FAFSA: The Bureaucracy of Suspicion
April 17, 2024 6:44 AM Subscribe
"Before 2024, the FAFSA was a Frankenstein’s monster, with all kinds of different forms grafted together to create a confusing and demoralizing process that left far too many eligible students unable to access their aid. This year, the Department of Education rolled out major revisions that are, in fact, much better — but only if they work. Right now, they don’t." David M. Perry (co-author of the wonderful The Bright Ages) with an opinion piece on the ongoing problems with FAFSA, incrementalism, and the suspicion around giving students money for school.
When I was in college, many years ago, quite a few of my fellow students were put in difficult positions by either a parent who wouldn't cooperate in getting the FAFSA filled out, or a parent who would cooperate with the form but who had no intention of providing the level of assistance that the formula predicted.
The problems this year with the online forms simply not working sound incredibly frustrating and stressful to deal with.
posted by Dip Flash at 7:28 AM on April 17 [13 favorites]
The problems this year with the online forms simply not working sound incredibly frustrating and stressful to deal with.
posted by Dip Flash at 7:28 AM on April 17 [13 favorites]
Need-based programs like financial aid (but also Medicaid, disability support and other social supports) are designed around what I call a bureaucracy-of-suspicion. The assumption built into these programs is that people will seek benefits for which they don’t qualify, and that it’s better to deny 100 eligible users rather than to give a single extra penny to someone who might be ineligible.
Dovetails nicely with the observation by Davis X. Machina:
The salient fact of American politics is that there are fifty to seventy million voters each of who will volunteer to live, with his family, in a cardboard box under an overpass, and cook sparrows on an old curtain rod, if someone would only guarantee that the black, gay, Hispanic, liberal, whatever, in the next box over doesn’t even have a curtain rod, or a sparrow to put on it.
posted by TedW at 7:33 AM on April 17 [46 favorites]
Dovetails nicely with the observation by Davis X. Machina:
The salient fact of American politics is that there are fifty to seventy million voters each of who will volunteer to live, with his family, in a cardboard box under an overpass, and cook sparrows on an old curtain rod, if someone would only guarantee that the black, gay, Hispanic, liberal, whatever, in the next box over doesn’t even have a curtain rod, or a sparrow to put on it.
posted by TedW at 7:33 AM on April 17 [46 favorites]
I’m really curious to learn the eventual backstory behind the failure of the rollout and would love to hear the opinion of any of the many Mefites with experience programming. I’ve worked for the feds for a while and the extreme lack of project management skills is just shocking. Like, a complete refusal to make any effort to establish multi-step deadlines and define responsibilities. And people who refuse to as much use Excel …
Coupled with a dynamic where nobody is willing to push back against managers (even when the own managers are clueless) and you have some real disasters.
posted by haptic_avenger at 7:39 AM on April 17 [7 favorites]
Coupled with a dynamic where nobody is willing to push back against managers (even when the own managers are clueless) and you have some real disasters.
posted by haptic_avenger at 7:39 AM on April 17 [7 favorites]
It’s been, to put it gently, a fiasco. Normally the FAFSA comes out in October of the previous year; this time students couldn’t access it until December 30, and even then it’s been plagued with technical bugs. The Biden administration blames the problems on changes to the financial aid formula, the complexity of changing a system based on millions of lines of computer code more than forty years old and missed deadlines with the outside vendor, General Dynamics, responsible for operating the new system.
I agree with the author about "bureaucracy-of-suspicion" being the core problem here -- FAFSA should not exist because higher education should be free.
But the immediate problem seems to be a bog-standard IT project failure, with the extra government fun of asking a defense contractor to develop a student aid calculator service. One would think that 11 years after the disastrous healthcare.gov release, and subsequent rescue by a hastily-assembled group of Googlers and other experts, the government would have learned to build its own websites.
posted by learning from frequent failure at 7:43 AM on April 17 [11 favorites]
I agree with the author about "bureaucracy-of-suspicion" being the core problem here -- FAFSA should not exist because higher education should be free.
But the immediate problem seems to be a bog-standard IT project failure, with the extra government fun of asking a defense contractor to develop a student aid calculator service. One would think that 11 years after the disastrous healthcare.gov release, and subsequent rescue by a hastily-assembled group of Googlers and other experts, the government would have learned to build its own websites.
posted by learning from frequent failure at 7:43 AM on April 17 [11 favorites]
One would think that 11 years after the disastrous healthcare.gov release, and subsequent rescue by a hastily-assembled group of Googlers and other experts, the government would have learned to build its own websites.
But that would be spending public funds without giving private industry the opportunity to abscond with a large chunk of the money, and we can't have that for obvious reasons.
posted by Faint of Butt at 7:55 AM on April 17 [32 favorites]
But that would be spending public funds without giving private industry the opportunity to abscond with a large chunk of the money, and we can't have that for obvious reasons.
posted by Faint of Butt at 7:55 AM on April 17 [32 favorites]
One would think that 11 years after the disastrous healthcare.gov release, and subsequent rescue by a hastily-assembled group of Googlers and other experts, the government would have learned to build its own websites.
You wanna pay for it?
FAFSA is a mess. FSA has struggled for years with competence issues and industry capture (if my conversations of the past ten years or so were recordable and searchable and one searched for "FSA and [swear word list]," you'd get a lot of hits), but it's also worth noting that they got a flat budget last year. Expertise, and professionals' time, and the experience to challenge outside SMEs, is expensive. It's a vexing problem, but it's largely driven by long-term dynamics of government funding and capacity, which are political issues far outside the ability of any department, or, to a significant degree, any individual administration, to control.
posted by praemunire at 8:02 AM on April 17 [8 favorites]
You wanna pay for it?
FAFSA is a mess. FSA has struggled for years with competence issues and industry capture (if my conversations of the past ten years or so were recordable and searchable and one searched for "FSA and [swear word list]," you'd get a lot of hits), but it's also worth noting that they got a flat budget last year. Expertise, and professionals' time, and the experience to challenge outside SMEs, is expensive. It's a vexing problem, but it's largely driven by long-term dynamics of government funding and capacity, which are political issues far outside the ability of any department, or, to a significant degree, any individual administration, to control.
posted by praemunire at 8:02 AM on April 17 [8 favorites]
“ the government would have learned to build its own websites.”
I actually worked with a government employee developer who was very, very good and had developed some really great tools for the agency. But he was about to retire and pretty bitter about the end of covid WFH. And of course the agency COO was a toxic nutcase which did not help. And also of course - the government typically has very very little interest in improving workflow or efficiency. That’s because it takes extra work to improve the workflow and nobody wants to do extra work. And processes tend to accumulate all sorts of steps that respond to a past mistake or a random hobby-horse of someone above who has no actual understanding of the process. Even worse, some employees insist on these steps because they *think* that is what Deputy Director so-and-so wants, but don’t actually ever really figure out of it’s true. Then all the time is spent on that pointless exercise instead of the meat of the project.
tl;dr - a culture of CYA and resistance to change makes bureaucracy work.
posted by haptic_avenger at 8:04 AM on April 17 [7 favorites]
I actually worked with a government employee developer who was very, very good and had developed some really great tools for the agency. But he was about to retire and pretty bitter about the end of covid WFH. And of course the agency COO was a toxic nutcase which did not help. And also of course - the government typically has very very little interest in improving workflow or efficiency. That’s because it takes extra work to improve the workflow and nobody wants to do extra work. And processes tend to accumulate all sorts of steps that respond to a past mistake or a random hobby-horse of someone above who has no actual understanding of the process. Even worse, some employees insist on these steps because they *think* that is what Deputy Director so-and-so wants, but don’t actually ever really figure out of it’s true. Then all the time is spent on that pointless exercise instead of the meat of the project.
tl;dr - a culture of CYA and resistance to change makes bureaucracy work.
posted by haptic_avenger at 8:04 AM on April 17 [7 favorites]
One would think that 11 years after the disastrous healthcare.gov release, and subsequent rescue by a hastily-assembled group of Googlers and other experts, the government would have learned to build its own websites.
Would LOVE to be a Fed employee, but Congress thinks it's cheaper to contract everything out.
posted by 922257033c4a0f3cecdbd819a46d626999d1af4a at 8:08 AM on April 17 [7 favorites]
Would LOVE to be a Fed employee, but Congress thinks it's cheaper to contract everything out.
posted by 922257033c4a0f3cecdbd819a46d626999d1af4a at 8:08 AM on April 17 [7 favorites]
“ It's a vexing problem, but it's largely driven by long-term dynamics of government funding and capacity”
Is it? Or is FAS just a terrible agency that should be dismantled, then put all the student aid functions some place that cared about financial services like Treasury/IRS? I hate to insult my fellow feds but ED and HHS do not house the best & brightest. Somehow the IRS manages to collect & refund taxes in a timely manner and actually provides pretty good customer service. If the government is going to originate & service loans, do it all in-house at agency that is actually set up for financial services.
posted by haptic_avenger at 8:09 AM on April 17 [8 favorites]
Is it? Or is FAS just a terrible agency that should be dismantled, then put all the student aid functions some place that cared about financial services like Treasury/IRS? I hate to insult my fellow feds but ED and HHS do not house the best & brightest. Somehow the IRS manages to collect & refund taxes in a timely manner and actually provides pretty good customer service. If the government is going to originate & service loans, do it all in-house at agency that is actually set up for financial services.
posted by haptic_avenger at 8:09 AM on April 17 [8 favorites]
Boy, am I glad I haven't had to deal with this mess. Never worked in financial aid and I feel for the few I knew who did.
posted by jenfullmoon at 8:16 AM on April 17
posted by jenfullmoon at 8:16 AM on April 17
There are frameworks for effective software development in the federal government that seem like they would have been a great fit for this.
posted by idb at 8:26 AM on April 17 [3 favorites]
posted by idb at 8:26 AM on April 17 [3 favorites]
It's worth noting that this is more than just a website. Part of the problem is that the "simplification" is related to the applicant-facing part and not to back-end processes. The back-end processes are now more complicated than ever because, in order to ask fewer questions, schools now need to download more tax data from the IRS.
posted by a dangerous ruin at 8:30 AM on April 17 [7 favorites]
posted by a dangerous ruin at 8:30 AM on April 17 [7 favorites]
Hi. I'm a parent of two kids graduating high school and headed to college and who filed the FAFSA this year, here to tell you why the snafu didn't matter for us, which in turn points to a solution. (Setting aside the bigger point that yes, higher ed should be free, and financial aid filings should be unnecessary.)
My kids applied only to private colleges (not bragging, just giving the picture). About 250 private colleges use a different system, called the CSS Profile, which is run by the College Board (the folks behind the SAT, AP courses and AP tests, and that's a whole 'nother post). Those colleges use it to determine the need-based aid they dole out from their endowments. The private colleges also require you to fill out the FAFSA, so you can get federal aid and possibly reduce how much the college has to cough up from its funds.
The CSS and FAFSA were remarkably similar -- I haven't done a question-by-question comparison, but I'd be stunned if they weren't 90% the same or more. It's a bit of work pulling all the info together, but the estimate of 15 to 20 minutes to do the form once you're organized is pretty much spot-on.
The CSS worked like a charm and sailed right through the College Board to the schools. (More or less; most colleges then come back and ask for some supplemental info). And while all the colleges also wanted the FAFSA, every single one just went ahead and worked up their financial aid offers without. One school sent a letter and explicitly said, umm, just forget about the FAFSA, we're good without it. We got generous offers, and in plenty of time to make decisions. The FAFSA filing took months to be processed but did go through in March, iirc.)
The downside is, the College Board charges you $25 for the first college you send it to, and $16 for every subsequent one. (It is free if family income is less than $100K, which we just missed - grrrr.)
So... I'm not a fan of the government privatizing its services, and even less so of private companies making money *just to give money to people who need it* -- but there is a functional and essentially parallel, if not duplicate system out there. It's doable. Wonder if the feds could have subcontracted for a year, or licensed the code, or something.
And parents of future college applicants, just a heads-up -- these forms aren't hard, and the private colleges that use the CSS may have high sticker prices, but they also can be amazingly generous. Look for colleges that are "need-blind" and "guarantee to meet financial need."
posted by martin q blank at 8:40 AM on April 17 [17 favorites]
My kids applied only to private colleges (not bragging, just giving the picture). About 250 private colleges use a different system, called the CSS Profile, which is run by the College Board (the folks behind the SAT, AP courses and AP tests, and that's a whole 'nother post). Those colleges use it to determine the need-based aid they dole out from their endowments. The private colleges also require you to fill out the FAFSA, so you can get federal aid and possibly reduce how much the college has to cough up from its funds.
The CSS and FAFSA were remarkably similar -- I haven't done a question-by-question comparison, but I'd be stunned if they weren't 90% the same or more. It's a bit of work pulling all the info together, but the estimate of 15 to 20 minutes to do the form once you're organized is pretty much spot-on.
The CSS worked like a charm and sailed right through the College Board to the schools. (More or less; most colleges then come back and ask for some supplemental info). And while all the colleges also wanted the FAFSA, every single one just went ahead and worked up their financial aid offers without. One school sent a letter and explicitly said, umm, just forget about the FAFSA, we're good without it. We got generous offers, and in plenty of time to make decisions. The FAFSA filing took months to be processed but did go through in March, iirc.)
The downside is, the College Board charges you $25 for the first college you send it to, and $16 for every subsequent one. (It is free if family income is less than $100K, which we just missed - grrrr.)
So... I'm not a fan of the government privatizing its services, and even less so of private companies making money *just to give money to people who need it* -- but there is a functional and essentially parallel, if not duplicate system out there. It's doable. Wonder if the feds could have subcontracted for a year, or licensed the code, or something.
And parents of future college applicants, just a heads-up -- these forms aren't hard, and the private colleges that use the CSS may have high sticker prices, but they also can be amazingly generous. Look for colleges that are "need-blind" and "guarantee to meet financial need."
posted by martin q blank at 8:40 AM on April 17 [17 favorites]
Somehow the IRS manages to collect & refund taxes in a timely manner and actually provides pretty good customer service.
The IRS is a perennial punching bag and continually starved given their remit..... and the only reason it is allowed to work "well" for the middle 75% is so the top 5% can continue fleecing us all* and the bottom 20% can serve as a warning to the middle that they should be happy with their lot.
Please don't add FAFSA to the IRSs already overburdened situation.
* obviously, the higher percentile you get the greater the fleecing, and the 5% isn't a hard cutoff.
posted by lalochezia at 8:46 AM on April 17 [6 favorites]
The IRS is a perennial punching bag and continually starved given their remit..... and the only reason it is allowed to work "well" for the middle 75% is so the top 5% can continue fleecing us all* and the bottom 20% can serve as a warning to the middle that they should be happy with their lot.
Please don't add FAFSA to the IRSs already overburdened situation.
* obviously, the higher percentile you get the greater the fleecing, and the 5% isn't a hard cutoff.
posted by lalochezia at 8:46 AM on April 17 [6 favorites]
Adam Harris has done some good reporting (ungated) on this, interviewing federal staff.
Inside Higher Ed has followed this story closely.
posted by doctornemo at 9:43 AM on April 17 [5 favorites]
Inside Higher Ed has followed this story closely.
posted by doctornemo at 9:43 AM on April 17 [5 favorites]
This is a fiasco which might have some serious fallout. Right now it's a massive tide of stress for a lot of would-be and current students, their families, college and university staff and administrators, the federal workers we've mentioned, and more.
Over the summer and fall, the FAFSA debacle might push some current students not to return to classes, and some applicants to give higher ed a miss this year (and maybe longer). In other words, American higher ed enrollment might tick down as a result. Why this matters: most colleges and universities in this country depend largely on tuition and fees for financial survival. Plus we used to think that everyone needed more college.
Second problem: FAFSAgate is now a gift to Republicans wanting to bash Democrats and the federal government for incompetence. As the 2024 election shambles on and heats up, I wouldn't be surprised to see the GOP gleefully point to it and bash higher ed.
posted by doctornemo at 9:50 AM on April 17 [6 favorites]
Over the summer and fall, the FAFSA debacle might push some current students not to return to classes, and some applicants to give higher ed a miss this year (and maybe longer). In other words, American higher ed enrollment might tick down as a result. Why this matters: most colleges and universities in this country depend largely on tuition and fees for financial survival. Plus we used to think that everyone needed more college.
Second problem: FAFSAgate is now a gift to Republicans wanting to bash Democrats and the federal government for incompetence. As the 2024 election shambles on and heats up, I wouldn't be surprised to see the GOP gleefully point to it and bash higher ed.
posted by doctornemo at 9:50 AM on April 17 [6 favorites]
You wanna pay for it?
DEAR GOD YES, I WANT MY TAXES TO GO TO PUBLIC GOODS THAT WORK
posted by Horace Rumpole at 10:00 AM on April 17 [44 favorites]
DEAR GOD YES, I WANT MY TAXES TO GO TO PUBLIC GOODS THAT WORK
posted by Horace Rumpole at 10:00 AM on April 17 [44 favorites]
Second problem: FAFSAgate is now a gift to Republicans wanting to bash Democrats and the federal government for incompetence. As the 2024 election shambles on and heats up, I wouldn't be surprised to see the GOP gleefully point to it and bash higher ed.
Given that the Republicans want to eliminate the Department of Education entirely, that wouldn't surprise me either.
posted by dlugoczaj at 10:07 AM on April 17 [4 favorites]
Given that the Republicans want to eliminate the Department of Education entirely, that wouldn't surprise me either.
posted by dlugoczaj at 10:07 AM on April 17 [4 favorites]
I recently read a book called Recoding America about how the government (at various levels) implements its websites that really opened my eyes to why so many of them suck. I think it's relevant to the FAFSA situation.
posted by gentlyepigrams at 10:22 AM on April 17 [4 favorites]
posted by gentlyepigrams at 10:22 AM on April 17 [4 favorites]
I have no kids, so no experience in this area. I was curious and googled what information you need for the FAFSA, and according to this link: What information will I need to fill out a FAFAS form? it's all bank statement info and tax form info.
My question is: What possible computation can the back-end system be doing that couldn't be done almost in the web page itself? It sounds like a list of 15-25 numbers. I understand that there is a commitment and some documents probably need to be stored as backup, but jeez - at the end of the day, isn't it that simple?
posted by scolbath at 10:37 AM on April 17
My question is: What possible computation can the back-end system be doing that couldn't be done almost in the web page itself? It sounds like a list of 15-25 numbers. I understand that there is a commitment and some documents probably need to be stored as backup, but jeez - at the end of the day, isn't it that simple?
posted by scolbath at 10:37 AM on April 17
scolbath, FAFSA's back end imports your previous year's tax data.
...Which, of course, they're not doing right.
posted by wenestvedt at 10:47 AM on April 17 [3 favorites]
...Which, of course, they're not doing right.
posted by wenestvedt at 10:47 AM on April 17 [3 favorites]
One of the worst parts of this is that the raw FAFSA data from the feds has to be imported into every college's Student Information System, where their very idiosyncratic Financial Aid awarding is done.
The companies who write those SIS systems aren't super geniuses, either, on their best days. The one that I help support will have five separate patches to handle the new FAFSA data, the last of which we hope to get in May -- which will be well after students should have received an admit decision & aid offer, chosen a school, and sent in a deposit.
The fact that some data the feds sent will have to be reprocessed and resent is infuriating: I am in full "the coach from 'Letterkenney' mode" whenever I think about this.
posted by wenestvedt at 10:52 AM on April 17 [6 favorites]
The companies who write those SIS systems aren't super geniuses, either, on their best days. The one that I help support will have five separate patches to handle the new FAFSA data, the last of which we hope to get in May -- which will be well after students should have received an admit decision & aid offer, chosen a school, and sent in a deposit.
The fact that some data the feds sent will have to be reprocessed and resent is infuriating: I am in full "the coach from 'Letterkenney' mode" whenever I think about this.
posted by wenestvedt at 10:52 AM on April 17 [6 favorites]
Oh, your current year (2024) and previous year (2023)?
But that just begs the question. So it's 30 numbers - 15 from this year, 15 from last year.
Although I still pale to think how hard it is to retrieve a set of 15 real-valued numbers from a database indexed by a single primary key. This is an example of what I call "internware" - I certainly see it in the corporation of 180,000 employees I work for. I don't call it that to denigrate interns - my claim is that I've seen interns produce better systems in a 3-month stint over the summer. We have systems in-house that are so badly broken it must have been work to make them that bad.
posted by scolbath at 10:54 AM on April 17
But that just begs the question. So it's 30 numbers - 15 from this year, 15 from last year.
Although I still pale to think how hard it is to retrieve a set of 15 real-valued numbers from a database indexed by a single primary key. This is an example of what I call "internware" - I certainly see it in the corporation of 180,000 employees I work for. I don't call it that to denigrate interns - my claim is that I've seen interns produce better systems in a 3-month stint over the summer. We have systems in-house that are so badly broken it must have been work to make them that bad.
posted by scolbath at 10:54 AM on April 17
For department of “how hard can it be?” - Primary systems in FAFSA include
- COD
- CPS
- Direct Loan Tools
- EDconnect
- EDExpress
- FPS
- G5
- NSLDS
- SAIG
Programs served by FAFSA data include:
- Academic Competitiveness Grant (ACG)
- All Title IV Federal Student Aid Programs
- Byrd Honors Scholarship
- Direct Loan
- Experimental Sites Initiative
- Federal Family Education Loan (FFEL)
- Federal Work-Study (FWS)
- Gaining Early Awareness and Readiness for Undergraduate Programs (GEAR UP)
- Health Education Assistance Loan (HEAL)
- Iraq and Afghanistan Service Grant
- Leveraging Educational Assistance Partnership (LEAP)
- National SMART Grant
- Pell Grant
- Perkins Loan
- Special Leveraging Educational Assistance Partnership (SLEAP)
- Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grant (FSEOG)
- TEACH Grant
And we haven’t even started with Selective Service or all the incarcerated kids.
Average enrollment in higher Ed has been steady trending down for years- many many places are not going to be able survive even a decline of 10%.
posted by zenon at 11:04 AM on April 17 [3 favorites]
Average enrollment in higher Ed has been steady trending down for years- many many places are not going to be able survive even a decline of 10%.
posted by zenon at 11:04 AM on April 17 [3 favorites]
Although I still pale to think how hard it is to retrieve a set of 15 real-valued numbers from a database indexed by a single primary key.
yes that is clearly what is happening and not an outbreak of virulant galaxy-brain engineers disease in this comment section. your comment is the most condescending thing - about something you clearly have NO understanding of - i've read in some time, and that's quite a high bar.
posted by lalochezia at 11:48 AM on April 17 [3 favorites]
I have been watching for a reckoning in higher ed for something like 20 years, but I sure did not expect it to be catalyzed like this. martin_q_blank's anecdote is chilling - all too easy for families of means to just write off the state systems.
Means-testing: not even once.
posted by McBearclaw at 11:53 AM on April 17 [5 favorites]
Means-testing: not even once.
posted by McBearclaw at 11:53 AM on April 17 [5 favorites]
I work with colleges. Three times within the last month I’ve gone to update my records on a school I hadn’t talked to for a few years and found they had closed or merged with other small local colleges.
posted by bq at 12:06 PM on April 17 [4 favorites]
posted by bq at 12:06 PM on April 17 [4 favorites]
I have been watching for a reckoning in higher ed for something like 20 years, but I sure did not expect it to be catalyzed like this. martin_q_blank's anecdote is chilling - all too easy for families of means to just write off the state systems.
Means-testing: not even once.
For me personally as a student who was reliant on financial aid, it was much, much cheaper to attend an expensive private school than it would have been to attend a state school, because the private school could offer "full need" aid while even back then the state schools did not. Way too many students from poorer families never apply to the elite schools because of the absurdly high sticker price, and thereby miss out on the deep-pocketed financial aid that the schools with large endowments can offer.
posted by Dip Flash at 12:11 PM on April 17 [13 favorites]
Means-testing: not even once.
For me personally as a student who was reliant on financial aid, it was much, much cheaper to attend an expensive private school than it would have been to attend a state school, because the private school could offer "full need" aid while even back then the state schools did not. Way too many students from poorer families never apply to the elite schools because of the absurdly high sticker price, and thereby miss out on the deep-pocketed financial aid that the schools with large endowments can offer.
posted by Dip Flash at 12:11 PM on April 17 [13 favorites]
Fuck the FAFSA and the penny pinching bullshit behind it.
The FAFSA was like “Oh, your ex husband explicitly said ‘That’s not my kid, I won’t give her a dime?’ Too bad, so sad, he was on your tax form two years ago, so go fuck yourself if you can’t get his cooperation.” And then my kid lost her financial aid.
FAFSA doesn’t acknowledge that some ‘parents’ just don’t give a fuck and cannot be made to give a fuck.
Oh, also: the “simplification” actually removes things that would have solved issues like that to help students get more money, like the displaced homemaker question.
posted by corb at 1:28 PM on April 17 [9 favorites]
The FAFSA was like “Oh, your ex husband explicitly said ‘That’s not my kid, I won’t give her a dime?’ Too bad, so sad, he was on your tax form two years ago, so go fuck yourself if you can’t get his cooperation.” And then my kid lost her financial aid.
FAFSA doesn’t acknowledge that some ‘parents’ just don’t give a fuck and cannot be made to give a fuck.
Oh, also: the “simplification” actually removes things that would have solved issues like that to help students get more money, like the displaced homemaker question.
posted by corb at 1:28 PM on April 17 [9 favorites]
Average enrollment in higher Ed has been steady trending down for years
That's correct. American higher ed enrollment peaked around 2012 and then declined every year until fall 2023.
This is something I research. Current book ms is actually called _Peak Higher Ed_.
posted by doctornemo at 1:49 PM on April 17 [6 favorites]
That's correct. American higher ed enrollment peaked around 2012 and then declined every year until fall 2023.
This is something I research. Current book ms is actually called _Peak Higher Ed_.
posted by doctornemo at 1:49 PM on April 17 [6 favorites]
One would think that 11 years after the disastrous healthcare.gov release, and subsequent rescue by a hastily-assembled group of Googlers and other experts, the government would have learned to build its own websites.
What's particularly odd about this is that in the wake of the healthcare.gov disaster, the government did set up it's own internal web development organization, 18F, which from everything I've heard is quite good at what it does. Given that 18F exists, I'm not sure why they decided to contract this out rather than use the agency they already have...
posted by cowtown at 2:27 PM on April 17 [6 favorites]
What's particularly odd about this is that in the wake of the healthcare.gov disaster, the government did set up it's own internal web development organization, 18F, which from everything I've heard is quite good at what it does. Given that 18F exists, I'm not sure why they decided to contract this out rather than use the agency they already have...
posted by cowtown at 2:27 PM on April 17 [6 favorites]
all too easy for families of means to just write off the state systems.
I don't think McBearclaw was implying anything about our family's choice, but just to be clear: We live in Florida, and my kids are all too aware of what years of Rick Scott and Ron DeSantis have done to our state university system. (And let's not forget Ben Sasse's slow demolition of University of Florida.)
They wanted no part of it, and also just wanted to live and learn in another part of the country, and thank heavens they had the academic chops to get offers of admission from some good schools that guarantee to meet financial need.
posted by martin q blank at 2:31 PM on April 17 [6 favorites]
I don't think McBearclaw was implying anything about our family's choice, but just to be clear: We live in Florida, and my kids are all too aware of what years of Rick Scott and Ron DeSantis have done to our state university system. (And let's not forget Ben Sasse's slow demolition of University of Florida.)
They wanted no part of it, and also just wanted to live and learn in another part of the country, and thank heavens they had the academic chops to get offers of admission from some good schools that guarantee to meet financial need.
posted by martin q blank at 2:31 PM on April 17 [6 favorites]
Yeah, pour one out for New College.
posted by bq at 3:08 PM on April 17 [7 favorites]
posted by bq at 3:08 PM on April 17 [7 favorites]
Somehow the IRS manages to collect & refund taxes in a timely manner
But they don't. They will literally audit impoverished families rather than rich people because rich people are too mean to them. And their most important form has an entire cottage industry built around it of third parties filling it out for you!
posted by praemunire at 7:10 PM on April 17 [7 favorites]
But they don't. They will literally audit impoverished families rather than rich people because rich people are too mean to them. And their most important form has an entire cottage industry built around it of third parties filling it out for you!
posted by praemunire at 7:10 PM on April 17 [7 favorites]
DEAR GOD YES, I WANT MY TAXES TO GO TO PUBLIC GOODS THAT WORK
Me, too (obviously), but people often don't seem to want to internalize that in the moment. Better services cost more. We are not even one full term out from an administration that took a hatchet to every government function they could find that didn't involve torturing brown people.
posted by praemunire at 7:15 PM on April 17 [3 favorites]
Me, too (obviously), but people often don't seem to want to internalize that in the moment. Better services cost more. We are not even one full term out from an administration that took a hatchet to every government function they could find that didn't involve torturing brown people.
posted by praemunire at 7:15 PM on April 17 [3 favorites]
I worked for a student loan guarantor that was nominally nonprofit, but we called it a NINO (Nonprofit in Name Only). There is so much unnecessary bureaucracy and rent-seeking in the system that we could just get rid of if we just Gave. People. Money. For. College.
Even with the moral hazard of people who would get money & never complete college, I sometimes wonder it might be cheaper. Student loans are already a trillion dollar part of the economy, as in trillion with a T.
posted by jonp72 at 7:35 PM on April 17 [4 favorites]
Even with the moral hazard of people who would get money & never complete college, I sometimes wonder it might be cheaper. Student loans are already a trillion dollar part of the economy, as in trillion with a T.
posted by jonp72 at 7:35 PM on April 17 [4 favorites]
martin, yes, sorry for my poorly-phrased comment. What's being done to Florida's state system is a total outrage, and your family is making the only sane choice. I place the blame squarely on people who load public programs up with barriers while simultaneously underfunding them.
posted by McBearclaw at 9:34 PM on April 17 [2 favorites]
posted by McBearclaw at 9:34 PM on April 17 [2 favorites]
Even with the moral hazard of people who would get money & never complete college
Never attending college would be one thing, but attending some college but not completing is different imo - you don't reap the career benefits of a degree, thus theoretically returning society's investment via your higher earning power and economic stability, but you do at least acquire some education and hopefully exposure to new people and ideas, which can return its own kind of benefit to society.
posted by trig at 12:04 AM on April 18 [3 favorites]
Never attending college would be one thing, but attending some college but not completing is different imo - you don't reap the career benefits of a degree, thus theoretically returning society's investment via your higher earning power and economic stability, but you do at least acquire some education and hopefully exposure to new people and ideas, which can return its own kind of benefit to society.
posted by trig at 12:04 AM on April 18 [3 favorites]
Somehow the IRS manages to collect & refund taxes in a timely manner
I'm sure the FAFSA works ok for the vast majority of families too, even if this year's rollout was slow, but it's for those who have slightly more complex problems where the IRS fails spectacularly. Like for me. Then the IRS is a complete failure to work with and the timelines for fixing minor things are measured in months. And the customer service is worse than any private firm and follow-up communication is terrible. Rant over.
I guess here's a list of current FAFSA defects
Never attending college would be one thing, but attending some college but not completing is different imo
According to net worth and income stats, 'some college' means you can compete with college graduates in terms of net worth and future income. With no college at all, you cannot. It's not even close.
posted by The_Vegetables at 7:26 AM on April 18
I'm sure the FAFSA works ok for the vast majority of families too, even if this year's rollout was slow, but it's for those who have slightly more complex problems where the IRS fails spectacularly. Like for me. Then the IRS is a complete failure to work with and the timelines for fixing minor things are measured in months. And the customer service is worse than any private firm and follow-up communication is terrible. Rant over.
I guess here's a list of current FAFSA defects
Never attending college would be one thing, but attending some college but not completing is different imo
According to net worth and income stats, 'some college' means you can compete with college graduates in terms of net worth and future income. With no college at all, you cannot. It's not even close.
posted by The_Vegetables at 7:26 AM on April 18
There is so much unnecessary bureaucracy and rent-seeking in the system that we could just get rid of if we just Gave. People. Money. For. College.
If it makes you feel any better, these guys' part of the system is sloooooowly sunsetting (because they were part of the FFEL program; the federal government lending directly does not require guarantors) and they are frantically casting about for ways to justify their continued existence.
But, yes, as with health care, the elaborate bureaucracy we have evolved to ensure that no one gets anything they don't "deserve" or can't pay top dollar for is far more wasteful than just meeting people's needs directly. So many pigs fattening at those troughs, though.
posted by praemunire at 7:58 AM on April 18 [3 favorites]
If it makes you feel any better, these guys' part of the system is sloooooowly sunsetting (because they were part of the FFEL program; the federal government lending directly does not require guarantors) and they are frantically casting about for ways to justify their continued existence.
But, yes, as with health care, the elaborate bureaucracy we have evolved to ensure that no one gets anything they don't "deserve" or can't pay top dollar for is far more wasteful than just meeting people's needs directly. So many pigs fattening at those troughs, though.
posted by praemunire at 7:58 AM on April 18 [3 favorites]
the moral hazard of people who would get money & never complete college [emph. mine]
Is the value proposition here in someone being educated, or in assuring someone of "completing" it to the satisfaction of someone who designed a program such that a degree is issued?
I kinda get where you're going with this, but I don't think this is at all a good way to think about how or why educations, educators, or student participation should be paid for.
posted by majick at 8:27 AM on April 18 [2 favorites]
Is the value proposition here in someone being educated, or in assuring someone of "completing" it to the satisfaction of someone who designed a program such that a degree is issued?
I kinda get where you're going with this, but I don't think this is at all a good way to think about how or why educations, educators, or student participation should be paid for.
posted by majick at 8:27 AM on April 18 [2 favorites]
If there's a moral hazard, I'd say it is the money that goes to institutions with artificially inflated tuition and inadequate services :-/
posted by bq at 9:18 AM on April 18 [2 favorites]
posted by bq at 9:18 AM on April 18 [2 favorites]
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