What are the changes to the 2021-22 FAFSA?
- Ability to complete the FAFSA earlier – You can complete your 2022-23 FAFSA beginning October 1, 2021.
- The income you provide on the FAFSA – previously, you had to provide the prior year’s tax return information when completing the application. You now will be providing your income data from 2020, which is two years prior to the application deadline.
What does this mean for you?
- No need to estimate income – you won’t need to estimate your taxes on the FASFA, as you will already have filed your 2020 tax return with the IRS. This will make completing the FAFSA easier, and will make it likely that you can import your 2020 taxes directly into the FASFA using the IRS Data Retrieval Tool (IRS DRT).
What is the deadline to file the FAFSA?
- The priority FAFSA filing deadline for current students is April 1st.
More details:
- The review process for financial aid begins after the end of the Spring semester and after Satisfactory Academic Progress (SAP) has been determined. Students must be making SAP in order to receive federal (and most institutional) funds. Financial aid award notification emails will be sent to returning students beginning in June.
- Students are notified of missing documentation on a recurring basis via their Merrimack student email account. Students whose applications/documents are incomplete or who must complete the verification process will be sent an award notification upon submission of all materials.
- Students must remain at least half-time to be eligible for Direct loan funding. Half-time for undergraduate students is a minimum of 8 credits per semester.
FOR MORE INFORMATION
Merrimack College
Office of Financial Aid
315 Turnpike Street
North Andover, MA 01845
Telephone: 978-837-5186
Fax: 978-837-5067
email: FinancialAid@merrimack.edu
