Angelina Zhao

With the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) opening on the last day of December, millions of students worldwide are filling out forms in hopes of receiving government money to assist with their upcoming college fees. “It is important for students to fill out the FAFSA yearly because there is a lot of money available to students to help pay for various costs of attending college,” Ayala financial director Cynthia Vasquez said.

Each year, the government gives out more than $120 billion in grant money. With the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) opening on the last day of December, millions of students worldwide are filling out forms in hopes of receiving government money to assist with their upcoming college fees. The FAFSA is a form that is used by many states to determine a student’s eligibility for federal aid. As many students are starting college next semester, the FAFSA is a great opportunity to offer financial support through the costliness of education. 

In December of 2020, the FAFSA Simplification Act got signed into law, making a few changes to the normal order of operations. Most notably, there are now far fewer questions. The previous 108 questions on the form have been reduced to 46, making filling out the FAFSA a less stressful process for students and parents. Questions regarding drug convictions and Selective Service registration have been removed, and are now replaced with questions about the applicant’s sex, race, and ethnicity – all of which have no effect on student aid eligibility. One of the major things that was removed from the 2024-2025 FAFSA form was the sibling discount. The amount of federal aid a student is eligible to receive will no longer increase if that student has one or more siblings attending college at the same time.

With thousands of students trying to access the website at once, there was an inevitable push-back upon its first release. The server was likely overloaded with everyone accessing the site at once, causing the initial problems.

“When the FAFSA opened on the last day of December, I planned to fill it out. However, I couldn’t fill it out during that time because too many people were filling it out at once. I later filled mine out in the morning of a weekday because that was when not many people got on the website,” Jessica Sujradi (12) said.

Many students voiced their same frustration.

“I was annoyed at the fact that the FAFSA did not open when it was supposed to, when the site was so busy that everyone had to wait at least 20 minutes to fill out the form, and when the government kept opening and closing the FAFSA at different times, making it hard to access the form,” Vicky Liu (12) added.

While the FAFSA is a great opportunity for extra aid, it is crucial to pay close attention to the website being used. There has been a recent rise of scam FAFSA websites that take advantage of your personal information, including your social security number. Filling out the FAFSA is completely free, so if the website asks for your credit card information, it’s a scam. To ensure that the site you are using is credible, look for the “.gov” in the website address. If a student loan relief company reaches out to you with your personal information on it, you have likely been scammed and should report it here.

Here is some advice from the Ayala financial director, Cynthia Vasquez to keep in mind while filling out the FAFSA.

“Do not wait until the last minute to fill out the application. Ideally, students should have it submitted by March, but the CA deadline was extended to April 2nd. When completing the application with your parents, make sure you have all necessary tax information/bank documents you will need to successfully complete the application,” Vasquez said.

The process of filling out the application may seem daunting and intimidating, so don’t hesitate to reach out to the Ayala Counseling website for more financial aid information and upcoming workshops available.

“The Ayala counseling page has important information that can help parents and students get familiar with the new FAFSA application,” Vasquez continued. “We provide important deadlines and links to the FAFSA website and different scholarship websites as well. Our office also provides the GPA verification for Cal Grant programs for all of our seniors.”