Tag: Aid

Judges Rule Trump Can’t Completely Stop SNAP Aid – The 74

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Two federal judges on Friday ruled against President Donald Trump’s move to suspend food stamp benefits starting November 1 amid the month-long government shutdown, with each noting contingency funding is available.

It’s unclear if the Trump administration plans an appeal or how quickly food assistance can flow to the 42 million Americans who rely on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. Sixteen million of them are children, putting pressure on schools to address their needs.

U.S. District Judge John McConnell of Rhode Island ordered the U.S. Department of Agriculture to distribute the funds in a timely manner using contingency money.

“SNAP benefits have never, until now, been terminated,” McConnell said, as reported in The Hill. “And the United States has in fact admitted that the contingency funds are appropriately used during a shutdown, and that occurred in 2019.”

In a separate ruling, U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani of Massachusetts gave the Trump administration until Monday to decide whether it will provide at least some food stamp benefits to recipients. She indicated the suspension of SNAP benefits is contrary to law.

She found fault with the defendants’ assertion that the U.S Department of Agriculture is prohibited from funding SNAP because Congress has not enacted new appropriations for the current fiscal year.

“To the contrary, defendants are statutorily mandated to use the previously appropriated SNAP contingency reserve when necessary and also have discretion to use other previously appropriated funds,” she wrote.

Despite the judges’ rulings, many advocates say some kids will go hungry in November because the process for obtaining the aid consists of multiple steps — some of which have already been missed for those who receive help at the start of every month.

On October 28, more than 20 states, the District of Columbia, and three governors sued the USDA for suspending November’s SNAP benefits. They called the move unprecedented and illegal.

“SNAP is one of our nation’s most effective tools to fight hunger, and the USDA has the money to keep it running,” New York Attorney General Letitia James, long embroiled in her own legal battle with the president, said in a statement. “There is no excuse for this administration to abandon families who rely on SNAP, or food stamps, as a lifeline. The federal government must do its job to protect families.”

Gina Plata-Nino, interim director for SNAP at the Food Research & Action Center, said her organization encouraged the USDA to tap into its contingency and reserve funds to save children and families from going hungry. By missing this opportunity, at least some recipients will likely miss their allotment.

Plata-Nino said states were directed by federal officials on Oct. 10 to stop reporting critical data — a list of household eligibility and food stamp allocation — information they send directly to electronic benefit transfer contractors, who are key in distributing the aid.

“Even in the best-case scenario, if the judge says, ‘We rule in your favor and we demand that this happens right now’, and the Trump administration doesn’t appeal…the process of getting benefits into recipients’ accounts would take time,” she said.

Arlen Benjamin-Gomez, executive director of EdTrust New York, a statewide education policy and advocacy organization, said it’s clear that serious damage has already been done to what is an essential program.

“We know from what has happened so far with this administration that when they make announcements like this, it does have a direct impact on programs and the ability to sustain them,” she said. “For example, there was an announcement of federal cuts to Head Start very early on in the administration, and the program actually shut down. It’s still recovering. So, we can’t predict the chaos that is spread by this most recent effort to cut benefits.”

Related

As Time Runs Out, a Dozen Head Start Families and Providers Share Their Fears

Benjamin-Gomez praised New York for declaring a state of emergency on the matter: Gov. Kathy Hochul is committing an additional $65 million in new state funds for emergency food aid to support state food banks. But not all states will do the same.

Ian Coon, spokesperson for Alliance for Education, an independent, local education fund that supports Seattle Public Schools, said his organization has already earmarked funding to bridge the gap for those in need.

He said the Alliance decided in late October to fund $150,000 in gift cards to area food stores for families in crisis. He said school staff will help identify children in need and offer the assistance of $25, $50 or $100. The $150,000 comes from a reserve fund.

“We are fully aware it’s not a long-term solution, but we needed to do something,” Coon said.

Carolyn Vega, associate director of policy analysis for Share Our Strength, which runs No Kid Hungry, said her organization also does not predict an abrupt or smooth end to the suffering of American families who rely on these benefits.

“We are not holding our breath for the money to start flowing today,” she said. “Kids can’t wait: Families have to eat every single day. We know from our extensive work with schools that teachers already see kids show up to school hungry on Monday mornings. We can only imagine how much worse that would be if a family came in and were expecting to see benefits on Saturday and they did not. It’s an unbelievable strain for food banks. We know that schools will be an important resource for many families, but they can’t fill in the gap.”

In fiscal year 2023, nearly 80% of SNAP households included either a child, an elderly person or a nonelderly individual with a disability, according to the USDA. About 39% of SNAP participants were children that year.

A statement on the federal agency’s website blames Senate Democrats for the shutdown.

“They can continue to hold out for healthcare for illegal aliens and gender mutilation procedures or reopen the government so mothers, babies, and the most vulnerable among us can receive critical nutrition assistance,” the statement read.

The department declined to comment on the judges’ rulings.

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October 31, 2025
States Must Step Up as Federal College Aid Crumbles, New Report Warns
File photoAs the Trump administration moves to dismantle the U.S. Department of Education and gut federal financial aid programs, a new analysis released Thursday warns that college is becoming increasingly unaffordable for low-income families — and states may be the last line of defense.

The report from The Education Trust examines state financial aid programs in Illinois, Indiana, and Minnesota, revealing that while some states are making progress, critical gaps remain in helping students who need assistance most.

“The role of states in ensuring postsecondary access and affordability is essential now,” the report states, citing the Trump administration’s July Supreme Court victory allowing it to proceed with layoffs that cut the Department of Education’s staff in half.

The staffing cuts, which disproportionately targeted financial aid personnel, come as congressional Republicans passed legislation in July 2025 that restricted Pell Grant eligibility, limited parent borrowing, and made student loan repayment more expensive.

The report documents a stark affordability crisis. For recent high school graduates in Illinois, the average cost of attending a public four-year college represents 63.2% of annual family income for Black students, compared to 25.8% for white students.

In Indiana, the gap is similarly wide: 58.8% for Black families versus 22.1% for white families. Minnesota shows comparable disparities at 57.1% and 22.9%, respectively.

“Despite the benefits of a college degree, most families cannot cover the costs,” according to the report, which notes that the average cost of tuition, room, and board at public four-year colleges rose from $8,984 in 1980 to $22,389 in 2023, adjusted for inflation.

Meanwhile, the Pell Grant — the nation’s primary need-based aid — has lost purchasing power dramatically. In 1975, it covered more than 75% of college costs; today it covers only about one-third.

The Education Trust analysis found significant problems with how states allocate financial aid:

Illinois dedicates 98.8% of its undergraduate aid to need-based programs, primarily through its Monetary Award Program. However, the grant functions as “first dollar” aid, meaning other assistance must be applied to tuition before MAP funds, potentially leaving low-income students with little support for non-tuition costs.

Indiana splits funding more evenly: 40% goes to its need-based Frank O’Bannon Grant, while 44% supports combination need-and-merit programs like the 21st Century Scholars Program. The O’Bannon Grant provides larger awards to students at private colleges than public institutions — a policy that researchers say “privileges students from higher-income and higher-asset families.”

Minnesota allocates 72% of aid to its need-based State Grant program. The state recently launched the North Star Promise Scholarship, which provides tuition-free education to families earning under $80,000, though as a “last-dollar” program, it may provide minimal assistance to the lowest-income students already receiving Pell Grants.

The report identifies numerous eligibility requirements that exclude vulnerable students:
- Neither Indiana nor Minnesota provides aid to undocumented students, despite those residents paying state and local taxes
- None of the three states allow currently incarcerated students to receive aid, even though Congress restored Pell Grant eligibility for this population in 2023
- Minnesota excludes students in default on federal loans, making it harder for those experiencing financial hardship to complete degrees
- Part-time students — often working parents or adult learners — face reduced aid or exclusion in many programs
The Education Trust urges states to redesign financial aid systems with ten key features:
1. Prioritize need-based aid over merit-based programs
2. Cover costs beyond tuition, including housing, food, transportation, and childcare
3. Serve part-time students, adult learners, and returning students
4. Include undocumented and justice-impacted individuals
5. Never convert grants to loans
6. Serve students at all public colleges equally
7. Allow access for those in loan default
8. Consolidate programs into streamlined, need-based grants
9. Use negative Student Aid Index numbers to direct more aid to the neediest
10. Implement college access policies like direct admissions and FAFSA completion requirements
“What’s more, policies that promote college attendance are crucial for reducing barriers to higher education,” the report states, highlighting that both Illinois and Indiana have FAFSA completion requirements and direct admission programs, while all three states offer dual enrollment opportunities.

The report highlights the economic benefits of state investment in higher education. Each college graduate in Illinois increases the state’s annual GDP by approximately $155,566 and generates 6.8 jobs. The state recoups its education investment in just 4.1 years of the graduate’s working life.

Bachelor’s degree holders earn $1.2 million more over their lifetimes than those with only high school diplomas, are 24% more likely to be employed, and are nearly five times less likely to be incarcerated.

“State policymakers have a vested interest in ensuring that recent high school graduates pursue higher education and stay in state to complete their education,” the report concludes.

The analysis comes as education advocates warn that the federal retreat from college affordability could reverse decades of progress in expanding access to higher education, particularly for students of color and those from low-income backgrounds.
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October 30, 2025
State Financial Aid Increased 12% in 2023–24

Most funding from the states was in the form of grants.

PamelaJoeMcFarlane/iStockphoto.com

States awarded $18.6 billion in aid to students during the 2023–24 academic year, a 12 percent increase from the previous academic year, according to the National Association of State Student Grant and Aid Programs’ annual report.

“The robust 12% increase from the prior year is further evidence that states understand the importance of postsecondary education and of ensuring every student is able to acquire the 21st century skills needed to drive their state’s economy,” said NASSGAP president Elizabeth McCloud in a news release.

About 86 percent of that funding came in the form of grants—three-quarters of which were need-based. More than two-thirds of all need-based grants came from eight states—California, Illinois, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Texas, Virginia and Washington.

The remaining $2.5 billion of nongrant aid included loans, loan assumptions, conditional grants, work-study and tuition waivers, with tuition waivers comprising 44 percent of nongrant aid.

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October 23, 2025
UI Bans Considering Race, Sex in Hiring, Tenure, Student Aid

A UIC official said the system made the decision after “considering the increased risk to our faculty and to the University that these criteria present in the current climate.”

Just_Super/iStock/Getty Images Plus

The University of Illinois system is telling its institutions they can’t consider race, color, national origin or sex in hiring, tenure, promotion and student financial aid decisions—a move that’s drawn opposition from a faculty union at the University of Illinois at Chicago.

Aaron Krall, president of UIC United Faculty, an affiliate of the American Federation of Teachers and the American Association of University Professors, said the UI system circumvented shared governance.

“This was a directive that came down and surprised everyone,” Krall said.

The system implemented a policy saying it and its universities don’t consider race or the other factors in determining eligibility for need- or merit-based financial aid. In a statement, the system further said it “issued guidance to its universities to ensure that hiring, promotion, and tenure processes follow the same standards.”

The statement said, “There may be some variation in how and when changes are fully operationalized” across its three universities: UIC, Springfield and Urbana-Champaign. The system didn’t provide Inside Higher Ed an interview Tuesday about why it’s making this change now.

Krall shared communications that he said UIC officials sent out last week. One, from Chancellor Marie Lynn Miranda and others, suggested the student aid change would apply to “donor-funded, college-determined and institutionally funded scholarships” and said “UIC will replace its Affirmative Action Plan with a Nondiscrimination and Merit-Based Hiring Plan.”

In another message Krall provided, a UIC official wrote that “faculty may no longer submit a Statement on Efforts to Promote Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in the dossier, nor may faculty members be evaluated on norms related to” DEI. The official wrote that the system “made this decision after carefully considering the increased risk to our faculty and to the University that these criteria present in the current climate.”

Krall said. “The most shocking thing to me, really, is they want to change the policy and make it retroactive—so we have [affected] faculty members going up for promotion right now who have already submitted their promotion materials.” He said the union has demanded the right to bargain over these changes.

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October 22, 2025
Financial Aid Advisers Question Trump’s ID Verification Efforts

Many financial aid advisers are worried that the Trump administration’s latest effort to bolster identity verification in the student aid system could have unintended consequences. Instead of simply catching fraudulent grant applicants and borrowers, some fear that the verification process could also prevent real, eligible students from accessing public benefits.

Education Department officials, however, assure aid advisers that one of their top priorities is to distribute aid smoothly to the students who have a right to it, even as they protect the integrity of the taxpayer-funded programs.

In an electronic announcement published Aug. 12, Federal Student Aid officials said they would be checking the identities of an additional 300,000 aid applicants, on top of the 125,000 students already flagged in June. Some college advisers said they were alarmed by the sheer scale of the requests—especially given what they describe as a very tight timeline.

While aid officers generally support the concept of catching identity thieves, they fear that requiring students to complete the verification process so quickly could delay or even block aid access for some legitimate students, putting them in a financial hole. FSA says the program will eventually be automated, limited to first-time students and managed by agency officials. But at the moment, it’s a manual process that can affect students midway through their program; financial aid officers say it is becoming increasingly complicated and burdensome.

“Schools have been asking for help on how to find these people and prevent fraudulent identities from obtaining Title IV aid, so we’re very supportive of the Department of Ed’s attempts to assume responsibility,” said Karen McCarthy, vice president of public policy and federal relations at the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators. “Unfortunately, the timing and how long it took ED to get this off the ground means that it’s August … We are entering, if not already in, the season of really large-scale disbursement. If verification is outstanding, schools may have to hold disbursements for those students.”

The largest unknown seems to be what the consequences of an incomplete or overdue identity verification will be.

The majority of students in the latest wave of verification requests are returning to college and need to verify their identity for the 2024–25 academic year as well as secure their awards for 2025–26. But some were flagged solely for last academic year and in most instances have already graduated or stopped out, making it harder to track them down and complete the process.

Verification results for 2025–26 can be submitted up to 60 days after the data portal opens Aug. 31. At the same time, according to a Federal Register notice, verifications and any other changes to aid applications for 2024–25 must be completed by Sept. 13, making for a busy two weeks for students and aid officers.

Experts have raised a number of questions about whether missing this tight deadline for 2024 could have repercussions. Some fear it could block students from completing future identity verifications or receiving upcoming disbursements; others worry that aid already disbursed in 2024–25 will need to be retracted. Either way, they say, it could have a crippling effect on low-income students.

“There’s going to be a variety of impact,” one financial aid adviser said. “The monetary impact could be anything from a few hundred dollars to 10-, 15- or 20,000.”

However, the Office of Federal Student Aid told Inside Higher Ed that missing that deadline shouldn’t be a problem—except in rare situations.

Verifications for 2024 don’t have to be reported through the portal the same way upcoming 2025 ones do, one agency official said on background. Rather, aid officers just need to verify the student’s identity and determine internally whether a student’s 2024 aid should be awarded; therefore, “there’s no deadline that people are going to hit and fall afoul of,” he added.

And in the “rare” scenario where an institution discovers inaccuracies on a 2024 FAFSA form, the department said, colleges can reach out to FSA to ensure a student’s eligibility is not impacted.

‘We Are Not Blocking Students’

“If anyone has any examples of that Sept. 13 deadline actually being a blocker for students, we can move the deadline back, because we are here to make sure we are not blocking students,” the FSA adviser said. “There is no reason” a 2024 verification delay should affect a student’s ability to complete the 2025 process and have their award disbursed.

Department officials also noted that they have streamlined the process to reduce the administrative burden, cutting steps such as making students provide a statement of purpose or notarizing the verification.

And of the 300,000 aid applicants flagged in the most recent set of verification requests, the external vendor that helped identify them says that at least 50,000 are examples of fraud. The vendor is “very confident” that the other 250,000 are as well, the FSA official said, but the agency is playing it safe and having colleges check each case for good measure before stripping those recipients of aid.

Ellen Keast, the department’s deputy press secretary, said it’s all part of the agency’s “student- and taxpayer-first mentality.”

“We are committed to ensuring that every single dollar is spent on eligible students, not fraudsters,” she said. “This is not about putting a burden on postsecondary institutions; it’s about warning them, before they disburse both taxpayer money and their own, that the ‘student’ in front of them is most likely not a real person.”

But representatives from NASFAA and college financial aid officers are still not clear on how the process will play out.

Caleb Williams, director of enrollment management at Northern Arizona University, said that in addition to the typical verifications that occurred before the Trump administration’s new campaign was announced, selection rates for 2024–25 verification at his institution rose by 54 percent in June and another 13 percent in August. As he understands it, he added, a student “flagged for Identity verification cannot receive aid in any year until the process is completed.”

Meanwhile, Charles Mayfield, the director of financial assistance at Northwest Missouri State University, believes that if an institution misses the September deadline for 2024 verifications, it will not be able to reinstate any of last year’s aid. But it would still be able to complete the 2025 verification and process that year’s aid.

Mayfield hopes that the department will put out clarified guidance to relieve aid advisers’ confusion and explain exactly what the September deadline means, how it will be enforced and what the consequences will be for students. But like the staff at NASFAA, he said his greatest frustration is not the general need for clarification but its timing at the end of an academic year.

“These students have received financial aid for the whole academic year, and now it’s all going to be taken away, and they’re at risk of not being able to enroll for the next academic year,” he said. “In the industry, we all know that students who stop out are much less likely to finish their degree.”

It would be one thing if these concerns and challenges were specific to one college, Mayfair said, but when there are 15 or 20 colleges expressing the same confusion on a Listserv on the same day, the department should be more responsive.

“It feels like when something doesn’t go right, we have to prove to the FSA that it didn’t work the way it was supposed to,” he said. “And until we can outright prove that—using data that’s on their system, that they should already have access to—they won’t acknowledge it.”

McCarthy from NASFAA said that what the department told Inside Higher Ed about 2024 and 2025 verification being handled separately “sounds promising,” but as of Aug. 22 she hadn’t received the same notification from FSA.

Other smaller concerns, such as whether the system for flagging fraud is accurate and if the new portal is functional, also have yet to be addressed, she added.

“It’s an awful lot of work being pushed onto schools,” she explained. “So we want to make sure that it’s useful, beneficial work and that these are actual, really concerning applications, not sloppy work on the Department of Ed which then leads to delays for students.”

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August 27, 2025
It’s More Difficult to File Student Aid Complaints, Dems Say

Sen. Elizabeth Warren, a Massachusetts Democrat, submitted the letter to the Department of Education on Monday evening.

Alex Wong/Getty Images

Massachusetts senator Elizabeth Warren and four of her fellow Democrats asked Education Secretary Linda McMahon in a letter Monday why her department has made it more difficult to file complaints about federal student aid and demanded her staff remove any extra steps that have been added to the process.

“ED is covering up its attempts to make [the Office of Federal Student Aid] less responsive to millions of students, families, and borrowers who rely on the agency to lower the cost of attending college and protect them from loan servicer misconduct,” the senators wrote. “We urge you to immediately act on our findings by streamlining the ‘Submit a Complaint’ process and restoring FSA’s workforce so borrowers can get the help they need.”

Who Signed the Letter?

Richard Blumenthal (Conn.), Mazie Hirono (Hawaii), Jeff Merkley (Ore.), Chris Van Hollen (Md.), Elizabeth Warren (Mass.)

In the letter, Warren states that she told FSA in March that the button for submitting online complaints had been “hidden.” The department responded in April that the button had just been moved from the top of the webpage to the footer and relabeled as “submit feedback.” The department added that no employees who handle technical functions of the aid applications of loan servicing had been laid off, and while some employees that handle complaints were, the remaining employees will “still be responding” to future complaints.

But the Democrats say they tested those claims and found the department’s reassurances were misleading. Although the department did move and rename the complaint button, it also added a series of four extra navigation clicks that must be made before the user actually reaches the webpage where they can file a complaint. (Inside Higher Ed checked the website and verified these steps. You can see screenshots of the process below.)

“Via an unintuitive, multi-step process,” the department is “making it more difficult for borrowers to let ED know when they are experiencing issues with their student loan servicer,” the letter reads.

The senators argue that this change was geared toward increasing the difficulty of filing complaints, citing an email sent by a senior department staff member and obtained by Politico. According to a report published by the department at the end of the Biden presidency, more than 289,000 complaints were filed with FSA in 2024 alone.

In the email obtained by Politico, the official wrote, “I believe this change would help decrease contact center volume and the number of complaints … so an overall win.”

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August 26, 2025
Financial aid administrators report disruptions since Education Department layoffs
Dive Brief:
- A large majority of financial aid administrators, 72%, say they’ve experienced “noticeable changes” in the Federal Student Aid office’s communications, responsiveness and processing timelines since the U.S. Department of Education’s mass layoffs in March.
- That’s according to a July survey conducted by the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators. The results also show that “federal support channels for students are breaking down,” including through issues with call centers, NASFAA said.
- These disruptions are hampering colleges’ ability to assist students, it said. “Unless federal service channels stabilize, the aid system risks becoming less accessible, less predictable, and less trusted by the very students it is intended to serve,” it added.
Dive Insight:

When the Education Department moved to lay off roughly half its staff in March, student advocates voiced concerns that the agency wouldn’t have enough workers to carry out core functions, including financial aid services.

NASFAA’s survey builds on those concerns. The survey found that higher shares of financial aid administrators surveyed in July said they are experiencing delays and a lack of communication from the Education Department than those polled just two months before.

For instance, 59% of officials surveyed in May said they had experienced disruptions in the Federal Student Aid office’s responsiveness, communication and processing timelines — a number that has since jumped to 72%.

Ellen Keast, deputy press secretary at the Education Department, sharply rebuked the survey.

“It is an embarrassment for NASFAA to release a ‘survey’ that blatantly parrots falsehoods and is not representative of the higher education community nor the American people’s overwhelming charge for change,” Keast said in an emailed statement Wednesday. “Clearly, NASFAA is peddling a false narrative to preserve the status quo.”

An Education Department official accused the survey of having methodological shortcomings. The official pointed to the survey’s response rate — completed by over 549 institutions — saying that represents less than 10% of the roughly 5,800 colleges that work with Federal Student Aid.

The official also said questions spurred respondents to report negative experiences and that those polled were overrepresented by administrators working at nonprofit and public four-year colleges, which the agency accused as being the most likely to oppose the Trump administration.

Additionally, the official said the mass layoffs did not impact FAFSA staff or Federal Student Aid’s ability to serve customers.

Melanie Storey, president and CEO of NASFAA, said in a statement that the survey reflects “the real, everyday experiences of financial aid professionals.”

“To dismiss these concerns as fabricated or political undermines the expertise of those working directly with students every day, eager to deliver on the promise of postsecondary education, and shows that the administration is not interested in working with experts in the field to achieve the best results for students; instead, it is focused on advancing its own agenda,” Storey said.

In the survey, 32% of respondents said they’ve experienced processing delays for the Free Application for Federal Student Aid since May.

Earlier this month, the Education Department began beta-testing for the 2026-27 FAFSA form. So far, more than 1,000 students have completed the form, according to a department official.

Meanwhile, 49% of financial aid administrators have experienced processing delays with the e-App, the application colleges submit to the Education Department to participate in federal financial aid programs. Among colleges that submitted the e-App, 63% said in July that it still had not been processed.

More students are reaching out to their financial aid offices, according to the survey. Sixty percent of administrators said they’ve seen spikes in student questions about the Education Department’s services in the July poll, compared with 45% who said the same in May.

While several respondents said students were confused about the FAFSA process or federal aid, not all officials specified whether the inquiries were related to the Education Department’s mass layoffs or other recent federal changes.

Republicans recently made sweeping changes to the student loan system through their massive domestic policy bill signed into law in July. That includes consolidating the student loan repayment programs into just two options and phasing out Grad PLUS loans, which allow graduate and professional students to borrow up to the cost of attendance.

Critics have noted that the Education Department will have to carry out the vast policy changes mandated by the bill with about half the workforce it had before President Donald Trump retook office.

U.S. Education Secretary Linda McMahon has framed the layoffs as the first step to Trump’s goal of eliminating the Education Department and shifting its duties elsewhere — a change that would require congressional approval.

A federal judge initially blocked the Education Department’s mass layoffs, but the U.S. Supreme Court lifted that order in July while litigation challenging their legality proceeds.
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August 21, 2025
Complaints About Federal Student Aid Office Rise Sharply

The latest NASFAA survey shows financial aid services moving in the wrong direction.

Photo illustration by Justin Morrison/Inside Higher Ed | Marvin Joseph/The Washington Post/Getty Images | MauMyHaT/iStock/Getty Images | subtik/E+/Getty Images

Complaints about the Office of Federal Student Aid’s operations have increased significantly over the past few months, according to the latest edition of a survey from the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators. Challenges that were once just kinks behind the scenes are evolving to become student-facing issues on the front line, the association says.

The share of institutions reporting disruptions to communication, responsiveness or processing timelines rose from 59 percent in May to 72 percent in July. Meanwhile, the share of aid offices reporting student confusion about the process increased from 32 percent to 51 percent.

The report, which is based on responses from financial aid officers at more than 500 NASFAA member institutions across the country, builds upon a similar survey conducted in May. It shows rising frustration with the FSA, despite the agency’s attempt to rehire about 50 of the more than 300 employees laid off earlier this year.

“I wasn’t overly surprised” by the data, said NASFAA president Melanie Storey. “But it was largely a disappointment that the trajectory is moving in the wrong direction.”

She added that the new loan caps and repayment plan changes detailed in President Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act could compound the damage, creating long-term consequences for college attainment rates.

Given the “fissures and cracks around trust in higher education, we need to eliminate barriers and support students clearly and consistently—and that includes helping them figure out how they’re going to finance their higher education,” Storey said. “If this trajectory continues, I’m really concerned about the decisions that students and families are going to be able to make to enroll in postsecondary education.”

An Education Department official called the NASFAA report inaccurate and accused the organization of “peddling a false narrative to preserve the status quo.”

“It is an embarrassment for NASFAA to release a ‘survey’ that blatantly parrots falsehoods and is not representative of the higher education community nor the American people’s overwhelming charge for change,” deputy press secretary Ellen Keast said in an email to Inside Higher Ed. “While NASFAA stands idly by ready to see us fail, the Trump Administration has just launched the earliest FAFSA form ever, which they are well aware of and decided to ignore.”

Storey responded that NASFAA has tried repeatedly to partner with the administration in their “shared goal of serving students,” applauding efforts such as FAFSA beta testing.

But to dismiss the survey results as “fabricated or political undermines the expertise of those working directly with students every day, eager to deliver on the promise of postsecondary education, and shows that the administration is not interested in working with experts in the field to achieve the best results for students; instead, it is focused on advancing its own agenda,” she said.

Worsening Outcomes

It’s been an eventful few months for the FSA. Mass layoffs throughout the department, first announced in March, quickly faced legal challenges; in May, a district court temporarily blocked the executive action. But any hopes that the staffing shortage would be resolved were squashed when the Supreme Court overturned the lower court’s ruling in July. And while the justices have yet to hear the full case or issue a final ruling, the order allows Education Secretary Linda McMahon to proceed with the pink slips.

Storey said that some of the increased frustration and concern higher ed officials expressed in the survey may be related to timing; the district court ruling spurred cautious optimism in May, which had largely tanked by July. Similarly, the repercussions of staffing shortages were not necessarily evident in May but are now becoming clear. She also noted that the mounting discontent could simply be a reflection of the cyclical nature of student aid and the imminent start of the new academic year.

Either way, the survey suggests that FSA operations are flagging, and many NASFAA members say it’s preventing them from properly processing aid. For example, 63 percent of institutions that have submitted their E-App—a form that must be completed and approved in order to receive federal aid—said their submission had yet to be processed in July.

Department officials argue that this data is biased due to NASFAA’s survey method. They point specifically to the sample size, saying that the 500 institutions represented are predominantly nonprofit or public institutions, reflecting only a sliver of the more than 5,000 that FSA works with—and are the ones most likely to harbor anti-Trump sentiments.

The department also described the survey’s questions as biased toward the negative and said it was conducted just as the department finished updating its Partner Connect Portal to address various complaints, meaning the results don’t accurately reflect the new changes.

But Storey stood by her view that most of the challenges financial aid offices face today are the same as those they reported in May, only worse, and with longer delays in response time.

For example, previous Inside Higher Ed reporting shows that when students hit a wall and cannot log in to the FAFSA application portal, college advisers struggle to reach the central processing system that manages user IDs. While a department spokesperson said all help lines remain fully open, multiple college and NASFAA representatives say they have been unable to get through at certain times.

The latest survey shows this is still a major problem. More than half of institutions reported issues with federal call centers, and more than 40 percent cited problems with the National Student Loan Data System. In addition, over a third flagged disruptions with student loan servicing. Collectively, the NASFAA report said, these failures affect colleges’ ability to resolve aid issues for students in real time.

Once the delays start to hit students—which is happening more and more often, according to NASFAA’s report—it could leave them without access to loans and therefore unable to pay their bills and stay enrolled. Although colleges can grant students extensions for tuition payments or on-campus housing fees, they can’t change when off-campus rent or childcare payments are due. Situations like these often force students to take a job and attempt to pay off their debt with some college but no degree.

So unless FSA addresses its shortcomings, Storey said, the impact could be far-reaching.

“It’s a compounding of issues and uncertainties that I think could have a long-lasting and significant impact on postsecondary enrollment and financing,” she said.

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August 20, 2025
Stanford says no to state student aid, yes to legacy and donor admissions
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Dive Brief:
- Stanford University will continue to consider applicants’ connections to alumni and donors when accepting its incoming fall 2026 undergraduate class, despite a new California law meant to curb the practice.
- Last year, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a law banning private nonprofit colleges that receive state-funded student aid from practicing legacy and donor admissions. Those who violate the rule, effective Sept. 1, must provide extensive demographic data on their newly enrolled students and the admissions rates of those with legacy or donor ties compared to those without.
- Stanford will no longer accept funding from state student aid programs “in order to comply with recent California legislation,” it said last month. Instead, the university will use its own scholarship funding to make up the difference.
Dive Insight:

Like many highly selective colleges that offer legacy and donor admissions, Stanford accepts a disproportionate share of its undergraduates from that population. In fall 2023, 13.6% of the university’s admitted undergraduate class had ties to alumni or donors, according to institutional data. Stanford’s overall acceptance rate that year was just under 4%.

Former California Assemblymember Phil Ting introduced the legislation banning legacy and donor admissions in response to the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2023 ruling striking down race-conscious admissions.

But several amendments to the bill significantly defanged it. Ting’s initial language would have cut colleges that violated the ban off from access to the Cal Grant, a program providing financial aid to students from low- and middle-income families.

Instead, the version that passed the state house lacked monetary penalties for such institutions, opting for a name-and-shame approach. To that end, the California Department of Justice would publicly list such colleges on its website.

While lawmakers framed the legislation as a ban, Stanford’s decision to continue using legacy and donor admissions demonstrates the limits of the law’s influence. By turning down state funding, the university can avoid the data reporting penalty and being listed on the state justice department’s website.

Stanford students who previously received state aid won’t see a difference in the amount of financial aid they receive, and no action by them is required, the university said in a July 29 press release.

Admitted students whose family income is below $100,000 don’t pay tuition, room or board at Stanford. For households making less than $150,000 annually, students do not pay tuition.
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August 13, 2025
Minnesota Alters Financial Aid Program Formula
Minnesota lawmakers managed last month not only to close a $239 million deficit in the state’s largest financial aid grant program, but also to increase its funding by $44.5 million over the next two years. But they did so by changing the funding formula, meaning some students may still find themselves with less aid for college, The Minnesota Star Tribune reported Tuesday.

The Minnesota State Grant program helps middle- and low-income students enrolled at in-state technical schools, colleges or universities pay for educational expenses, such as housing and tuition. While not every student’s financial aid award will decrease this year, many are still waiting to find out how the changes to the formula will change their award.

The amount each student receives is tied to their family size and income, and during the 2025–26 academic year grant values are expected to range from $100 to $17,717. Last year, average grants awards were cut by anywhere from $175 to $730 to offset the program’s then-$40 million deficit.

According to The Star Tribune, changes to the formula include:
- Students can receive the grant for four years of full-time attendance, down from the previous six-year cap.
- Students who are dependents are responsible for paying an increased total cost of college.
- There is an earlier application deadline.
- Students will receive less money for living and miscellaneous expenses, such as room, board and transportation.
- There is a reduced maximum amount awarded for tuition and fees to match the University of Minnesota’s Twin Cities’s rates, plus a 2 percent reduction for each of the next two years, regardless of how much tuition increases there. If a student attends a school that costs less, they are awarded the average cost of tuition and fees at that institution.
Republican state senator Zach Duckworth said some of the changes are temporary. “I don’t think anybody was entirely happy with the end results, but the fact that we were able to increase some funding [to the State Grant overall] for students and families was a good thing,” he told The Star Tribune.

The changes come as Congress is also weighing President Donald Trump’s proposal to cut TRIO, federal work-study and other federal programs that support college students.
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July 24, 2025