Moreover, their office of Federal Student Aid provides federal grants, loans, and work-study funds each year to millions of students paying for college or career school. The pivotal document known as the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) consists of an annualized form prepared by both current and prospective undergraduate and graduate students to determine eligibility for financial aid. Unless a student has locked up a full-ride scholarship or family foots the bill for college, it behooves most students to spend time researching available grant and scholarship money as many funds continue to go unclaimed due to the sheer ignorance of students who have dire need of them. A consolidated list of websites illustrated in Figure 15.3 at the end of this chapter, highlighted by the U.S. Department of Education, provides a solid core of information sources to review. The subject matter covered includes student grants, scholarships, loans as well as federal and non-federal work-study …show more content…
For this reason, each potential candidate should research the offerings and nuances, especially relating to the sharp divide between federal and non-federal programs to avoid being left out at crunch time. Applied through the familiar Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) document, the Federal Work-Study program awards benefits to students demonstrating financial need and requires an annual reapplication to retain continued eligibility afterward. Student eligibility and securing a commensurate award as a collegiate freshman must initiate during the senior year of high school for the allocation of financial aid funds to occur. Undoubtedly, NerdWallet’s discovery of significant sums left behind demonstrates the value of conversancy with guidelines published by the United States Department of Education and participating institutions nationwide. Earnings from the federal program become taxable to the recipient, cannot exceed award allocation and ought not to count toward the following year’s contribution for financial aid need. Students would be assigned work hours by their employer with consideration of their total award and class schedule; presumably, to spread these out as efficiently and evenly as