What’s Missing from the 2024-25 FAFSA?

FAFSA 2024-25 missing inflation adjustment.

A Critical Element Is Missing from the 2024-25 FAFSA

Updates from the U.S. Department of Education

On 01/22/24, the U.S. Department of Education agreed to correct its income tables to reflect the inflation adjustment.

This was reported in an article by the Washington Post and other media outlets.

Shortly after the announcement of the error correction, the DOE made another announcement that has alarmed families and thrown university financial aid offices into chaos.

It has been widely reported that universities will not receive student FAFSA information until mid-March.

This has the greatest impact on this year’s college-bound high school seniors, who will not receive their financial aid packages until April.

With the customary commitment and deposit deadline being May 1, students will have little time to evaluate their offers to make the best decision.

Higher education professionals joined forces to implore universities to extend the deadline.

Some schools have already heeded the call.

***Extended deposit deadlines are being updated on the “The FAFSA Fallout Continues post***

Schools with Extended June 1 Deposit Deadlines

Misericordia University

Monmouth College

Wittenberg University

Widener University

University of Indianapolis

Kalamazoo College

Lewis & Clark College

Oregon State University

Marietta College

Oregon Institute of Technology

University of New England

Schools with Extended May 15 Deposit Deadlines

The University of California (all campuses

California State University

This list will be updated frequently, but follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn for more timely information.


If you’ve been following the Financial Aid posts on this blog, you know that the FAFSA Simplification Act of 2020 introduced many new changes to how students file and how financial aid is calculated.

The legislation’s goal was to make the application easier for everyone to complete and extend aid to more low-income students.

Most of the changes were implemented with the release of the new FAFSA, but there is one key factor that the Department of Education did not include.

What’s Missing?

An adjustment for inflation was not included in the new application.

Multiple news outlets have widely reported this. The Washington Post was the first to notify the public.

Without the adjustment for inflation, more income will be used to determine aid eligibility and award amount.

Students will not receive the full amount they are entitled to under the new format.

With rising inflation and tuition costs, this is unacceptable for students and their families.

The U.S. Department of Education Needs to Act – Now

Correcting this error will further delay the already behind schedule process, but it would be the best course of action for all students.

There has been no commitment from the DOE to fix the error for the current FAFSA.

They have not stated if the change will happen now or with the 2025-26 FAFSA.

What Can You Do?

Once again, the suggestion is to contact your Congressional representatives – all of them.

Implore them to have the mistake corrected with this year as soon as possible.

Hearing from constituents can be a great motivator for action.

If you don’t know your current representatives, use these tools:

Find Your Representative | house.gov

U.S. Senate: Senators

The FAFSA Soft Launch Left Students Frustrated and Confused

FAFSA Soft Launch Frustration

The FAFSA Soft Launch Has Not Gone Well

January 5 Update

Since we first published this post, a lot has and hasn’t changed. Read to the end of this update for important information about the weekend.

As we predicted the situation stabilized on January 2, when many parents and some students reported back to work or school.

The FAFSA office had more staff available.

The application has been available from roughly 8:00 AM to 8:00 PM (or later).

Before 01/02, the application was available for a total of three hours.

FAFSA-Soft Launch Availability Hours

What is FAFSA Saying?

No sign of 24/7 access availability.

FAFSA statement on soft launch

Reactions During the Opening Days

Needless to say, the near-total outage and major glitches did not go over well with students and their families.

Here’s a random sample of non-caustic comments made:

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2024-25 FAFSA Update

2024-35 FAFSA Update

2024-25 FAFSA-UPDATE

We’re presenting a 2024-25 FAFSA update to students and their families. This information is based on an email received at 2:36 AM on 12/02/23 from the FSA Partner Connect – Weekly Knowledge Center Update.

♦♦12/29/23♦♦

Below is what appears on the login page. The application should be live with limited access through the holiday weekend.

FAFSA Going Live 12-29-23

By now, you should know that the new FAFSA includes significant changes to income reporting and financial aid calculation.

If you’re unfamiliar with the changes, read our FAFSA 2024-25 Rundown. Watch the Education Unpacked “The Changes to FAFSA 2024-25 You Don’t Know About But Should” video to learn how these changes may impact you and how you can prepare and offset some of the negative impacts.

By December 31, 2023 is the only commitment made by Federal Student Aid.

December 31 is a Sunday before a federal holiday.

If the application is released on Friday, December 29, it is unlikely help will be available over the holiday weekend.

Historically, there have been hiccups during the early days of a new FAFSA application. This year may experience more widespread issues due to the first use of a new system.

12/15/23 Announcement from FSA Partner

The end-of-the-year FAFSA release will be a “soft launch.”

  • Contributors may be placed in waiting rooms to avoid system overload.
  • There will be periodic scheduled maintenance.
  • Student/family information will be delivered to universities in late January.

When attempting to access the FSA Partners website, this is what appeared the last two weekends. Note: This is not the Federal Student Aid website, where students and their families file the FAFSA.

FSA - Maintenance message

Click here for the complete announcement from FSA Partners.

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