3
2 years ago
Admissions Advice

Financial Aid
Answered

Due to some personal problems, I'm very late with my CSS profile and I still haven't submitted it as I'm not finished yet. I'm planning to send it in by Feb 1 but since it's way over the deadline I'm worried that it will decrease my chances of receiving aid. Should I email the schools letting them know the reason I'm so late is because of some issues or would that negatively affect me even more? and I don't really want to go into detail about my problems.. would they want to exactly what my reasons are?

late
financial-aid
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2 answers

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Accepted Answer
2 years ago

Hi! I would email the schools to letting them know that there is a reason your apps are late, even if you don't go into much detail. It wont hurt to let them know

1
3
2 years ago

There is no single answer that will fit your question because each school treats the CSS profile differently.

If you applied to mix of Need Blind and Need Aware schools, the Need Aware ones may not render an admissions decision until they understand what your families ability to pay is. And the Need Blind ones may or may NOT give you a admission decision until they evaluate your CSS profile and work out a finaid package for you. Or they will give you an admissions decision, but not give you the finaid package you are looking for because much of the funds were already doled out for the ones that handed in on time.

Or if the don't feel comfortable giving you an acceptance or rejection, they might waitlist you until all the numbers come in and know whether you are someone that they want to fund or not.

Keep in mind, if you are applying to one of the 16 Elite schools under investigation for colluding with regards to financial aid, you may be put in a pile of wait-listed applications and then these schools just "cherry pick" who makes the most financial sense for them based on family income and assets.

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/10/us/financial-aid-lawsuit-colleges.html

At a minimum, I recommend contacting every one of the schools you applied to give them a detailed account of why your CSS profile is not part of your college application. I would inform them that you aim to get the completed CSS profile by 2/1/22. Honesty is the best policy when you don't follow the instructions.

One thing that you should know is that unless you come from a wealthy background where your family fully intends to 100% fund your education, you are at the mercy of their financial aid office with regards to how much aid you will be given. The more competitive the college is that you applied to they more people there are that are happy to pay full price just for the opportunity to attend.

If you were counting on financial aid to attend these schools, I would also have a plan B.) at the point. I don' t know your hold up reasons, but here's a list of colleges that don't require the non-custodial parents CSS Profile.

https://www.financialaidcoach.com/blog/css-profile-schools-that-dont-require-non-custodial-parent-information

Only 242 schools require the CSS Profile, so I might consider applying to a couple non-CSS profile schools as a safety measure so you have somewhere to go to next fall.

Good luck.

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