, but of course, as I said, MEFA Pathway is cost free. Um, so whether your school uses another portal, you are still welcome to utilize me the pathway.

And so one thing we did this year that was a little bit different with Mefa Pathway is we really revamped the curriculum as part of Mefa Pathway. We provide [00:07:00] free curriculum lesson plans for counselors and advisors to use with students. As my cap grows in popularity across the state, financial literacies growing in popularity, we really wanna provide resources for counselors, educators to use with students.

Um, and so we completely revamp the curriculum. I’m gonna give you just a little tease. Um, so for our middle school grades, we offer a 10 lesson curriculum sequence. Um, all of the lessons correspond to different activities within NEFA Pathway, which we’ll see in just a moment. But we thought this be. One helpful way to package things nicely.

Sometimes I always joke that, you know, within nefa pathway we like throw everything plus the kitchen sink at you and it can be overwhelming. Um, so we really put together a thoughtful sequence of curriculum lessons that counselors, educators can use to move students through the platform. And in doing so, we’re introducing [00:08:00] things such as financial literacy and smaller digestible nuggets for students.

So this is an example of what like a seventh grade curriculum sequence would look like. Um, and so a school, you know, we would meet with you, we would develop your scope and sequence and so you can kind of select the curriculum lessons that will work for your school. Uh, but we also made sure to include financial literacy lessons.

And so our lessons are really chock full of various activities that students can do within the platform, which is wonderful. Um, and so, you know, there’s four different parts to our lessons. So this is something that a school can even break up and do over time, um, or just do in smaller chunks. And again, we made sure to include financial literacy lessons for every grade level because again, these are things that we want students to continue to build their knowledge over time as they move through school.

So I’m gonna jump into the Mefa Pathway portal. [00:09:00] I’m gonna jump into my middle school account. And one thing I wanna highlight about Mefa Pathway is what students start in middle school will carry over to high school. Um, so they’re not losing any of their work. Um, so that’s a really good, good feature. I also wanna point out that we have site translation into six different languages, which is especially important.

Um, we wanna make sure that it’s something accessible and that will meet the needs of all students. Um, so students are able to select whatever language applies to them. And the site will translate some of the static boxes. Um, they won’t translate, but the actual activities, the questions that students are being asked will translate.

So I just wanted to call attention to that. But within Mefa Pathway, this is the middle school portal and the high school portal, we have all sorts of, you know, financial calculators, loan cost estimators, um, college compare calculators. So the high school portal is chockfull of, of a lot of that [00:10:00] information.

But within the middle school portal, we really wanted to focus on career exploration. So helping students explore and figure out what might they want to do, um, what might they want to pursue in college, what their career might look like. Um, so we provided a lot of awesome games and activities that really allowed students to explore, figure it out.

Um, but we also made sure to infuse Financial Liter literacy into the platform. So as you can see, we have a pay for College tab. And so on this page, one of the great activities that we have is a sample budget activity. And so this is something when I was meeting with that, that student that I mentioned at the start, I was like, oh goodness, I wish even like a simple budget conversation with this student would’ve been so helpful to have upfront so she could understand like if you’re taking out your federal student loan and you’re talking about getting another $30,000 loan just for your first year of college, [00:11:00] you’re not gonna have any money to live off of once you graduate and you have to work in the real world.

So starting off with students early and introducing some of these even just simple concepts such as budgeting. Um, and so we do it fun. We have allowance in here. We have cell phone, clothes, video games. In some ways it’s a little lighthearted, but this is for middle school students. We wanna introduce the concept.

’cause once they’re introduced to the concept and you continue to build on this over time. When you go and you look at a loan cost estimator calculator or some of the other tools that we have in the platform, it’ll make more sense because it’s not like they’re seeing it for the first time. They’re gonna understand the larger concept.

Um, so this is one activity that we have within the middle school portal. Um, the other thing that I do want to show, um, is our investigate your future activities. And so we have four different activities within Investigate your Future and all this ties [00:12:00] into forward thinking what your future is going to look like.

Um, so we have within our four different activities, we have now trending or students can see the top trending skills and occupations in today’s market. Looking ahead, which is a really great activity as well, where students are able to explore current and forecasted in demand career opportunities. So as students are doing that career exploration, one thing you wanna know, are you looking at a growing career field?

Are you gonna have a job when you graduate from college? What’s that going to look like? Um, so students are able to do some of that through these activities that we have within NEPA Pathway. We also have popular places for students who are like, I am leaving Massachusetts, I’m going out to California, and I want to be this career.

Well. Does that make sense? Um, so we we’re providing a lot of forward thinking activities for students. Um, but really what I wanna underscore is we have this awesome new curriculum that’s making it much easier for [00:13:00] educators, counselors to work with students and introduce new topics, financial literacy, so students understand and have the building blocks that they’ll need.

To really be successful and understand the concepts that they’re gonna face as a senior in high school. How am I doing on time, Julie? Okay. Um, so, oh, and our, I missed one activity. Career path is another great activity that we have within the Investigate Your Future suite of activities where, you know, many students start off saying, I wanna be this particular career.

Um, and maybe they don’t have the grades to pursue that major in college. Um, or, you know, life happens and, you know, you don’t always follow the trajectory that you set for yourself. Uh, so Career Path is another great activity that allows students to, um, look and see that there’s more than one set path to get to where you wanna [00:14:00] go.

And sometimes your path might change and that’s okay. Um, and it allows students to find, um, related careers.

So with that, that’s me a pathway in a nutshell. Um, our high school portal has an expanded suite of activities as it relates to, you know, comparing different colleges, comparing financial aid offers, looking at loan cost estimators. Uh, so me a pathway is chock full of resources, but we do make sure to pair down the middle school so that way students are really seeing activities that directly relate to where they’re currently at in school.

And so with that, I’m gonna turn it back over to Julie

and we’ll hear from Tim. Thank you, Alila.

Great. Thank you. Um. Happy to be here with, with so many of you this morning. Gonna [00:15:00] talk a little bit about some work that my colleagues and I have been doing. Um, we’ve created this, uh, student focused workbook called College Un Maed. Um, I’m gonna try to go through it kind of quickly focusing on the, the financing side of things here.

There is a, a link at the end of the presentation, we’ll provide a link later. Um, the, the full version of the presentation about what we call the lead strategy and the six keys of college fit is actually, um, available through the Metha Institute. So, um. That will be available here, um, shortly if you’d like to, to learn more about the lead strategy and the six keys of college fit.

But, um, but, uh, uh, kind of a funny story, timely story. I went Christmas shopping with my daughter last night. Uh, she’s 16. It’s the first time she’s had money, uh, of her own to spend, um. And, uh, I was gratifying and horrifying at, at the same time to see how much money she was spending on presents for her friends.

Um, and, and at about this time next year, we’re gonna be having conversations about, [00:16:00] um, the costs of college and what loan debt means, and she has no idea what those things are. So that led me to thinking about, uh, I don’t know if people are familiar with the, through mass hire ci IS the mass Mass Hire Career Information System.

It’s, uh, the link here is, um, mass Hire, um, mass cis dot inter careers.org. They have a thing called Reality Check, which is pretty similar to what Absolutely was just describing, um, this reality check through there. It’s a pretty engaging activity that allows students to go through and pick what kind of house do they wanna live in, what kind of car do they want to drive, how much money they do they wanna spend on entertainment.

A lot of those things that Aula was just talking about, uh, does it in a fun kind of interactive way and then it links it to, at the very end, uh, you say what kinds of. At the very end, you this over on the right side. Um. So, here we go. Sorry. Um, gives you over here. Whoops. I’m not good at drawing. Um, the specific occupations and then the wages, um, that are available, [00:17:00] those are median wages.

I don’t know any elementary school teachers who are starting out at $76,000 a year, but it gives you a sense to figure out. Um, for, for me, I went through and, and did this $65,000 a year. Um, was what, uh, what was required for me given the options that I selected and, um, so I would be able to live within my means, so to speak.

So it’s just a fun, engaging activity. Could be for middle school or high school students. Uh, I’ve seen interns that have gone through it and, uh, it’s worked. Um, it’s worked pretty well for folks. So again, uh, meet the Pathways does something very similar to this worth, worth checking out. And one of the nice things about Mass CIS um, again, if you’re not familiar, is you can actually create a school level account that lets you see all of your students’ information as the counselor or the program advisor.

Um. So, um, that’s something I, again, don’t have enough time to get too far into that today, but it’s a nice resource. It’s free from Massachusetts residents because it’s paid for by our tax dollars here in the state of Massachusetts. Um, so it’s, it’s not, it’s not ad supported or anything like that. [00:18:00] Um, all right.

So, um, thinking about the college choice process, again, similar to what Ulu was talking about, um, one of the challenges confronting young people and their families, I think, is that it’s not that there’s not enough information out there about colleges to help people make informed decisions. It’s actually that there’s an overwhelming amount of information out there.

Um, so what we’ve done, we’ve put together what we call the lead strategy that can help young people and their families, um. Approach the college choice process kind of systematically and, and end up with informed decisions. And of course, financing education is one of the important pieces, but it’s not the only piece.

So, uh, the lead strategy again, in a nutshell is just that everybody begins by making a list of colleges to explore from that list of colleges. Um, they explore them more deeply by gathering information and facts. Um, given those explorations, they move ’em to the next phase, and then they choose which colleges they’re actually gonna submit applications to.

What are those colleges that are worth your time and money essentially to, to submit an application [00:19:00] to from those places you were admitted, you make a decision about which college. To attend. Attend. And then the last step in the lead strategy is the succeed part. And, and that’s succeeding in transition from high school to college.

Summer melt is a very real problem in every high school, um, across the state of Massachusetts. So, uh, and, and, and the country as well tends to be, uh, more of a problem in more urban areas than the more affluent areas. But every school has students who graduate from high school saying, I’m going to college, who don’t show up on a college campus that fall.

Um, so some of the success planning that we can do as program advisors, as school counselors, et cetera, that can help people succeed in that transition happens, um, in that last step. So, uh, just some fast stacks here. Um, looking at some of the data available from the National Center for Education Statistics, this is, as far as I know, the most recently available data, the four year graduation rate.

Overall four year graduation rate for students who start college full-time is 46.6%. That’s less than half of the students who [00:20:00] start college, uh, finish within a four year timeframe. And again, they’re starting as full-time students. So they’re starting as full-time, first time freshmen, less than half graduate in four years.

Some of ’em drop out in that first year. Um, so they’re not retained in the college. Um, as for about half of that 50% comes from a little less than half. Um, but the other half, uh, there’s about another half or so, 20% or so that graduated in six years instead of four years. So, uh, my reason for highlighting this and talking about paying for college is that a great way to increase the cost of your college education is to not graduate in four years, to add another year of tuition and fees.

And in fact, in fact, um, so you’re adding costs to your college education. You’re also not earning money. During that year or two that you are, um, finishing your college degree. And, and frankly, it, it happens more. I work at a public institution, uh, UMass Boston. Uh, public universities are not as good at helping students graduate on time as private universities are.

It’s a fact born out by the statistics that I’ve [00:21:00] provided here. 42.4% of the students who attend a public university graduate in four years. That number jumps up to fi 56.8% if you attend a private university. Um, I don’t have enough time right now to get into some of the possibilities about why that is, but it’s, it’s an issue.

And again, in, in my estimation, uh, if you’re attending a public college, um, you’re at risk for not graduating on time. Um, that’s just, it’s just a, a risk factor borne out by the statistics here. Um, and again, these statistics come from the National Center for Education Statistics. I suspect these statistics, once we, uh, get into the covid years are going to be even more dire.

Um, so. So what is college fit? So I don’t know if, uh, people here have seen this before, something like this. This is, uh, from Gestalt psychology. Some of you look at this and you see an ornate base that’s the black. And some of you look at this and you see two faces looking at each other. Um, what we’re trying to promote with making informed decision making, uh, in the college choice process is to help students and families see the whole picture so that you can see both the [00:22:00] vase.

The faces. Um, and the way that we can do that is, is by helping people really examine and think about, um, the strategy that we’re, we’re considering Here is what we call the six keys of college fit. Um, so some of these keys are things that people naturally look at and, and attend to things like financial match, which is certainly critically important for most students and families.

People are also paying attention to the personal match side of things. Uh, that, that key, which is looking at what kind of institution is it? What are the living arrangements? Do they, is it a campus that I like? What’s the size? Those kinds of things. How many students are enrolled? Uh, that’s the personal match key.

And then the academic match key is essentially what are my chances of getting admitted? Uh, do they have large classes or small classes or a mix of both? Do they have the programs that I’m interested in? That kind of thing. Those are the three keys that most students and families are, are paying really close attention to.

Um, what we also try to draw attention to, uh, is also looking at other things like student outcomes, like the four year graduation rate. Um, the retention rate. I, I like to think of the retention rate, [00:23:00] uh, as the freshman satisfaction score of our, our college. It describes the number of students who, uh, show up on a college campus as freshmen who were supported.

Uh. Satisfied enough with their experience to come back as sophomores. Right? There’s great variability in that, uh, among many colleges, it does tend to be at, at the more selective colleges that the retention rates and graduation rates are a good bit better than they are at less selective colleges. But even when you’re looking within the same range of colleges, if you will, there’s gonna be some variability in those statistics and in those student outcomes.

So it’s worth looking at that information and using that information to ask questions of the college. I would never say you shouldn’t attend a college that has a lower retention rate or, or a lower graduation rate, but it should prompt questions of admissions and of people who are working at the college to help you see how you’re not going to be one of those people who maybe isn’t retained, um, or doesn’t graduate in four years.

All right. So that’s a, a quick overview of the, the six keys of college fit. Again, there’s more information about this. Um. Through the, through the, um, [00:24:00] MEFA Counselor Institute, and we will provide the link for that, um, later. So, um, again, so going through the lead strategy, uh, again, so this is looking at what’s the kind of initial universe of colleges that I’m gonna be exploring as a student or family.

We’re, we’re looking here in this initial list phase at just three of the six keys of college fit. You’ll notice absent from here is that we’re not looking at cost. Um, because if you look at cost in this initial phase, you might actually be missing some really good college options for yourself. Um.

There’s no way to sort colleges that I know of anyway. And if there is a way to do this, please let me know. There’s no way to sort colleges by net price. Um, there’s a way to sort colleges by list price, but as we’ll see here in a couple of seconds at, at some colleges, perhaps many colleges, the net price is very different than the LIS list price.

Um, that, so the, the sticker price of the listed tuition and fees, for example, that can be very different from particularly private colleges that offer a lot of scholarship money. Um, so that’s why we don’t include, [00:25:00] uh, looking at costs in this initial phase because you might be missing some really good options.

Um, so, uh, we promote the use of, of the college navigator as a tool because that’s freely available to everyone. Um, so here is just a picture of the college navigator where you can, um, search for colleges, uh, to, to narrow it by down by these relatively. Obtuse criteria, like do they have the majors available?

Is there housing available on campus or at least near the campus? How far is it from home? How, how many students are enrolled, et cetera. Kind of really generic basic things like that. Um, and the idea here is to create initial list of colleges to more fully explore us so that you’re not missing any good options.

And if we include cost at this time, um, you might be missing some really, really good options for yourself because private colleges, even though they have a high sticker price, might actually be quite affordable after you consider the financial aid that they award. Um, so how do you figure that kind of stuff out?

Um, let me move ahead here. Uh, in the explore phase, now we start to look at all six [00:26:00] keys, the college fits and pieces of the six keys of college fit. Um, and in the college navigator you can see here’s a, a selective college, the information that’s available regarding financial aid. So at this college here, you see the listed tuition price is actually $58,000.

Um, room A board is another $14,000. Again, you’ll find this in the financial aid section of the college navigator. What you’ll see here and having trouble finding my, uh, there I am. You see here, oh, I think there, um, every single student who attends this college, 100% of the students received a scholarship for about $40,000 that comes out to a 70% tuition discount.

So this is why, again, uh, we can’t, we can’t look at colleges just by the list of sticker price. ’cause here, literally nobody who attends this college pays the sticker price. Literally no students do. So this is not uncommon for, for moderately or or less selective smaller private colleges. This kind of a situation is, is not [00:27:00] terribly uncommon.

Um, you may have heard in the news this fall, LaSalle College, um, LaSalle University, sorry, um, right in in Newton, um, made headlines. I heard about this story on the news before I heard about it anywhere else made headlines because they, they cut their tuition by 33%. We see that down here, um, 33% reduction from, um, uh.

Prior years. Um, what they found, they cited a study here by Sally Mae has listed down here, 60% of high school students won’t consider a college or university, even if it meets their other requirements, if the sticker price is deemed to be too high. So LaSalle said, you know what? We’re going to increase the transparency.

Um, instead of giving all of our students a significant discount, what we’re going to do is we’re just gonna cut the sticker price. Um, and, and ostensibly we’ll see what happens. Give less in merit based financial aid. Right. So, um, similarly, this actually, I don’t know if other people saw this in the New York [00:28:00] Times.

Uh, this was just published yesterday. Um, this, the headline for the story is a sign that tuition is too high. Some colleges are slashing it in half. This one talks about, uh, Kolby Sawyer College up in New Hampshire. Uh, they also did this at about the same time as, as LaSalle. Um, they cut their tuition to 17,500 a year from $46,000 a year.

So, um. I looked at the College Navigator data as exists for LaSalle, um, today, and that information is again, so they give a hundred percent of their students, um, about a $22,500, um, scholarship or, or discount that comes out to a 38% average discount on tuition. So, um, those of you that were paying close attention might have noticed that I said that they LaSelle cut their.

Um, tuition, uh, by 33%. So it begs the question, what happens to the other 5%? Are they just gonna pocket it? And so time will tell What’s gonna happen with that? Um, the optimist in me likes to think that they’re going to save that 5% for need-based aid as [00:29:00] opposed to merit-based aid. Um, so, but time will tell what happens.

I appreciate, regardless of what happens here, um, I appreciate the increased transparency that colleges like LaSalle and, and Colby Sawyer are providing for students and families around the actual net price. Um, ’cause now their sticker price actually closer to the net price, and that’s gonna just increase the transparency for all students and families that are going through this process.

Um, another feature available in the college navigator is, uh, net price by income. Um, so this is just showing that lower income students pay less than on average. Um. Higher income families, and this varies from college to college. Again, these are averages. So what individual students pay, even within the low income or, or the high income bands of this is going, is going to be different.

Um, at UMass Amherst, just for comparison, this was at a private college at UMass Amherst, low income students paying $6,000 about and higher income students are paying $24,000. Um, but this information is all there, [00:30:00] uh, available to give you kind of a, a rule of thumb way of thinking about costs and the actual net prices available at the colleges.

Of course e each college is required to have a net price calculator that I would encourage students and families to use. Um, there’s been reported problems with how accurate the net price calculators are. Um, and, and we won’t get into that too much today other than to say having a net price calculator and using it is better than not using it.

You’re gonna be more likely to get an accurate estimate, um, by using it than if you just use something like this. It’s gonna be more accurate I think than, than even this is. Alright. All right. Finally, if I’m keeping within my time, I hope, um, just about out. So this is the succeed step of the lead strategy.

So now you’ve been accepted at college, you’ve placed your deposit, you’re planning on going in that summer. Uh, over that summer, you’re gonna make some plans to integrate socially, academically, and financially. So, for example, one of the, one of the things that you can help students and families plan for in, in the summer before they actually show up on a college campus is if they did get [00:31:00] scholarship money from, from a college, how do they qualify for that every year that they’re in college?

Are there requirements? Do they need to do community service hours? Is there a GPA requirement? What is satisfactory academic progress and what does that look like For me, every college is, every college has that. Um, and, and every college that I know of anyway is going to have some stipulations around what we need to do to qualify to maintain the, the scholarship award that they’ve given you.

So finding out what that is, staying ahead of it instead of behind it, is going to be helpful for the students and families that you work with. So, um. If you have any questions, feel free to email me tim dot [email protected], and uh, we’ll provide this link to the Mepa Institute, um, video on, on the more in depth description of the lead strategy is here.

But I will turn the, turn this back over to Julie and thank you for your time. Thanks Tim. And I put the link to College Navigator in the chat and we’ll also put that, um, on, on the follow-up [00:32:00] sheet. So I’m gonna turn it over to Bill.

Thank you. I think you can see my screen now, hopefully. Yep. Okay, great. Uh, welcome everyone. Uh, my presentation here, I tried to come up with a witty, um, uh, title and I failed miserably, so I ended up with just financial aid, which is really boring. Um, the prior presenters did a great job at explaining resources that are available.

Uh. I’m tasked here to try to stay a little bit more practicable. So some of you, I’ve heavily modified some of the, uh, if, if any of you have attended a MEFA pre presentation on financial aid, we’ve kind of take, taken this section of the presentation, try to revitalize it to applicable process based questions on what is financial aid, how do you help your students, and where to go.

Um, and I’ll admit, I’m gonna talk outta both sides of my mouth on 90% of these slides, and that’s okay. And I’ll explain why. [00:33:00] Um, the, the vast majority of you, um, are really wondering how to start. I’m actually seeing some of the questions that are coming in and they’re saying, asking really practical questions, Julie, which is great.

Um, and, and my advice to all of you is don’t get too inundated. I know the beginning half of this presentation was all of the steps that you could take to prepare. And what I’m telling you here is start somewhere. It’s important when you’re working with these students. You understand the need for them to get through the process of applying for financial aid.

And the only way for them to get to the end is for them to start. I don’t want them to panic or you to panic. When you’re working with students about things that are out of their control or questions that they have, I’m 99% sure most students enter this process not having all of the answers. And that’s okay.

Um, that should not mean that you should not start the process. We wanna get you [00:34:00] into the process and so that you can get those answers and there’s people here who can help you. There’s a lot of great resources out there, almost too many. So what is financial aid really? Um, when we say the word financial aid, what is it that you’re referring to?

Oftentimes that comes in a question like money. Like how do I get money to pay for college? Like that is a source. In that sentence, money is a financial aid. Really. Um, in our world, we bucket financial aid into really three, three distinct buckets, or two buckets depending on who you’re talking to or which school you’re talking to.

Um, that’s grants and scholarship. That’s money that typically does not need to be repaid. So that’s the free money. That’s the money that you wanna get the most of. And then there’s, uh, another bucket of money that could have multiple categories and that’s considered self-help. So things that a student could do, uh, to earn money and or receive money.

But then there’s [00:35:00] some stipulation to do that. So is it work study where in order for gain the money, they actually have to work somewhere and then get paid and then either allocate that money to their bill or repay the institution? Or does it come in the form of a loan? And for many students, uh, um, the most used.

Financial aid tool across the country actually is a federal Stafford loan. It happens the most, uh, of all of the financial aid programs that are out there, that is the one that is used and you hear about the absolute most. And that is a form of aid that you’ll see and students will see on financial aid, award letters,

award letters. This next slide I want you to think about. So as you’re working with students, don’t get hung up on where the money is coming from, right? This slide is really telling you that the aid that you could receive could come from [00:36:00] a variety of different sources. So it could come from federal government, state governments, private institutions, uh, not-for-profit agencies, your local high school, um, a Rotary club.

All of those foundations have a variety of different aid programs that they provide students. Most of ’em are trying to provide students with scholarship opportunity. The government and the state is gonna provide the most in terms of loan, um, loan dollars, uh, and then the institutions themselves are going to probably, in many instances, incentivize enrollment either through merit, scholarships or uh, meeting needs.

So when you apply for aid, you determine how much need a student has, and that money would then be awarded to the student in the form of a need-based grant. This slide is just telling you that that could come from a variety of sources. Don’t get hung up though on where [00:37:00] the funds are coming from. That’s the least important part of whether or not you get the money.

Most students, when they’re sitting in front of me in my office and I say to them, I can find you a scholarship, or you receive a scholarship from this organization, they don’t care. They just wanna know, do I have to repay it or not? And does it get applied to my tuition bill or room and board costs? Or even things like, you could have students receive money specifically earmarked for books and supplies, and that’s okay too.

So what is merit-based aid? Um, merit-based aid is one that is more commonly used now than it was in the prior years and continues to become more of a thing. Tim kind of, um, hinted at this in his net price kind of example, um, with, with schools that are discounting and many schools discount by using merit aid.

Merit aid [00:38:00] traditionally comes in the form of a scholarship to a student from the institution that they’re applying to. There could be nuances to that, and that’s not always the case. Um, but that’s the most common form of merit aid. The other key component of merit aid, oftentimes but not always, it’s dependent upon all of the information that’s in the admission application, not the financial aid application.

Um, sometimes it has to do with the financial aid application depending on what type of school it is, but most times the merit scholarships that students receive, uh, students would receive those based on all of the criteria in which, uh, schools allocate and review admission. Why is that important? Well, that’s important ’cause every school is gonna do that a little bit differently.

Uh, and not all schools have merit aid. Let’s start [00:39:00] there. So the, a good question that you could ask a student to ask the school, or you could ask the school is, does your offer, does your institution offer merit aid? If not, they may offer need-based aid, and if they don’t do that, then they might not have any money, and it just might be whatever you can receive on your own.

Uh, to further complicate it though, merit scholarships aren’t always, there isn’t always a published criteria to who gets it. And so what I mean by that is you can’t make the assumption that if one school has a chart on their, on their admission app, uh, website that says this, GPA, this standardized test score, or, um, rank in class equals this merit scholarship that may apply only to that specific institution.

Another competitive institution may have a different set of formulas to determine who gets the merit scholarships, and that may be [00:40:00] proprietary. At the end of the day, you wanna find out how you would apply for those merit scholarships. In most cases, you would apply by applying to the institution. If there’s a separate application to apply for those, the individual schools would probably let you know, or it would be somewhere on their website.

The other side of the coin need based, so this is, um, where it gets even dicier in terms of there’s no standardization, right? There’s no way for me to say to you as a applicant that the need-based aid that you’re getting at Stonehill College is the same that you could get at Boston College or the same that you could get at LaSalle.

It’s probably not, it’s probably all a little bit different. And the reason why it’s all a little bit different is it’s based on school specific criteria. The amount of institutional need-based aid that the school has to allocate, and then which students they’re allocating those fundings to. And it’s not [00:41:00] always, um, equitable across the board.

It’s very specific, that institution. And also how that specific student situation ultimately is reviewed at that institution. To apply for those, you have to fill out some forms typically, and they’re almost always based on financial criteria. What I mean by financial criteria is criteria that is coming from aid applications, and we’re gonna talk about eight applications in a minute.

So I said start somewhere at the very beginning. It’s really important when you’re working with students. I’m gonna say it’s really important when you’re working with students, almost all schools that they’re applying to, students are getting better and better. Of products that are out there to determine admission timelines.

Almost all of the schools have financial aid timelines, and it’s [00:42:00] important for those students to understand that those timelines need to be followed as well. I’m gonna say that it’s important to monitor deadlines and times, however colleges understand and know and appreciate that students are entering and exiting this whole crazy world of applying for aid and getting to net price at different points.

If you’ve missed the deadline for the purpose of this presentation, still apply. Let the college or institution say no. If you, um, if you see a deadline that, that you can’t apply for, move on. Go to the next one. But if you still can submit, submit, don’t panic if you’ve missed a deadline. Call the institution, find out what you should do.

Some schools may have a priority filing deadline, and that isn’t necessarily the same as a hard stop. What that is, is before that deadline, you would be reviewed for all of these funds. After that, [00:43:00] that deadline, the funds may be, may shrink. Um, the amount you may receive could shrink, but you want to pay attention to the deadline.

At the same time, ignore the deadline apply. Right? That’s really the message I’m trying to deliver. That is not always the case though when it comes to applying for federal and state aid. Federal and state aid have pretty rigid timelines of which you can apply for aid. Those timelines typically are later in the process, uh, but they do impact students.

You wanna pay attention to what those are. Massachusetts has very clear defined timelines for a variety of different programs. If you go out to the website, they’re all there on, on the site with individual programs in those timelines. Um, so you, you should pay attention to those. But if it’s institutional aid, you should call the school and not worry about the deadline.

If you’ve passed it, if you can meet it, meet it. I’m [00:44:00] gonna go quick here. FAFSA is about to change. So all this information is really for 23, 24, and then it changes to the, to something that is different. Um, it’s still gonna be the FAFSA form, but the output is gonna be different. You’re still gonna need to fill it out.

You still wanna fill it out. The most important tip I can give you today is every student needs a FAFSA id. Ultimately, they need a way to sign that FAFSA and to show who they are on the FAFSA form. If you walk away with anything today from my part of the presentation. Have your students get their own FSA ID number?

That’s an important step that they will need. Every student should have one. Even if they’re not sure if they’re gonna apply for aid, they should get an id.

When you’re filling out the form, there’s a variety of different tools that are available. Many people ask questions about taxes. [00:45:00] The good thing is about the FAFSA form is that you’re able to link, most students are able to link now the FAFSA form with their IRS tax returns and it will put the data in for them.

If they can use that tool, you should encourage students to do it. Another quick form, the CSS profile, the C CSS profile is a form that’s run through the college board, so you probably have familiarity with it there. It is going to be requested by private institutions only. And those private institutions are going to be listed on the profile form.

So if you ever have a questions of which schools are a profile school, there’s a comprehensive list on the website as well as, um, they’re on individual school’s websites that will be links that would tell you if they are, uh, or how you would apply in each individual school. It would tell you if the profile is requested, you do have to pay for this one.

Um, there is a cost associated with it, but there’s oftentimes ways for [00:46:00] students to get those costs waived. Um, there is built in fee waivers into the actual form itself. So if you meet certain criteria as you’re filling it out, when you get to the end to pay, it will not ask you to pay. Highly encourage students to do that.

Uh, and if you ever have any questions about the questions that are on the profile, then you should ask the individual schools in which you’re applying that’s requested it.

After you apply for aid, the most important piece of this tip I on this slide is very simple. After you apply, oftentimes you enter this gray area, blackout area, which, for lack of a better word, you hear nothing, right other than, uh, you could check with the schools to confirm that they’ve received it.

Great. If they have a portal where you can see it, they’ve received it even better. Um, but if you’re working with a student and the student says, I filled it out, but I’m not entirely sure I had a question about it. [00:47:00] All of the forms, if it’s a profile or a FAFSA form, have the ability for you to log in or receive a student aid report profile.

It’s called something a little bit different. Ultimately, that is, uh, think about it as an audit of how you answered the questions that you were asked. And so for many students. It’s a good tactic for you to walk away from this and say, there is a way for me to find out how I answered the questions. I can go in and I can see it.

That student aid report is ultimately kind of the student’s version of a copy that the schools are going to receive. Schools receive a slightly different form. It’s called an institutional Student Aid report, but ultimately that is the way in which the student can audit themselves. If they have any questions, they can file corrections or they can call the eight offices.

Twenty four, twenty five I hinted out at the fastest is gonna be shorter, simpler for simpler, [00:48:00] simplified, further. I tripped up there. And also, um, Pell Grant eligibility is really the key thing that’s changing, at least from my understanding of reading. All of this. Who qualifies for Pell Grant is gonna change a little bit.

It should be broadening. And not restricting. At least that’s the theory. Um, and there’s certain changes to data elements that are not on it. For the purpose of this presentation today, that’s not as relevant. I am confident MEFA will be having more presentations for a variety of audiences, specifically on FAFSA for 24, 25, and hopefully MiFi will even be able to train some of the aid directors that are clueless when it comes to some of these changes as well.

Last thing I’m gonna talk about mass transfer. Um, mass transfer. For you working with students, that takeaway is simple. You need to understand that the state of Massachusetts has a variety of options for students to take [00:49:00] advantage of going from a community college to a four year institution and what the mass transfer does, the mass transfer agreements, if students meet certain benchmarks, ultimately what happens is through the mass transfer.

It helps students navigate two things. Tim already hinted at one of them time to degree and price of that degree. So if you remember anything from the mass transfer, remember, mass transfer helps students navigate the time to degree completion. It makes it very concise. It makes it clear, uh, and it also provides additional support to those students.

Assuming the students can meet the demands of the timeline, they can graduate on time through a transfer program and that will save them money in the end. Ultimately, that’s a key component to mass transfer, that if you’re working with students, it helps them stay organized with degree, completion, timeline and cost.

Two very [00:50:00] important things for students to remember. It’s a terrific program. Uh, much more detailed information can be on it, but if you remember those two topics, that’s really what you want to focus on. Other than that, I’m at my free resources, which is gonna be provided to you later through. Um, Julie, I think I’m probably over my time.

Thank you. I’m here for questions. That’s okay. Thanks, bill. All right, mark, I’m gonna turn it over to you.

Thanks, Julie. Uh, should be able to see my screen. Let’s see. We’re still seeing bills. All right. So maybe you can stop share, bill.

Okay. So now I think you’ll be able to share. Alright.[00:51:00]

Good.

So, um, my colleagues, I can hear them chuckling as I say that, uh, talking about borrowing responsibly, I’m like a dog on a bone. Um, to me, when we hear the stories of students, uh, who in some cases haven’t completed a degree or walking away without a credential, uh, it’s very concerning. And for the clients that we serve, it’s even more concerning because the idea that, you know, we could be working with a client who’s worse off after completing, uh, a period of time without that credential, uh, is not helpful.

So I think part of our [00:52:00] challenge is to try to take a look at how do we work with, uh, students, and I’ll say both traditional and non-traditional students on understanding. Uh, what it means to borrow responsibly. And I was, uh, campus-based for 17 years at three different colleges. And you know, part of the challenge is to try to, uh, understand how students feel about borrowing.

And I would argue sometimes that ego gets in the way, uh, of making what I think to be good financial fits. So we’re trying to help our students and clients understand what is a reasonable amount to borrow. Um, one of the challenges that we have in higher ed is unlike, uh, let’s say the mortgage industry, uh, which has a gatekeeper.

It’s called the mortgage company or a bank, you know, which when you’re applying for a mortgage, they will let you know how much you will qualify [00:53:00] for based on your ability to repay. Unfortunately, in higher ed, uh, we don’t have a gatekeeper. And in essence, you can borrow as much money as you can find, and that becomes a challenge, at least, uh, you know, for a good number of students and families.

You know, there’s a rule of thumb, I think that’s been circulating for a number of years on what would be a reasonable amount to borrow, and there’s some slight variations on it, but in essence, it’s about 10%, uh, of your monthly income, uh, can be used, uh, for a student loan payment. So, with that guideline, and that’s not hard and fast, but it’s a, it’s a guideline.

So with that guideline, we tried to create, uh, this calculator that would help, uh, students and families understand what that looks like. In essence, it works backwards, but what it starts with is taking a look at your monthly [00:54:00] income. So by putting in just one figure, uh, which is if. Students have a sense of what their annual income might be.

Uh, and in our example, we use, um, a teacher salary. And I’m mindful that Tim, I think had a teacher salary in the seventies. Uh, I’m starting it off at 45. Uh, so let’s say the, uh, monthly income is, uh, 37 50. That’s all we’re gonna add to this calculator. And what it does is it tells us, you know, what the typical take home pay would be.

Now all we’re doing is taking out Social Security and Medicare. Uh, so, you know, there are plenty of people who have more deductions from their monthly income, uh, their paycheck. Uh, but I didn’t want to get into that. I just wanted to take a look at what everyone has to have, uh, in terms of a salary reduction or payroll reductions.

Uh, so we have, [00:55:00] uh, $2,904 to start off with. Um, a had talked a little bit about, uh, budgeting. Uh, you know, again, a rule of thumb, you know, that I think we’re trying to, um, chat about with students is this concept of a 50, 30, 20 budget. Again, it’s just a guideline, and the guideline is to take a look at, uh, 50% of your monthly income to be used for needs, 30% to be used for wants and 20% for savings or paying off debt.

What we don’t get into here is how do you define needs and how do you define wants, because you can guess as well as I can, it’s very subjective, so there’s a guideline. If people want to go to the, uh, to the link about learning a little bit more about needs or wants, they can find that out. But we didn’t really want to get caught up in, in the emotion of what’s a need or want.

What we really wanted to emphasize [00:56:00] was that. According to this, uh, personal budget, about 20% of your take home pay each month should go towards savings or paying off debt. So what we say is that about 50% of that figure, which in essence is 10% of your take home pay, can be used towards a student loan. So without overwhelming your, your, your finances on a monthly basis.

So in this case, that gives us $290 to play with. And what our calculator does is it then takes a look at that $290. And, but this purpose, uh, we put the interest rate at the current, uh, federal rate, which is 4.99 over 10 years, and it gives us $27,392. What that does is it gives a student and a family a sense of, uh, what they could reasonably borrow, but it comes with a [00:57:00] caveat.

I use the example of a teacher salary. In most cases, teachers have to get a master’s degree. So what we have to remind our students and families about is that’s total borrowing total. And I know we all hear folks and probably some on this call, you know, who realize when they were in grad school it was all loans, you know?

And if they had known that, you know, it was gonna be all loans for graduate school, you know, perhaps they would’ve made different choices at their undergraduate level. Uh, maybe, uh, borrowed less, maybe even attended a different institution. But I think our job is to give students and families, you know, sort of this, uh, from beginning to end when it comes to borrowing.

And if we can get to them before they fall in love with the school. I think it’s ideal. You know, we, uh, I think Tim was mentioned, uh, net price calculator, some being better than others, and, and [00:58:00] it’s better than nothing. Um, I told Ebony, uh, you know, that I think one of the best calculators out there is bcs because, uh, and I, I send people to it all the time, even that I’m interested in, in, uh, enrolling at bc.

Um, because, um, it’s just a really good calculator. It gives people a sense of, of what the final costs are gonna be, uh, if that student’s accepted, uh, at bc. Um, so again, you know, the idea is just to get the conversation going about what is an, uh, you know, an appropriate amount to borrow. Um, let me take you to our next, uh, tool, which is our fact sheet.

So a lot of, you’re familiar with the college scorecard, a lot of, you’re familiar with some of the, um. Opportunities for other type of calculators. But again, having been 17 years campus based, uh, so having been on the other side, [00:59:00] uh, you know, I can say that, uh, there’s still a lot of, um, challenge, uh, to reading financial aid offers, um, especially when it’s not accompanied, um, by the costs, uh, which requires then a student and a family to go and look for the costs on, uh, the institution’s website.

So what we did was we created this fact sheet, uh, you know, and you can put three, and then you can start with another three. But the idea is to take a look at, um, what the actual costs, costs are gonna be for that student. And you use, you see in the example, um, you know, we try to include everything, uh, for direct and, and, and indirect costs.

Um, but then what it does is it asks you to. Uh, input, you know, each of the, uh, gift aid, uh, figures, which then gives you that net cost. And I think that right there [01:00:00] is the most important piece of this, uh, calculator because as, um, Tim had mentioned, we don’t wanna eliminate choices. Uh, there are plenty of times when for a specific student, a private, uh, may be a better option financially, but we need to be able to compare apples to apples to apples.

Uh, and that’s where I think a lot of students and families get confused. So once they get that, uh, that net cost, we then walk through students on, on how they can pay for that. And so you’ll see this is where the loans will start. Um, and then followed by, um, you know, a balance. I also wanna mention that we, we vary a little bit from the college scorecard in that we don’t include work study up above.

We include work study, I’ll say almost as an afterthought [01:01:00] because we know from experience, probably even in our own examples, um, you know, that work study, first of all, the student has to accept a job, um, and then, you know, with their paycheck that may come out every other week. The reality is, is that their tuition bill was due, you know, two months earlier, uh, or their, their bill for the semester was two months earlier.

So really, I call it pizza money. You know, I think a lot of students use it, you know, to help, help offset, uh, some of their costs while they’re enrolled, but not necessarily towards their, towards their bill. The other thing that we had had mentioned is, you know, what are the other issues that, um, students should be looking at, uh, when it comes to, is this a good fit financially?

And I would agree that, you know, graduation rates, retention rates, um, average student indebtedness, things of that nature are all important. Uh, so then we also have some, uh, additional links, uh, as part of that. Um, so [01:02:00] I’m gonna cut my time and send it back to Julie.

Thank you, mark. And now we’ll hear from Ebony. And then I see you have some great questions that we’ll address at the end. We’ll, we’ll start with those and if you have more, please continue to send them.

Excellent. Thank you Julie. And, um, I know that we wanna leave plenty of time for the questions, so I’ll go through my slides quickly, and I appreciate you giving me this section so that I could do so. So we’ve talked a lot about the decision making process, you know, going from making a list of schools, trying to decide where to apply best practices for the actual application process, um, evaluating the aid awards, being realistic about borrowing, um, and kind of making hopefully the best decision possible.

But what happens with financial aid after that decision is made, like during [01:03:00] freshman year and beyond. And so that’s kind of what I’ll be talking about. So first it’s important that if. Perfect. So my important considerations is the whole process itself is a rollercoaster. I mean, again, students will have ups and downs.

As a discussed, you’ll have a student who will have their heart set on an institution and perhaps the financing or other situations will not work and they’ll not be able to attend their dream institution. So a lot of ups and downs. The kind of, I guess bad news is financial aid applications are a yearly process.

Once you get through everything in that first year, you’ll have to do it again every subsequent year. Uh, depending on the institution, the process may change slightly. Uh, some schools that do require the CSS profile perhaps may only require the FAFSA in subsequent years. Um, they may switch to an institutional application.

It really depends. But at a baseline for financial aid processing, any [01:04:00] institution you attend and you’re receiving financial aid, you’ll have to fill out that fafsa and you’ll need to do it every year. Also, depending on the school, if they’re providing institutional money. As mentioned, if there are merit awards, there are requirements for those scholarships.

It’s important that students are familiar with that. If it’s a GPA component, if there’s an eligibility component, some scholarships may relate to whether or not they qualify for Pell. Again, it’s important that they understand what are the requirements for the merit. If you’re receiving institutional aid, it’s important if there is a commitment that you understand what that commitment entails.

Um, some schools they will say, we will guarantee X amount of dollars, but what that guarantee, that means that if, let’s say your situation. Um, goes downward, they don’t necessarily increase the financial aid you’re receiving. So again, as you’re thinking about the decisions and what that aid means, it’s important to understand what’s committed.

And [01:05:00] there’s really no institution that can commit to a certain federal amount because you have to fill out your FAFSA every year. The FAFSA form is what determines your federal eligibility, and it’s based on a new tax year each season. And so there’s no way to really guarantee. This is the amount of federal funds you are going to receive.

There’s a kind of ability to say you’ll always be offered a loan, but beyond that, it’s hard to really solidify will a family qualify for Pell each year? Because Pell is very sensitive to income. And so if let’s say a family received a bonus in one year versus another, that could impact their eligibility.

I think the important thing to remember is that even if you apply in a subsequent year and that aid changes, talking with your financial aid office may help to either understand the change or understand if there are any opportunities to appeal that and potentially receive a different type of aid or [01:06:00] reassess what’s on the FAFSA form so that hopefully you can gain some of the eligibility that might be lost.

So those are things just keep in mind as you’re working with students. It’s not a one and done. It’s something that will have to be done year after year. Additionally, there are considerations beyond just the funding. And so Tim mentioned it a little bit when he was talking in his section about satisfactory academic progress.

This is a federal regulation that requires that aid recipients maintain satisfactory progress towards their degree. Um, and what all those words means is that the federal government wants to make sure that if they’re providing their dollars to help you achieve your degree, you’re actually going to be able to do that.

And so it requires that every year or for certain schools a little bit more frequently, uh, it could be every semester or every term. Uh, they evaluate the GPA. The credit progression for federal aid [01:07:00] recipients. And so the actual GPA required can vary by institution, but a lot of schools center around a 2.0 that they need students to have a 2.0 GPA to be considered making satisfactory academic progress for credit progression.

What that means is that. Based on the number of credits that they’ve attempted or registered for, they need to earn a certain percentage of those credits. So for example, if I enroll in 12 credits per semester, I attend for a. Fall and spring, that’s 24 total credits that I registered for. Most schools will need you to earn 67% of that.

Uh, so that means that you have to really be earning credits. So if a student’s enrolling in 12 credits and failing every course, their GPA is gonna suffer for that, and also their progressions going to suffer. And all that means is if a school determines that a student is not making satisfactory academic [01:08:00] progress, they have a few options.

They can put them on a warning, uh, they can say that they’re ineligible for aid. Most institutions, I really don’t know any that have said no to this, but it is an option provided most institutions will allow a student to appeal that status, but they don’t have to. So it’s something that, again, you should familiarize yourself with the concept of sap.

And it is important that students perform well, not just. To remain at that institution, but also to receive the financial aid dollars. And if you appeal, what that basically means is that you’ll be able to receive a probationary term of aid to hopefully bring your GPA or earned credits up, or perhaps they’ll have to put you on a longer plan where there’ll be some benchmarking of saying, okay, you’re going to receive this type of GPA.

Uh, but overall, the government is not trying to pull the rug out from families, but they’re trying to make sure that students aren’t using financial aid and will never have an [01:09:00] opportunity to earn a degree, because the resources from the federal government are finite. They’re not unlimited, and so they don’t want students to be wasting their eligibility and not earning a degree.

That would be terrible. Some other things to consider are enrollment decisions. The amount of credits a student takes has a direct impact for some types of federal student aid. So it’s important that if a student is not attending full-time, and that would be 12 or more credits, that they understand how those decisions impact financial aid, both federally and institutionally.

Additionally, if a student is thinking of withdrawing from the school for a semester. Or taking a leave of absence. It’s important to understand what happens to their federal aid as well as institutional. I’ve worked at a number of private institutions and we ask students to kind of have a conversation with us about if they’re with taking a leave or withdrawing, is it permanent?

Are they trying to go to a new institution or are they taking a leave for kind of [01:10:00] personal reasons, some time off from school so that we can talk about their institutional funds. Um, for the federal government, it depends when they withdraw. If you withdraw after the end of the semester, there’s usually no impact, but students should be aware of whether their loans will go into repayment, because when you take time off from school, you’re eating into what’s known as the grace period for federal loans.

And so it’s important to understand the ramifications of withdrawing. But if you take time off in the middle of a term or a semester, it may require a school to do what’s known as a return to Title IV calculation because you earn your credit. Based on the amount of time you spend in your courses. And so if you withdraw middle of the term, you may not have earned the full eligibility.

And so we have to do a calculation to see how much aid did you earn for that semester. So withdrawing has impacts. And so again, as they’re working potentially with their academic advisors, their department, they should also involve [01:11:00] financial aid in that conversation. And I just wanted to give a quick mention to the transfer process, um, for those students that again may be enrolling in a two year school and have their eyes on enrolling at a four year, it’s important that if you’re not part of kind of that.

Massachusetts in-state transfer process. Maybe you’re trying to enroll at a private institution or elsewhere that you are aware of the actual transfer process and the relative kind of acceptance rates for those. Often, you know, people will say, well just go here for two years and then you can easily transfer into, I don’t know, Bentley, Boston College, et cetera.

But sometimes it is a very selective process and maybe not as easy as one may envision. And also the financial aid opportunities from an institutional perspective are different for transfer students than freshmen. And so, uh, families should be aware that, again, if they’re offering, let’s say, certain merit awards to incoming freshman students, those may not be the same opportunities [01:12:00] if they decide to transfer.

So again, as you’re thinking of enrollment, it’s important to just kind of understand the differences, uh, that can impact kind of their financial aid. I’ll give a quick. Little note to financial literacy. We’ve talked about borrowing and making smart decisions. It is important that students think about work and how that will impact their experiences.

You know, we often encourage students to think about going abroad and you know, I. Taking internships, et cetera. And so for our kind of low income students, they need to balance the, the need to work with those opportunities and also think about how work can help defray some of their expenses. You know, we talked about work study and that, that’s kind of like pizza money.

They should think about, okay, what am I doing for the summer? How am I saving? I don’t think many professionals are thinking, I mean, depending on the type of work a student is doing, uh, that they’ll be able to maybe make a huge dent in their. Tuition costs, but perhaps they can save money to help for [01:13:00] books or save money to help for if they’re living off campus, some of their off campus expenses again, so they don’t have to borrow for those.

Because as you saw in the example that Mark provided, you know, if depending on what you’re going to earn, it’s a very small amount. You’ll be able to borrow kind of for the lifetime of your education. And the last piece is just that family support. More and more students are helping to support their family, whether or not they’re staying in state or going away.

And it’s important that we get investment from the family to try to figure out other mechanisms to, for the family beyond that college student’s earnings or support. Because we received funding during, uh, the COVID pandemic. It was called her for CARES funding. And I was so surprised the number of students who took that funding, which was free money from the federal government.

So it was great, but took that to kind of provide it to their families, which is noble. But you know, it was meant to help towards their education and potentially their [01:14:00] expenses. And so it, it just amazes me kind of the amount of contributions that our students have to make towards the family. And so it’s not just a decision of where a student is gonna go to college, but kind of how their attending a college will impact whatever support they could provide to the family.

So it’s a real holistic decision that. Students and you know, as you’re guiding them through, need to make kind of as they’re going into the process. So the last thing I wanna say is, we have a running joke on my campus, as you know with some of my friends, is that it’s important for students to create relationships on campus.

We try to say you should make a friend with an adult. And so, you know, trying to make a friend either being participating in work study, that’s a great way to make friends on campus. Uh, so that way if you run into a situation, you have someone that you can kind of go to, to help you navigate kind of the institutional pathways to get assistance or just to kind of [01:15:00] advocate for you.

So I always encourage every student to really do work study. Often students will say, it’s not enough money. I can earn more elsewhere. But the kind of relationships you can build by working on campus, it’s. You know, it, you can’t even really measure the benefit. So again, uh, encouraging students to talk with their financial aid counselor, unlike kind of high school, there’s no mandatory requirement that they have to interact with financial aid.

And often we find students are coming to us once they’ve entered into a problem or they did something based on a misunderstanding. So every school has financial aid officers and we are paid to help students. So often they feel we’re only there if there’s a problem. But feel free to go talk to an aid counselor when you’re working with families.

Go talk with that aid office as they’re going through the process. That is what they’re there for. So try to make those connections, create those relationships. We are humans. You’ve met with some of us through this kind of, uh, panel discussion. We are [01:16:00] humans. We are here, we are trying to help you understand there are no definitive answers.

We financial aid, everything is, it depends. And so it’s important that you have those conversations at the beginning of the process and throughout the whole academic year. And again, als also academic advisors, faculty, great relationships to have. So that is it for me because I wanted to make sure we have some time for questions.

So I will stop and pass it on to Julie. Well, thank you Ebony, and thank you all, um, really wonderful information and, and as I mentioned, we’re gonna have a lot of follow up and a lot of links and a lot of resources to share. Uh, but let me ask a few questions here because we have some, some questions. So here’s a question that, um, that I thought was a good one.

This person is saying, I’m wondering if in your profession you recommend a student stay more local or in state to avoid high college costs until they have some idea of [01:17:00] their major or not. So I’ve bet a few of you have thoughts about that.

I can start off, I guess I, I would be the first, I guess the first thing I would say is, uh, we should probably not expect 17 year olds what they want to do, know, know what they want to major in. Um, I, I suspect if we ask the people in the audience here, how many of you are doing today, what you thought you’d be doing when you were, you were 17?

Um, that is relatively few of them that are doing that. So, um. College can be a place for exploration. And in terms of to not get too long and drawn out about this college can be and should be a place for career exploration. It’s often not well suited to doing so, unfortunately, given the number of credits that need to be invested, et cetera, et cetera.

But, um, to more pointedly answer this question, I think, um, I would say you may be missing opportunities if you’re, if you’re limiting yourself to only public colleges. ’cause as we’ve noted, I hope, um, and I hope it’s been, uh, clear, that sometimes private [01:18:00] colleges can actually be just as cost effective as, as public colleges.

Uh, it doesn’t have to be, again, I don’t wanna make it sound like private colleges as a deal of the century. There’s, they’re sometimes not, but sometimes they can be for the right student in the right situation applying to the right kind of private college. So,

does anyone else have anything? And to add to that. I think all I was gonna do is to add on to Tim’s point that yes, this is, it’s hard and it’s important to not try to eliminate student, even if they have no idea of what they want to do. Most colleges will offer the opportunity to explore different careers and different pathways.

I think what’s important for a student is to figure out kind of the learning environment they’d wanna be in. Think about, again, what is the driving factor? Do they need to be home for a reason? Is there a place they’ve wanted to go? What types of things may they be interested in or do they excel in and what’s offered at the different institutions?

And try to go along those lines to try to make that decision or think about where to [01:19:00] apply versus thinking that, oh, if I stay local, I’ll, I’ll find a decision, because that’s not necessarily a guarantee. So yeah, just being open-minded. Can I just add one more thing to that? Sorry. So I do think, and I put this in the chat, I think that, um, you know, some institutions you should be, there should be some sense of career pathways.

So for example, if you’re thinking about maybe majoring in psychology, uh, you wouldn’t want, uh, or sociology or anthropology. You wouldn’t want to go to Worcester Polytechnic Institute as the place to figure that out. Um, so there are some colleges that are better, as, as Ebony was just saying, there are some colleges that are better for helping you explore what you might be interested in than others.

And I think if you think of the careers as, uh, the majors in bigger buckets, like, I wanna go to a stem oriented school. I want to go to a liberal arts school. Um, that can be helpful, um, to narrow things down a little bit, even if you don’t have much of an idea. I, I suspect most students have a little bit of an idea of what they like and what they don’t like.

That’s great. [01:20:00] Alright, so the next question, and this is just uh, a common, a common type of question. Um, those of us in the financial aid, uh, world receive. So is most financial aid for lower income families, if your family makes around $150,000, are there still financial aid opportunities, but maybe fewer?

I dunno, I’ll get us started because I did give an answer to the person that asked that question and again, I, again, I have no definitive answers. You know, the contributions that are determined by the FAFSA as well as the CSS profile look at not only just the income, but the household size. And so it’s hard to say if you earn X amount of dollars, this will be your contribution.

And in turn this will be the amount that will be provided because there’s a whole lot of different factors that go into that calculation. Taxes paid all sorts of things. I will say just kind of high [01:21:00] level, if you’re, uh, maybe a household size of maybe four people, one going to college earning $150,000.

You may not qualify for the Pell Grant. And so therefore, if you’re not qualifying for the Pell Grant, if you are trying to apply to a private institution, yes. The amount of financial aid, I mean a public institution, the amount of financial aid may be limited if they don’t have institutional resources, let’s say.

Uh, but again, if that public school has merit scholarships, again, it’s hard to say, but if public institution, no merit, et cetera, that might be a work study offer, maybe a loan, uh, compare that to potentially a private school that has institutional funding. Yes, they, they may offer merit, they may offer need-based funds.

And so there may be, again, different opportunities that you’d have to take those offers and then compare to see what’s your, like bottom line looking at those two schools. So it’s hard to give just a final end all answers. Everyone should [01:22:00] apply for financial aid. If they’re, if they’re thinking that I don’t have an ability to pay out of pocket, I cannot write a check for $80,000, that’s just not really in my wheelhouse, et cetera.

Apply for aid and let the forms kind of guide you on what your eligibility will be. So that’s always what I encourage. The FAFSA is free and the college board has recently made changes for those that have an income of less than a hundred thousand dollars that will be free. So even as a baseline, if you just do the FAFSA form, that’ll give you some idea of your eligibility.

So that’s, I Thank you. And then there’s a question, how, how is the process of, uh, financial aid for graduate school? What does someone do, um, to apply for graduate school financial aid?

I think as, as somebody who primarily teaches in the graduate program at UMass Boston, I, I know some students are often disappointed in that there is no federal financial aid that, um, o other than [01:23:00] loans, um, there’s no Pell grants for, for graduate school. Most of it, as Mark noted earlier, as loan based is the primary form of financial aid at private institutions.

They may offer scholarships, merit-based scholarships, very similar to, to how, how they look at the undergraduate level, but at the graduate level, much less financial aid available. Yes. And I, I’m just gonna go back, uh, to one other question that has to do with, um. Early on, you know, not really knowing what you wanna do.

Um, so what’s a, what’s a recommendation for a student who, who is starting this process? You know, maybe looking at Mefa Pathway, looking at College Navigator. Um, and they wanna make a good financial decision, but they just have no idea of a, a major they’re interested in, or, or what they might wanna do. Um, can you just give a couple of thoughts about, you know, I think you, you shared a little in your presentations, but how, how to go [01:24:00] about that process when you feel you’re right at that beginning stage.

I can start it off. Um, I always tell students to cast their net wide, uh, when you’re starting off, you don’t wanna limit yourself. Um, really it’s a time to explore and learn what it, what you actually like. Um, and that’s why a lot of the activities made for Pathway, at least for the middle school portal, is designed to allow students to cast their net wide.

Play games that get out. What are your core interests? Um, there’s various interest assessments that students can take, um, and all of that is helpful. Um, but also on the career search side, it’s also helpful to learn more about different careers. What are like the day-to-day activities of a, of a specific career?

Is that something that you like? Um, in high school doing internships, um, all of these are ways for you to explore what are your general interests and all of that helps build into sort of [01:25:00] what is the broad pathway you’re looking at when it comes to actually going to college? Julie, let me add that. I think, um, you know, it’s important for for students to understand the ramifications when they get to school and, and they’ve given thought to what they wanna major in, but when they change their major.

And so we know from a cost perspective, uh, that, um, the number of credits that students are graduating with, let’s say at the community college, you know, on average should be about 60. And I think it’s in the low eighties, you know, at the, at the four year schools, you know, maybe it should be about 120, but it’s closer to 135.

And part of that is either they registered late for their classes, but had to have a full course load in order to remain eligible for financial aid, or they changed their major. And I’m not saying that you can’t change your major, you just need to be aware of the financial ramifications of changing your major, especially if you’re gonna do at the end of sophomore year or beginning [01:26:00] of junior year.

You know, so, so, so getting as much information as you can early enough, knowing that plenty of students aren’t gonna have a declared major or aren’t a hundred percent, but know the financial ramifications of, of change. I can just e extend on that really quickly. I mentioned that early on in my presentation.

I think one of the challenges that four year col public four year colleges have with their graduation rate is that when people change their major, it’s hard for the students as a junior, for example, to go back in and, and take the gateway courses that are needed to qualify for admission to the major.

So for example, if you wanna be a psychology major at, at x University, uh, you need to take intro psychology, the stats course and, and the research course. Right? And, and that takes three semesters to do that. Um, so then it’s hard to then graduate on time. You just don’t have enough time to do it. So then, you know, taking extra credits, which costs more money, et cetera.

Yeah, I’m gonna piggyback on that too. Um, so, you know, a lot of our students will go on to a community college with the [01:27:00] intention of transferring to a four year college. And I always say try to make sure that what you’re taking at the community college isn’t just going to transfer to the four year college, but is gonna count towards your degree.

Because all too often, oh, sure. All of those courses will transfer. Again, you fall into the, you’re gonna graduate with a hundred thirty five, a hundred forty credits as opposed to the 120. So I don’t think there’s a problem, and I think a lot of families are hesitant to call and make these calls, either to the financial aid or to the admissions office.

But I tell students, if you’re registering for a class at a community college before classes start, make sure that it’s not just gonna transfer towards a four year school that you’re thinking of, but that it’s gonna count towards your degree. That’s excellent. Well, I’m seeing that it’s, it’s 10 30, so I’ll just talk about two things.

We have a group of questions about the FAFSA changes that, that we didn’t get to. But what I’d say about that, and I think Bill alluded to this, is that we are just, now, we know about the changes, but [01:28:00] we’re just now learning about how those are going to be implemented and how they’re gonna affect individual students.

So what I would say is that please, um, stay in touch with MEFA because MEFA will be doing some programs on that, uh, you know, over the ne over the next months and, and year. And also stay in touch with, as Ebony mentions, every time I speak with her, uh, with the financial aid. Offices at the colleges, um, that you are, uh, where your, where students are attending and where they’re thinking of attending and all of that, because we’re all gonna learn a lot over the next, next few months and a lot of detail about this.

So, um, you, you will have a lot of resources that can give you more definitive answers. Um, I also see a few questions here about 5 29 plans. And so I just want to let you know that MEFA, um, also has a number of programs on, um, college savings programs, including 5 29 plans and how [01:29:00] those, um, work with, um, the, the financial aid process and with paying for college.

So please go to the MEFA website and I will put those links in to follow up to learn more about 5 29 plans and how those, how those work, um, and how, um. Any of the rules that are changing, how that, how that will affect, um, college savings as well. And other than that, I think there were a few other very specific financial aid questions, um, that you can also follow up with either financial aid administrators or, um, with MEFA in general, um, to get, get a few of those final detailed questions answered.

Um, so with that, I, I will thank the panel and thank all of the participants. And Mark, I’ll, I’ll, I’ll allow you to end it there. Well, I wanna echo, uh, Julie’s thanks to our panelists and colleagues, uh, who were actually a lot of fun at the same time planning for this. So very greatly appreciative of your time and your [01:30:00] expertise, uh, and Tam Mefa as our partner and one of our sponsors, um, a key topic for all of us.

So I, I hope this was helpful. So thanks everybody and have a great holiday.

Thank you.