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Inside Secrets to Getting a Connecticut College to Change Its Financial Aid Award Offer Letter

If you’re in the process of reviewing your child’s Connecticut college financial aid award, then you need to know the inside tips I reveal in this article that can save you tens of thousands of dollars. The first thing I want to tell you is that any financial aid officer at the University of Connecticut can use professional judgment to increase or decrease one or more of your family’s financial data items, such as income and assets, used to Calculate the amount your family is expected to contribute. . However, it is important to note that professional judgment can only be used if the Student Aid Report has been submitted and the EFC has been calculated.

When you are considering appealing a financial aid offer, you should be aware that it could include circumstances that were considered special conditions in previous school years, such as divorce, separation, or the death of a parent or spouse after the application was submitted. . If these situations occur, you should immediately contact the college’s financial aid office to see if your financial aid award can be increased.

Just to give you an idea of ​​what we’ve seen accomplished when a family is determined to get extra financial help, we’ll give you a few examples. We have seen financial aid officials adjust the COA to account for special circumstances, such as medical needs or excessive travel costs. We have also seen financial aid offers that override a student’s dependency status to make a dependent student count as independent. By the way, in that case, when the financial aid officer changed the status at a particular university to override the dependency status, the student will be considered independent not only at that university, but also at all other universities to which he applied. the student. .

In all cases where we have seen an appeal approved, the student had a higher chance of success if the student matched the type of merit the university needed to meet their enrollment needs. In the appeal letter, the student’s merit was emphasized to the financial aid officer.