2024-2025 FAFSA Update
February 2, 2024Harvey Mudd is committed to doing all that we can to ensure that cost of attendance will not be a barrier to attending the college. We are also committed to working with families throughout this process and throughout a student’s education at HMC. We know that applying for financial aid can be confusing and overwhelming and that complications this year make this especially true. We hope we can help reassure families that we are aware of the complications and have plans in place to give families the best and most accurate information available to us. Please see below for more information.
Over the past year, the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) has been undergoing significant changes to simplify the application process for students and their families. With the complexity of the changes, the rollout of the 2024-2025 FAFSA has been challenging for many applicants. Typically, the HMC Office of Financial Aid will receive a copy of your FAFSA application a few days after you submit it, but due to the processing delays, HMC is expected to receive a copy of your FAFSA application in mid-March 2024.
For applicants to Harvey Mudd College and current students who have filed the 2024-2025 FAFSA, this may mean that your Financial Aid @ HMC portal will not reflect that we have received your FAFSA until mid-March. If you have successfully submitted your FAFSA, your HMC portal will not show your application has been “received” until later in the spring.
While many applicants have been able to complete their 2024-2025 FAFSA without issues, we are also aware that applicants and parents are encountering errors creating an FSA ID, with contributors providing consent with their FSA ID, and submitting their FAFSA due to various errors within the FAFSA application. Applicants are also unable to make corrections to their FAFSA application until it has been processed later in the spring. The Department of Education is working hard to resolve these issues as quickly as possible.
We understand that these errors are creating unplanned delays beyond the student’s control. Students may contact the FAFSA helpline by calling 800.433.3243, chatting with a live agent, or sending an email from their website to address questions or concerns with the submission process.
Fortunately, HMC also requires the College Scholarship Service Profile form. This provides us with a great deal of information we can use to offer preliminary, tentative financial aid packages even without the data from the FAFSA. We encourage all students applying for financial aid to ensure they have completed the CSS Profile and submitted all supplemental documents to IDOC. Admitted students will receive a tentative financial aid package based on the information from the CSS Profile, and once we receive your FAFSA application from the Department of Education, the Office of Financial Aid will provide an official financial aid package.
We look forward to partnering with you during this process.
Originally Posted on Feb. 2, 2024