Turn the radio down. Power off the TV news. We’ve got some real financial news that’s important to your high school senior’s (and your) pockets: financial aid for college.

Plan now. The Department of Education in Washington loans money to every student who needs it.  But to qualify, you must complete the FAFSA and possibly the CSS/Profile.

FAFSA stands for Free Application for Federal Student Aid (http://www.fafsa.gov). It’s an application for financial aid also used to apply for aid from other sources like the state. All colleges require the FAFSA to determine eligibility for financial aid. Some may also require the CSS/Profile or their own form as well; you’ll need to check financial-aid requirements with individual colleges.

The CSS/Financial Aid Profile, CSS/Profile, or College Scholarship Service Profile is available from the College Board and is much more detailed than the FAFSA (https://profileonline.collegeboard.com/prf/index.jsp).

The FAFSA determines Federal funding and uses a formula to calculate what it and others call the Expected Family Contribution (EFC).  Note that the FAFSA does not take into account home equity, medical expenses, or change in employment.

The CSS/Profile helps determine money that will come from the college’s own resources in many cases.  A school’s EFC calculation will vary somewhat by institution, and may take into account home equity, deductions for medical expenses, and provisions for special circumstances. In addition, some colleges require their own form to determine financial-aid eligibility.

No matter what your household income may be, you should consider filling out the required forms in a timely manner. The CSS/Profile has varying deadlines depending on the school and becomes available in the fall.  If you are applying EA or ED, the CSS/Profile may be due quite early. The FAFSA becomes available on January 1 and should be submitted as soon as data is ready.

Please note there is now a FAFSA requirement for the Florida Bright Futures Scholarship. http://www.floridastudentfinancialaid.org/SSFAD/bf/

The FAFSA application can be found at: http://www.fafsa.ed.gov/. Operators will be standing by at FAFSA who are EXTREMELY helpful in answering your questions. Call them rather than remain in the dark concerning the online application. Phone numbers are 1-800-4-FED-AID (1-800-433-3243) or 319-337-5665; online chats are also available with a click!

Fill out the required forms each year if you desire aid for college.  And always check your college’s website for further financially-related forms or information. You never know what a college may require in addition to the above forms.

The most popular campus in Florida makes admission tougher each year. In order to increase the number of students who can enroll in UF’s undergraduate program, the school has created a special school term under the umbrella of its Innovation Academy (IA).

IA is actually a novel enrollment model that operates on a spring-summer calendar. In a move to balance out the number of students on the campus throughout the calendar year, UF will

enroll IA students who will take UF courses on campus during the spring and summer terms only. IA students cannot take fall semester classes on campus during the entire period of their undergraduate degree program.

The university wants to take advantage of classroom space made available when students graduate or drop out after fall semester, or when they leave campus to study abroad. What happens during the fall semester? At that time, IA students are encouraged to take online courses or participate in study abroad programs, internships, research, community service and/or employment.

IA students will be able to participate in fall semester activities available to all UF students (Go Gators!), including access to UF services, and activities like football and other events. An IA student may live on campus, belong to any club, participate in student government and participate in sorority or fraternity rush.

Major requirements and standards remain the same as always, coupled with the same academic advising that UF students have always received.

UF describes this experience as a way to provide a smaller-college experience combined with the look, feel and access provided by one of the country’s largest schools.

Who is Eligible to Participate?

Initially, the program will be limited to 500-800 freshmen and transfer students admitted to select majors. The long-term goal is a mix of 2,000 students.

When Will the Program Begin?

The first group of students admitted to IA will enroll Spring 2013 (current high school seniors).

For more information about UF’s Innovation Academy, click here or contact an expert college counselor at Judi Robinovitz Associates.

In order to receive Florida Academic Scholars (FAS) and Florida Medallion Scholars (FMS) awards, Florida Statutes require that a student pass four college preparatory math credits at the Algebra I level and above:

o Students entering grade 9 in 2010-11: Algebra I, and one Geometry course or a series of courses equivalent to Geometry

o Students entering grade 9 in 2011-12: Geometry

o Students entering grade 9 in 2012-13: in addition to above, Algebra II or a series of courses equivalent to Algebra II.

Please note that for 2011 and 2012 high school graduates only, the sequence of Algebra IA and IB and the sequence of Applied Math I and II may count as two credits, State University System (SUS) admissions and FAS/FMS eligibility. For 2013 and later graduates, these courses will revert to the traditional one high school credit per sequence for SUS Admissions and FAS/ FMS eligibility.

These courses DO NOT COUNT for any of the four required math credits toward Academic or Medallion awards:

Liberal Arts Math,

Consumer Math,

Business Math,

Math for College Success,

Applied Math III,

Informal Geometry,

Explorations in Math I & II

Pre-Algebra.

However, these courses are considered as meeting a math requirement for high school graduation and therefore do meet the requirements for the Florida Gold Seal Vocational Scholars (GSV) award.

While applying Early Action or Early Decision may increase your chances for a positive admissions decision, there are definitely strings attached.

Here are the five broad areas under which most all college applications fall:

· Rolling Admissions

· Early Decision

· Early Action

· Single-Choice Early Action (or Restricted Early Action

· Regular Decision

No doubt you’ve heard about them. Are you clear about the differences between them? Here’s a review.

Rolling Admissions means that colleges made decisions soon after your application is complete – typically within just a few weeks. Your chances for admission are greater the earlier you apply – even if you’re planning to take the SAT or ACT again to increase your score.

Early Decision (ED) means if you get accepted you MUST commit. The decision is “binding.” If you are accepted by your ED college, you must withdraw all your other applications. There are some definite advantages of applying ED to your top-choice colleges – as long as you’re positive that this is the best college for you. However, if you were to back out of your commitment to an ED college that accepted you in favor of another institution, you may end up high and dry—with admission to the other college rescinded! Colleges do communicate with one another.

Early Action (EA) means that students who get accepted do not have to commit. You’re not bound as with ED. The decision is “non-binding.” Unless the college has some restrictions attached to its EA plan, it’s almost always to your advantage to apply EA when that option is available.

A growing number of schools offer “Single-Choice Early Action” or “Restricted Early Action,” whereby you would violate the application rules if you were to apply Early Action to one college at the same time that you apply Early Decision or Early Action to another.

The original intention of the Early Action plan was to enable students to apply to multiple colleges under an Early Action plan, and even apply to another college under an Early Decision plan. In most cases, that is still true. However, there are some colleges that have “Restrictive” early plans which eliminate your ability to apply to other colleges either EA or ED. So always consult the school admissions website—or call admissions—to get the latest rules. Don’t stop inquiring until you are absolutely clear about a school’s policies. The rules have often become a moving target in an environment where institutions are vying for the best, brightest students possible.

Here are a few examples of colleges’ restrictive Early Action plans:

Here are some typical application deadlines that may guide your work over the next few months – but remember to check each college’s actual deadlines:

Two notable exceptions to the above:

The Early Notification/Early Evaluation option at a limited number of selective institutions gives students an idea of their chances for admission. It is neither an admission plan nor an offer of admission.

Common Application        https://www.commonapp.org/CommonApp/default.aspx

University of Florida         https://eagle.ufl.edu/cgi-bin/eaglec

Florida State University                https://admissions.fsu.edu/undergradapp/

With the pleasure of being at the top of the heap—the senior in high school—most teens who enter their final year are different from students below them in one significant way: they have an eye on the college process looming with ever more certainty.

The best of the best at the admissions process are bookkeepers and detail fanatics! These students have their plastic box from Office Depot into which every piece of college literature has made its way. Folders contain letters and catalogues. There is, perhaps, a printout of the latest simple spreadsheet with schools listed, application due dates, the names of teachers who will provide recommendation letters, etc. And one spreadsheet column for essays. Ah yes, essays, universally perceived as the hardest hurdle in the application process.

It’s true. The essay is the toughest and most insightful aspect of the application, and most schools require one or more. All the rest of the application is merely data input. But the essay requires time, energy, thoughtfulness, hours of drafting and re-drafting. That’s because of all the elements of the application, the essay(s) will contain a unique picture, an element of personality, an angle that is nowhere else to be found in the college application. Because colleges rarely offer individual interviews, what with the sheer number of applicants (thirty thousand applications for about 6 thousand freshman spots, for instance!), how you write your essay is paramount.

Many schools ask this simple, justified question among others: Why do you want to come to our institution? Your answer often takes the form of a single paragraph, but sometimes the school requests a longer response. To reply, you best serve your chances by visiting the campuses of your choice, where you take notes, visit buildings, sit in on a class or two, check out the student union, chat some current students, and generally take down names of campus community members with whom you’ve interacted. How come?

Schools know they are attractive to some segment of high school students. Whether urban, suburban, rural, or anywhere in between, campuses are beautiful in the eyes of the pre-disposed student who ventures to them. So don’t tell the admissions officer that the place is pretty. She knows that already. Explain why you think the school is an academic fit. Indicate how, when you were on the 2^nd floor of “Smith Hall,” you visited Professor Ayala’s psych class, and you were struck by the interaction between teacher and student. “That’s the kind of community I’d like to be a part of.”

First, the reader will know that you have visited. That’s no small thing in considering your intentions about attending. Second, you demonstrate the presence of mind to remember the name of the building, professor and class subject. Hey, says the reader, I’ve got a student with enough aplomb to recall Smith Hall, second floor, and write about it. There’s a degree of maturity there. Relate to the reader what you want to study, and then, perhaps, you can talk about the physical environment of the school in response to this particular question.

Be sure to write carefully and have your parents and/or college counselor review your draft before you enter it on line. Be savvy. Show your savvy. Don’t wait until this last minute to write. Senior year, and the clock is ticking.

There are websites at which students can get help filing the FAFSA for a fee. These sites are not affiliated with or endorsed by the U.S. Department of

Education (ED). We urge you to advise not to pay these sites for assistance that is provided for free at ED’s website.

For more information about federal student aid, submit questions at:

www.fsa4counselors.ed.gov/clcf/contactus.html

or call 1-800-4-FED-AID

If a Florida student applies for and/or receives a Bright Futures scholarship, he or she will be required to fill out the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA).

The change to the application for Bright Futures applies to incoming freshman, to students graduating from high school in 2012, and to students renewing their Bright Futures scholarships.

Even though the Bright futures program is a merit-based scholarship rather than a need-based one, if you don’t fill out the FAFSA, you will not receive any Bright Futures dollars.

The FAFSA is also required for students getting Florida Resident Access Grants and Access to Better Learning and Education Grants.

What is the FAFSA? It’s a federal financial form used to determine student eligibility for need-based federal student financial aid. Before this year, FAFSA was never required for Bright Futures. Lawmakers say they’ll use FAFSA to gather more demographic information about students who are attending college on taxpayer money.  Whether or not you think it’s more red tape, you have to submit it.  Students will surely need their parents’ help to complete the FAFSA, whose information requirements are quite detailed.

If you have a questions about the FAFSA requirement, contact a college or university financial aid counselor, or a college admissions expert.

Detailed information is also available at the FAFSA website: www.fafsa.ed.gov

But wait! That’s not all!

Bright Futures is also increasing the test score requirements (for high school graduates in 2013 and beyond), and the total number of community service hours completed. Here’s the breakdown:

We’ll bet that someone has shown you this strange paper-and-scissors phenomenon: a long, adhesive-taped strip that has only one edge and one surface. It’s “non-oriented” as a mathematician might say. And we think if we were specks navigating that paper, we’d get nowhere fast. Could produce a sinking feeling.

You might get a hint of the same sort of vertigo if you were to watch the film “The Race to Nowhere.”

In it students are stressed out, physically and mentally exhausted from homework and from the high expectation that they present themselves as teenage idols of academia. Every voice in the movie expresses the tension, the overload, the breaking-point strain of the high school balancing act between academics and everything else.

In the movie you’d hear students use the word “perfection” time and time again. Pressures come from any and every direction: school, family, peers, and the inner voice. A grade of “B” might as well stand for BAD, BUM, BEATEN. These kids think that only top schools could do. Sure enough, most high schoolers (yes, most, a majority) cheat to achieve the ideal. And the beat(-ing) goes on: eating disorders, depression—suicide. It’s not an easy screening, this movie.

The problem: “Prestigious school or nothing.” Only the name brands will secure a life worth living. Anything less would be…what? Let’s see.

Educational consultants like us confront this mindset almost daily. We work best at breaking down barriers of miscomprehension. With about 4,000 colleges and universities to select from, a knowledgeable, experienced and well-traveled consultant opens up the world to students and their families. There’s so much to consider when providing a student with appropriate choices. Our individualized guidance can’t be matched in most school settings. Check us out. Get off the Möbius strip and move into a comforting, 3-dimensional future teeming with choice and satisfaction.

Throughout your junior year you have been receiving fan mail from colleges and universities, many of whose names were completely new to you—and your parents. So, sooner than later (hopefully) you begin to ease yourself around the net, checking out the websites for these and other schools.

Urban environment. Exurbs. Cornfields. No matter what the location, college websites naturally paint the best possible pixel pictures of campus facilities. Be careful. All that glitters is not gold. Students over the years have been disappointed by the “final product” when they drive up to campus on that first day to unload at the gates of a freshman dorm.

To some observers, it appears that students glut the wires with a dozen applications or more, and accept admission to a school that they have never actually visited. How do you like the idea of a blind date that could last four years? No thanks.

Don’t procrastinate. As soon as you are down to your short list of undergraduate institutions that you’re considering, make plans to visit. A trip through a freshman dorm, combined with a visit to the student union, is worth its weight in gold.

While you can descend on a campus sight unseen and nose around to your heart’s content, expect neither to leave any lasting impression on the Admissions office nor gather specific information about the school (unless you are a real data miner in a hard hat!). Plan Ahead!

Call ahead. Get the schedule and sign up for an info session and campus tour. Try your hardest to visit classes during the academic year. On larger campuses, there are sessions in progress year round, but summer has a different feel from the traditional school year.

When you get there:

1. Sign in!

2. Attend that information session; take that tour… and take notes & photos!

3. Ask an intelligent question at the info session. Get the name of the admissions officer presenting. Send her or him a thank-you note when you return home.

4. Chow down in the student union or wherever students hang out (ask your tour guide). Mix with students there, and ask about the pro’s and con’s of academic and non-academic life. You’ll find that undergrads love to share their insights.

5. Attend a class, meet a professor, ask intelligent questions.

6. Check out the extracurricular possibilities. Are they what you want?

7. Hand out your “business card” (prepared before your visit) to every admissions person with whom you come into contact.

8. Check out the course catalogue with a view toward your possible major (if you know what that will be). Don’t have a major in mind? Ask about the core or distribution requirements (but look that up in advance so you can ask a specific question!)

9. Where’s the school located? No rolling campus, only busses and tall, anonymous looking buildings? Or are you surrounded in every direction by wheat and sorghum? Do you (and your parents) feel safe?

10. Take digital pictures and notes the whole time you’re in the area (campus and city or town). When it comes time to respond in your application to the question of “Why have you chosen to apply to Oberlin College?” you can respond with first-hand aplomb! “When I walked across Tappan Square toward Finney Chapel…”. Nothing beats this kind of immediacy in your short essays!

Arrange your trips so that you can visit a number of schools within reasonable travel distance. Do NOT visit more than two schools on any one day.

Don’t be surprised. Plan now to get well acquainted soon with the schools of your dreams.