Blog
Talking With Your Student (or Parent) About The Cost of College
This can often be the hardest part of the college process for both students and parents. From the parents’ perspective, they have been probably telling their kids all their educational lives that if they work hard and do well in school...
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How Can Uncle Sam Help with the Cost of a College Education?
Here are a few ideas. Remember to seek out the help of a qualified tax advisor if you need assistance implementing these. Education Tax Credits American Opportunity Tax Credit (AOTC) The AOTC offers up to $2,500 per eligible student...
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The FAFSA Gates Are Open…Time To Get To Work
The beta testing phase for the 2025-26 FAFSA has concluded, and the form is now widely available for all students and families. Here's how you can begin the filing process: Go to studentaid.gov, the official website for filing the...
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SAT/ACT Tests are Pretty Much Optional These Days. Why Do I Need to Take it?
It’s true that the majority of US colleges have gone test optional. However, there are several reasons why you might wish to still take these tests, some of which could influence what you pay for college. Good test scores can...
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College Scholarships: What to Do and What to Avoid!
Here are a few pointers to make your and your students time most efficiently used in this process. Focus locally. There were tons of websites out there like fastweb or scholly that have thousands of scholarships listed on them. Know...
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Have you Ever Heard of the CSS Profile Form for Financial Aid? Now There’s a LITE Version.
Some of you were already aware that there is a second financial aid form called the CSS Profile. About 250 colleges require it, in addition to the FAFSA form that the department of education requires when helping to determine your...
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When It Comes to Need-Based Financial Aid
When applying for need-based financial aid, strategic planning is crucial. Ideally, you should start preparing a few years before your child's college enrollment. The Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) requires...
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Is it worth paying extra for more expensive or prestigious college for my child?
More and more parents are questioning the return on investment of a college education these days. Deep down we may feel that spending more will provide a greater level of confidence that your child's future will be secure. But is it...
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Did you know that going to college in Connecticut could be free?
It can be free if you use Connecticut’s Pledge to Advance Connecticut to fund the first two years of your child’s college education at one of Connecticut’s 12 community colleges. Most parents we meet at the college funding strategy...
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How to find the colleges that offer discounts off retail
Right now, the demographics of young people reaching college attendance age is making the next several years a buyer’s market for purchasing a college education! Due to the economic crisis of 2008-2009, the birth rate declined...
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Make sure that colleges know that you're interested in them. It could result in a larger aid package
We get asked all the time about ideas that can help increase the amount of aid a college could offer you. We wish we had the magic sauce for this, but the honest answer is that there is likely a combination of factors that influence...
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Are Colleges Offering Sale Prices? You Bet!
We get asked all the time about ideas that can help increase the amount of aid a college could offer you. We wish we had the magic sauce for this, but the honest answer is that there is likely a combination of factors that influence...
Read MoreColleges Emerging from Pandemic with New Challenges
As parents and prospective students assess the college landscape post-pandemic, colleges themselves are doing the same thing. Remote learning has changed campus life drastically as faculty across the U.S. have done more and more of...
Read MoreFinancial Aid For College: Changes For The Better, and The Worse
So we are always urging that our clients do their best to plan on how to pay for college. But a good plan needs to be flexible, because change always comes. And, once again, the ground rules surrounding the Department of...
Read MoreWhat do you mean I have to fill out the FAFSA AND the CSS Profile?
Knowing from personal experience exactly how much fun it is to fill out the FAFSA form, I would not wish to add additional headaches to that process for anyone. However, if your child is planning to attend a small to midsize private...
Read MoreHow to capture 529 tax savings in just 24 hours
First let me say that we are not offering tax advice here. You should seek out the help of a qualified tax advisor in your home state that can help verify the opportunity we are pointing out here. That being said, I was reading some...
Read MoreIs My Child’s Top College Pick Going Broke?
According to a recent article in CNBC’s website, Moody’s Investors Service is estimates one in five small private colleges are facing fundamental stress. This is due to declining revenues, rising expenses and very little...
Read MoreParents, start planning EARLY on how to pay for college!
We do dozens of workshops every year at high schools around our region to help educate parents on how they are going to pay for their children college. And while we love doing them, the one thing that is most frustrating to us is how...
Read MoreHow to appeal your financial aid award
If you get a financial aid award letter, you may think that’s the last and final offer. That is certainly not the case. You can appeal that award. There’s a formal process you need to go through so that you have the...
Read MoreTrophy Colleges-Are They Really Worth the Money?
Over and over again, our individual financial counseling sessions with families about college uncover a sense of entitlement that some teenagers possess. These teenagers seem to believe that excelling in high school means that their...
Read MoreCan out of state students get in-state tuition?
I get this question quite a bit. Once my child moves to another state to attend a university in that state, don’t they qualify for in-state tuition? Here are the general rules as to how most state universities judge whether your...
Read MoreWhat does this term “tuition discounting” really mean?
According to the association of government boards of universities and colleges, tuition discounting is defined as “the process by which the institution offsets its published tuition price (sticker price) with institutional grant...
Read MoreCan I be an independent student for the FAFSA?
As many of you know, when you fill out the FAFSA form, you have to list both the assets in the income for the parents and the students. However, we often get the question, “Is there any way I can just list my students income and...
Read MoreWhy 4 or More Years For College? What About Three?
Though there are some programs that require more, most four year colleges have approximately 120 credits that you must earn before you graduate with your bachelor’s degree in your major. Most of us enter into college with the...
Read MoreWhy you really need to use Net Price Calculators- sooner rather than later!
Every college has something called a net price calculator (NPC) on their website. The purpose of this is to give families some general idea of what they are net out-of-pocket cost will be for college. It often takes into account things...
Read MoreSome Q&A on outside scholarships for college
Question: how can I find out about what scholarships I can obtain? Answer: there are tons of resources on the Internet. www.fastweb.com is probably the most well-known. Other than that, your local community (Check with your local...
Read MoreTrying to read Financial Aid Letters is a fool’s game. Be prepared.
As if the college decision process wasn’t hard enough, when schools finally send out their financial aid award letters, you are going to find that they are not standardized. So, it is going to be difficult for you to compare and...
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