The College Solutions Blog

October 13, 2011

In my last blog, I talked about why it’s important to know what your EFC or Expected Family Contribution is. Here is the post: What Is Your Expected Family Contribution? Today, I’m going to show you how you can get a preliminary EFC, which is not as tough as you might assume. You just need to use an online EFC...

October 6, 2011

Filing for financial aid can be more complicated when the parents are divorce. A Divorced Dad From Massachusetts I thought I’d bring this up because of an email that I received from a divorced dad from Massachusetts, who has not remarried. He makes about $100,000 a year and doesn’t own a home. His ex-wife did remarry and she and her...

September 29, 2011

4 Stubborn Financial Aid Myths I think that many of the misconceptions that people possess about the college process revolve around financial aid. With the college admission season about to head into high gear, today I want to share the four financial aid myths that are probably the most common. Myth No. 1:  I make too much money to qualify...

August 16, 2011

Is your family going to qualify for financial aid? Many families I talk to assume that they won’t qualify for financial aid. Why are so many parents pessimistic about their chances for financial assistance? I think a lot of them assume that the money they’ve squirreled away in their college savings accounts will kill their chances. I find it ironic...

August 15, 2011

I think the most misconceptions that people have about the college process revolve around financial aid. With the college admission season about to head into high gear, today I want to share the four financial aid myths that are probably the most common. Here are four of the most stubborn financial aid myths. 1. I make too much money to...

August 1, 2011

I devoted my last two college blog posts to exploring why high school counselors fail so many students with their college advice. If you missed them, here they are: What’s Wrong With High School Counselors What’s Wrong With High School Counselors, Part II  I received many great comments regarding those posts and I wanted to share some today, as well...

April 20, 2011

I got a question this week from a mom about grandparent contributions to college. It’s great to have generous grandparents who want to help with college costs, but you don’t want any gifts to backfire. Here are five things to keep in mind when grandparents want to help with college: No. 1. If your family isn’t going to qualify for...

April 20, 2011

I’ve been writing posts for this college blog since the summer of 2008 and I figured I’d written about every topic imaginable, but there was at least one that I had overlooked. Even though plenty of parents are worried about it, I had never addressed this issue:  If a student has a job will this hurt his or her chances...

April 4, 2011

In the financial aid process, many schools treat students with divorced parents differently. As someone who has been married for more than 26 years, I don’t think this is always fair, but it’s the reality. Today I’m going to illustrate how schools can treat families of divorce differently by using the story of a girl, who I’ll call Sophia. Sophia...

February 4, 2011

Thought I’d share my response to a message that I received from a mom, who was interested in finding private colleges that just use the Free Application for Federal Student or FAFSA. Here is Patrice’s question: Is there a way to determine which private colleges use the FAFSA method for financial aid?  I would like to focus in on those...