FAFSA Completion Best Practices - Road Map Project Completion Best Practices & Planning High School and Beyond Leadership Institute August 19, 2015 High School and Beyond Leadership

FAFSA Completion

Best Practices & Planning

High School and Beyond Leadership Institute

August 19, 2015


This Session

• FAFSA Session Goals• Why FAFSA?

• Research on the connection between FAFSA completion and college attainment/enrollment

• Research on why students don’t apply

• National Leaders to Learn From• Chicago• Dallas• Detroit• Santa Ana• Memphis• STRIVE Network• Renton• Overall

• Discussion


Today’s Goals

• Understand why FAFSA completion is important

• Learn some strategies and tips for how to improve FAFSA completion from other districts and schools that have been successful

• Become familiar with your own FAFSA filing data

• Practice using the FAFSA portal

• Set a FAFSA filing goal for your schools and district!

• Brainstorm regional ideas for improving FAFSA/WASFA and financial literacy

• Develop an initial plan for your school or district to improve FAFSA/WASFA filing rates


Continuous Improvement Model


FAFSA Completion Rates At-A-Glance

National FAFSA Completion Rate • 57%, 2012

• Between 32-35% for low income households 2007-2012

Washington State FAFSA Completion Rate• 51.2% (2.7% submitted with errors), seniors in 2014-15 Academic Year

Road Map Project Region• 63% submission by high school graduates

• 78% submission by high school graduates enrolled in the College Bound Scholarship


Why FAFSA?

In Short…

• Necessary to qualify for federal, state and institutional aid

• It might cost more to attend if you don’t

• More likely to enroll in postsecondary if complete the FAFSA

• College Bound Scholarship requirement

• More likely to attend full-time if receive aid > More likely to complete a degree if full-time


Why FAFSA? Research

SOURCES:From High School to the Future: Potholes on the Road to College, 2008

Barriers to College Attainment: Lessons from Chicago, 2009

More likely to enroll in postsecondary.


Why FAFSA? Research

SOURCE: http://dps-counseling.wikispaces.dpsk12.org/file/view/FAFSA.pdf/446136358/FAFSA.pdf

More likely to enroll in postsecondary.


Why FAFSA? Research

• “…the sad truth is that 2.3 million students who would have qualified for federal student aid still do not file the FAFSA.”

SOURCE: Journal of Student Financial Aid

• Approximately one in five low-income students who are enrolled in college and would likely be eligible for Pell grants never filed a FAFSA.

SOURCE: American Council on Education

• Students who file in January, February or March receive on average more than twice the funding from federal, state and college sources as those who file later in the year.

• More than 1 million students might have received as much as $3.8 billion more in educational grants had they filed the FAFSA during the first three months of the year.

SOURCE: Edvisors

Necessary to qualify for aid and might cost more if you don’t.


Why students say they don’t complete the FAFSA?

• Thought they were ineligible

• No financial need

• Didn’t want to take on debt

• Lack of information on how to complete• Lack of social and other supports to complete• Confusing and multiple deadlines• Lack of understanding about how financial aid works

• Forms are too long, complex and intrusive• Request for financial info on parents/guardians that may

be difficult to getSOURCE: Mark Kantrowitz, 2011


Barriers to Completing the FAFSA

• Many students lack knowledge of what financial aid is available, what they are eligible for, and when and how to apply. Low-income students are more likely to state that financial aid is too complicated to apply for and believe that the costs of college are too high for them to apply, and they are less likely to apply for financial aid early in order to maximize their likelihood of receiving institutional and state aid.

SOURCES: American Council on Education, “Missed Opportunities: Students Who Do Not Apply for Financial Aid” (2004); Mari Luna De La Rosa, “Is Opportunity Knocking? Low-income Students’ Perceptions of College and Financial Aid,” American Behavioral Scientist 49 (12) (2006): 1670-1686; Dynarski and Scott-Clayton, “College Grants on a Postcard.”


National Leaders to Learn From


Chicago

SOURCES: http://media.collegeboard.com/digitalServices/pdf/nosca/nosca-school-counselors-fafsa-completion.pdfhttp://www.wiche.edu/info/cacg/meetings/denver11/montoya.pdf

STRATEGIES• Reporting and Accountability

• FAFSA lists by student name allowed school staff to work on FAFSA completions and problem solve around specific student issues

• Counselor caseload strategy not “random acts of guidance”

• Capacity building through school based collaborations

RESULTS Year % Completing FAFSA (~18,000 seniors per year)

2007 57.5%

2008 62.2%

2009 68.0%

2010 74.8%

2011 82.3%

2012 85.6%

http://media.collegeboard.com/digitalServices/pdf/nosca/nosca-school-counselors-fafsa-completion.pdf


Dallas

STRATEGIES

• http://youcanaffordcollege.org/• > Financial Aid Workshops > Counselor and Site Lead Resources

• Allow community members and organizations to lead financial aid workshop sites

• Sample parent letters

• Marketing Downloads—Fantastic posters, also have a desktop screen saver for school computers: http://youcanaffordcollege.org/portfolio-items/marketing-downloads/

• Peer-to-peer messaging

• Texting reminders (did summer melt texting too, students opt in)

• Awareness campaign

• Instagram campaign—counselors verify student completed FAFSA and give them a sticker, then students post to Instagram with hashtag

• “Tuition Tuesdays” to highlight financial literacy tips

Good Resources HERE!

http://youcanaffordcollege.org/

http://youcanaffordcollege.org/portfolio-items/marketing-downloads/


Online Map of Events


Screen Saver Image for High School Lab Computers


Poster Examples


Commitment Cards (for students and families)


Detroit


DetroitRESULTS

• Last 3-years (73%, 70%, 68% seniors)

STRATEGIES (regional)

• Set a public goal (80% FAFSA completion)

• Serves 50 schools (public and charter)

• Identified a college access champion for FAFSA in each building and principal. This list is who they sent all email communications.

• FAFSA lunch and learn summit—someone from each building attends and they have experts there that address FAFSA filing issues around foster youth, homeless, undocumented and independent students. Trainings supported by 2-yr/4-yr college financial aid counselors.

• Send biweekly FAFSA # updates to 300 partners, including 50 school leads. They allow counselors to update their senior #s.

• Send shout outs to moving schools or those who’ve met 80% goal.

• Have a contest that the first 10 schools to reach the 80% target get a college tour for one bus of students (~45 students).


DetroitSTRATEGIES (school-level)

• Set FAFSA as graduation requirement

• Discount on Prom tickets for those who submit the FAFSA

• Make the FAFSA a grade in a class (assignment)

• Help students to complete their FAFSA or start it in a class

• Work with senior teacher in a class with students and then do outreach to parents

• Discuss at senior meetings and include in parent correspondence

• Schools create action plan and their team includes students

• Senior FAFSA competition across advisories

• Student incentives (Student’s with completed FAFSA entered for text book gift card)

• Print off copies of last years FAFSA form and send it home over winter break to have students and families start filling it out with last years information. Then bring in and update in the new year.


Houston

STRATEGIES• http://www.houstonfafsa.org/

• Donated PSAs and billboards (work closely with Univision)

• Phone banks to call students that have not filed

• T-shirts for all counselors and phone bank volunteers to wear throughout FAFSA season

• Train 25 bilingual advisors on FAFSA

• Develop “trusted centers,” people get approved to be a FAFSA support site and receive training

• Track the % and number of low income students not filing FAFSA by district

• Maintain a data dashboard (by district and by school): http://mydegreecounts.com/college-going-culture/fafsa-completionsubmission-by-school > Click on a district to see.

http://www.houstonfafsa.org/

http://mydegreecounts.com/college-going-culture/fafsa-completionsubmission-by-school


Santa AnaRESULTS

• Went from 44% financial aid form completion to 90%

STRATEGIES

• Made the FAFSA or DREAM Act paperwork an expectation for senior graduation • Makes not discretionary• They also require a college application for graduation. • Students were already going though scrutiny for graduation, and added the

college application and financial aid forms to that checklist

• Embed completion of the forms into curriculum--senior year economics class

• Higher Education Centers in each high school with computers and meeting space for college reps

• Placed first Higher Education Center in public library and provided training to library staff. Offer summer sessions and can sign up for times to meet with counselors

• When for-profit colleges want to attend events, ask for: placement rate/gainful employment rates and loan default rate


MemphisRESULTS

• In one year (2014 to 2015), improved from 60% to 83% of seniors countywide filing

STRATEGIES

• Set a public goal (80% FAFSA completion)

• Leadership buy-in to goal critical!

• Served 22 high schools, 7,000+ completions, held 73 events

• Held a large FAFSA season kick-off with mayors and Superintendents. Issued proclamation focusing the month of January on FAFSA filing. Received a lot of earned media.

• Seeding Success was data aggregator and emailed weekly data reports to full partners list including superintendents, core leadership of campaign, principals and counselors. Coded reports to have schools in red, yellow (progress) and green (on-track).

• Received commitment from the head of counseling services to participate

• Network teams met once per month to review data (Jan/Feb/March/April)


Memphis


Memphis

STRATEGIES

• Every school agreed to hold an evening and day event between January and March

• Partners and CTCs held weekend events

• Maintained shared calendar of events

• Used their Tennessee Promise Scholarship as a marketing tool

• Faith events held at churches on Sundays. Churches and community centers

engaged in distributing resources.

• Did a big push 2-weeks before their Feb. 15 priority deadline. Call to action—Don’t

leave money on the table!

• Social media targeted adults

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Overall FAFSA Lessons Learned

• Adhering to proper planning and timing for FAFSA completion activities is key!

• Building a culture of data collection and continuous improvement is a process that takes time, however it is critical to success!

• A combination of school-based and community-based activities are essential (based on your target population)!

• Having a strong grip and access to student level data can accelerate progress!

• Continually improving the project on the macro level will lend itself to dig deeper to the micro!

28© StriveTogether 2015© StriveTogether 2015 July 29, 2015 │ 28

“Increase the number of FAFSA Completion by enrolled GEAR UP students eligible to complete a FAFSA application from 50% to 75% by June 1, 2015.

An increase of 25%, or an additional 200+ FAFSA completions

Hughes

Time• College Block/Follow Up Block: Weekly

time to work on College Access• One on One: Counseling Sessions

Parents• Parent Give-Aways: Gift Cards, etc.• Bulletin: Name as a Thank You

Key Drivers & Action CommitmentsHigh school Long Term Goal

Cincinnati Public Schools will

increase their Postsecondary

Enrollment rate from 69% (in

2012) to 75% by 2020

Goal Statement


Renton High School


Best Practice Recap—Common Themes

Universally schools or communities had the most success when…

• Buy-in from leadership at the highest levels that FAFSA is important! Especially Superintendents, Principals and sometimes mayors.

• Data! Overall filing rates released regularly to the public. Student-level data available and accessed by “frontline” workers.

• FAFSA/WASFA completion integrated into existing processes/classes or made a requirement (e.g. senior graduation requirement).


Discussion

• Was there a best practice you heard about today that you hadn’t thought of before?

• Is there a best practice you learned that you think would work well in your school or district?

• Is there a best practice you learned about today that you think we should implement regionally?


LET’S PLAN!!!


Regional FAFSA Planning

• Overall regional goal, let’s set one!

• PSCCN is committing to releasing regular data reports and supporting Road Map to College Financial Aid Events

Discussion• What other ideas should we consider as a region to

support FAFSA/WASFA completion?

• What resources or activities would help to support and complement your school and district-based efforts?


Regional FAFSA Planning

Activity

• Put your CA$H where you think we should put our cash!


Support for your Action Plans

Gift cards provided to support FAFSA efforts!

Examples for how you might spend the funds include:• Printing costs• Food for financial literacy events• Gift cards to support interpretation or translation

Steps to Redeem Gift Card

1. Today: Identify lead who will be in charge of receiving gift card and completing follow-up worksheet.

2. September: Avery will send lead 1-page document outlining use criteria. Lead will sign the sheet and receive their gift card.

3. March: Complete follow-up worksheet that describes how you spent your FAFSA action plan implementation $$$.


School/District FAFSA Planning

Things to consider in your school/district plan:

• How can FAFSA filing be made a priority?

• How will all staff in the school building be involved?

• Data

• Communications (Esp. among staff and to students/families)

• In your plan, think about where reflection will be incorporated (before (now ), middle and after.

• “Reflect IN action,” Reflect ON action,” “Reflect FOR action”


How Might You Engage Others in Supporting FAFSA Completion

Sample asks for how people can participate:

• Participate in training

• Provide volunteers

• Host/organize events

• Messaging

• Promote (via links) on social media


Other Sources of Inspiration

• First Lady’s FAFSA Commencement Challenge: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y8tYo_G5ldk

• Last year’s winner: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lmV-MqQkzxQ

Let’s enter the Road Map Project region in 2015!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y8tYo_G5ldk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lmV-MqQkzxQ

Documents

FAFSA Completion Best Practices - Road Map Project Completion Best Practices & Planning High School and Beyond Leadership Institute August 19, 2015 High School and Beyond Leadership