FAFSA glitch still causing issues for mixed-status families

Officials have worked around a glitch in this year’s application for federal financial aid that stopped students with parents without Social Security numbers from being able to submit their form, but students still need help.

The work around requires students to delete their original application and makes their parents initiate a new application from their side.

“Without going to the financial aid workshop, I wouldn’t have been able to figure it out,” said sophomore speech language pathology major Danielle Guerrero, who went to a financial aid workshop with her parents at the beginning of the semester. She was finally able to apply by being walked through the entirety of the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) form by Javier Garcia, a student services coordinator.

In years past, students whose parents do not have a Social Security Number, were directed to print and sign the signature page of the FAFSA form and mail it in to the Department of Education (ED). If the contributor didn’t have a Social Security number or an Individual Taxpayer Identification number, the form says to leave the question blank and move forward. The glitch did not allow for this, leaving students unable to submit.

This year, the 2024-25 Online FAFSA now requires each of the student’s contributors to create a StudentAid.gov account, and students of mixed-status families often have to make these accounts themselves and fill out the information in the form as best they can.

Officials advise the students affected by the glitch to delete their original/student FAFSA account and form and start over with their parent’s side of the form first. That way, the parent can begin the form and invite the student to complete the student side of the form. Then, the account/form can be found by matching the student’s social security number.

However, the workaround does not work for everyone as a result. One of the main issues Manson has seen is that students’ parents without social security numbers often struggle with computer illiteracy and have never done anything like these online forms before.

“We’ll have some students who will not even be able to get the parent information to link and we’ll work with the student and tell the student to just delete your FAFSA, and start over with your parents first,” Associate Dean of Financial Aid at Santa Ana College Robert Manson said.

Students have tried to help their parents by filling out the forms for them/on their behalf, but the new Federal Student Aid (FSA) system is not designed for that. The Social Security number is the key link in the FSA system that easily and quickly allows for the student’s form to be connected to their parent’s social security number. Without the social security number, the system essentially fails.

“[My parents] have never filled out any taxes or forms because they don’t live here.. Because the new form changed everything, so we’re still working on it.” Jackie Nunez, a sophomore biochem/molecular biology major, who is still trying to gather the necessary information to fill out the form on her parent’s behalf.

Two sophomore students at Santa Ana College, Willeny and Angeles, were also advised to create a new FSA ID for their parent’s so that they can finally submit their FAFSA. Both students had to fill out the form on their parents’ behalf since their parents do not have tax, income, or asset information for the United States and currently reside in Mexico. The students stated that filling out the form was very difficult and didn’t know how to answer many of the questions.

“Last year was so simple,” said Willeny who was waiting in the line at the financial aid office during the second week of school.

After submitting their forms, the students could only wait for their forms to be processed so they left.

When asked if they were planning on returning to the financial aid office every day to check the status of their application, Angeles said, “What else can we do?”

Despite the issues and errors with the new form, Santa Ana College’s financial aid office is getting ready to disperse its first amounts of money for Pell Grant recipients, on Sept. 13, 2024 where they will be giving about 3,460 students their Pell Grant disbursements, which totals $4,186,000. This will be the most money Santa Ana College has ever disbursed for the Pell Grant. As opposed to last year, there is about a 22% increase in the number of students receiving aid this Fall.

“I do believe the new FAFSA rules are benefitting the majority of our students, and the changes are good changes, but the bungling of the transition by the Department of Education has been very difficult for many students who need financial aid the most.” said Manson over email.

Any students who have questions or concerns about these issues should contact the Financial Aid Office at 714-564-6242 or go to the financial aid office located on the second floor of the JSC building in room 201.