Holiday Update

It is that time of year again!

We will be taking off the next two weeks in observance of the holiday season and we will return on January 4th to bring in the new year and the new semester!

A word of encouragement: After all of the presents have been unwrapped, all of the eggnog has been drunk, and the decorations have been taken down, I would encourage you to do a mental check of your financial aid.

If you have completed this past semester successfully, and you have registered for Spring classes, your financial aid should already be in place. You can simply come into the Admissions and Registration Center on January 5th, to print your book voucher and purchase your textbooks. If you had some difficulties this past semester and you think you might be in danger of falling below a 2.0 gpa and not completing 2/3 of your credit hours, then you will want to check your campus cruiser e-mail account. If there is a problem with your financial aid for the Spring semester, you will have an e-mail explaining the situation. Please read this e-mail and follow the instructions provided on how you can regain your financial aid eligibility!

Also, remember that we are rapidly approaching tax season which means that the 2010-2011 FAFSA will soon be up and available. Continue to check back for additional updates and information regarding the new academic year!

If you encounter questions over the break please refer to the numerous posts in this blog where many common financial aid questions have been answered. Don't forget to check the comments where many more details are explained!

You also can check out the newly redesigned financial aid website for any additional questions. http://www.gvltec.edu/financial_aid/

Thank you as always for your time, and from all of us here in Financial Aid....."Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!"

Federal Student Aid Update

This past week I was in Nashville, TN for the Federal Student Aid Conference. This event was hosted by the Department of Education and was a 5 day event aimed at updating all financial aid workers on changes, plans, and future updates within the federal student aid system.

If you have followed the major news from Washington these past few months, you have probably heard about our President's proposal to transition all student loan lending under the Stafford and PLUS loan programs to the William D. Ford Direct Lending program. This will mark a significant change in how our school manages student loans. We as a school have decided to go ahead and make the switch as of the 2010-2011 school year, which will go into effect in August of 2010. We have just begun the process of converting to Direct Lending and will hopefully complete early in Spring 2010. So, please continue to check back for future updates and any additional information as it becomes available.

With all change comes some difficulties, but after hearing directly from the US Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, this transition will ensure student access to Stafford and PLUS loans into the future and allow all of you, our students, to continue to progress towards your educational, career, and life goals that have begun with your education here at Greenville Technical College. We as a financial aid office are committed to ensuring your access to funding for your education and will do all within our power to make this transition a smooth one.

If you have any questions concerning the transition to Direct Lending, please contact DJ Wetzel, at Donald.Wetzel@gvltec.edu

Scholarships for Welding Students

The American Welding Society (AWS) has contacted Greenville Technical College about the opportunities they are offering students for competitive scholarships. They have created the AWS Foundation which has numerous scholarship programs through which they award students. An overview of these programs can be found at http://www.aws.org/foundation/

The submission deadlines are March 1st.

Please contact DJ Wetzel at Donald.Wetzel@gvltec.edu for more information and applications.

MLK Dream Weekend Scholarship

As part of the MLK Dream Weekend, January 15 – 18, Greenville Technical College will present a $3,000 tuition scholarship to be awarded at the Diversity Banquet on January 15 at the Hyatt Regency Hotel.

Students interested in applying for this scholarship, along with two other scholarship opportunities, are encouraged to go to

http://www.mlkdreamweekend.com/scholarships/

to download an application packet. Deadline for entry is December 11.

New Scholarship

The C.G. Fuller Foundation Scholarship Program is once again accepting applications for the upcoming 2010-2011 Academic Year. The scholarship is worth $1,000 per semester.

To qualify, an applicant must:

• Be a South Carolina Resident
• Attend a SC College or University
• Be high school seniors entering their first year of college
• Have SAT scores that meet or exceed 1100
• AGI of parents must not exceed $60,000

All applications must be submitted to GTC Financial Aid Office by March 15th.

For Applications and questions please contact DJ Wetzel at: Donald.Wetzel@gvltec.edu

Ask the Readers! Financial Literacy Edition

You are our most valuable source of information! The world of financial aid that we live in is constantly changing. With every change that we make, we also have to consider how these changes effect you, our students. So with that in mind, we would love to hear your input on a new program that we are considering building.

Financial Literacy

This would be a pilot program to be started through the financial aid office to offer basic financial advice for free. It will be centered around paying for college, student loans, budgeting, and creating a stable financial base during, and after college. With a majority of our students here at GTC receiving student loans, financial literacy has become a priority. We will discuss topics such as repaying your student loans, managing credit, creating a budget, repairing bad credit, and discuss where to go when you run into financial difficulties.

We feel that a program of this nature will help you to feel better prepared to enter into your chosen career as more well-rounded, capable individuals. A solid financial base is essential to your future success and that is what this program to designed to teach.

Please give us your feedback. Is this a program that would interest you? What topics would you like to see covered? Would you spend one hour in a free workshop to learn about managing your money?

As always, thank you for your participation in this blog! We cannot do this without you!

Oral Roberts University Scholarship

I received a notice of a scholarship for any students who are interested in transferring to Oral Roberts University. The Whole Person Scholarship is a "generous scholarship for ambitious, well-rounded students to aspire to the whole-person ideal of intellectual, physical, social, and spiritual development.

To be considered for this scholarship you must be nominated. Our financial aid office will nominate one student from Greenville Technical College for this scholarship so please apply now!

The nominations are currently being accepted and the deadline is January 4th.

If you are interested please contact DJ Wetzel at 864-250-8987.

Mid Semester Check-Up

The temperature is dropping. The leaves are falling. Tests and other school work have entered into a frenetic pace. Christmas is just a little over 2 months away. This time of year brings to mind a few things: picking apples, carving pumpkins (and roasting pumpkin seeds!!), raking leaf piles, and unfortunately, FLU season. With the threat of the regular Flu and this new fangled H1N1 virus, many doctors are warning us all to be wary and constantly monitor our symptoms. I would like to propose a somewhat gloomy analogy…. Just like our doctors have given us warnings and precautionary measures to protect ourselves from getting the FLU, there are also some things that you can do to make sure your financial aid doesn’t keep you out of school for next semester! Stick with me, because I think you will find this information very helpful!

Tip # 1: Make sure your financial file is complete!

Hopefully by now you have already submitted a FAFSA and you have already heard back from our office letting you know whether or not we can complete your file, or if we need more information. If you have received an award letter and returned it back to our office, then rest easy, your file is complete. If you have not received an award letter, please contact our office as we will need additional documentation to complete your file.

Tip # 2: Make sure you have received all of the awards you are eligible for!

Run a quick check on your award letter and compare it to your account summary on Campus Cruiser. If the numbers don’t seem to add up, please take a moment and see if you can determine where the shortcomings might lie. If you still cannot seem to decipher the numbers, give us a call and we can look into it for you. If you have been awarded grants, loans, or scholarships that are not accounted for in your account summary, please give us a call.

Tip # 3: Have you gotten your refund check?

We have been working frantically to get all loans certified and all refund checks mailed out to students as soon as possible. I am very happy to report that as of today we are up to date with loan certifications. What this means for you is that if your loan has not been certified then there is a problem with your loan eligibility. I would recommend contacting our office to determine what you can do to correct this. Secondly, if you have not received your refund check you may wish to check with us, but if you have received your “Official” award letter, then rest easy, because your refund is on the way!

Tip # 4: Are you maintaining Satisfactory Academic Progress?

In order to maintain your eligibility for federal financial aid in the next semester you must maintain a minimum 2.0 cumulative GPA and maintain a cumulative 2/3 completion rate. How are your grades looking for this semester? Are you in danger of slipping below the critical 2.0 GPA mark? If so, there are numerous ways to find help in ensuring that your GPA does not suffer this semester and you can maintain your financial aid well into the future. You could contact Student Support Services and request a tutor, you could contact your professor and see if they can provide additional assistance, you could form a study group with your classmates to try and get help from your peers, you could even visit the GTC library and utilize their resources. If you think you might be in danger of falling below these standards, please contact our office. We can sit down with you and discuss your specific situation and see what can be done to keep you above the standards and maintain your financial aid.

I hope you have found some of these tips helpful! We want to hear from you so please let us know if you would like to see more of these tips, if these tips did not apply to you, or if you have additional questions outside of these tips!

As always, thank you for visiting and please tell all of your friends. Together we can make financial aid work for you!

Financial Aid Refund Checks

It has been a few weeks since my last blog post which can be directly attributed to the rush of Fall registration. Over the past few weeks I have been getting numerous comments and questions every day through this blog that pertain to financial aid. These comments have been wonderful and I am very appreciative for all of your feedback. Recently though, the vast majority of these comments have surrounded one topic: REFUND CHECKS. This is the time of year for financial aid refund checks to go out so I wanted to shed a little light as to how these checks work.

The basic concept is that if you are awarded financial aid over and above what your tuition costs are, you may be eligible to receive that overage in the form of a refund check, which you can then use to cover other educational expenses (IE. housing, transportation, textbooks, personal expenses). Many of you may be wondering if you have a refund check available. The simplest way would be to consult your award letter. If you have awards showing on your award letter that total up to more than your tuition costs are, more than likely, you will receive that amount in a refund check. You also can check your account summary on Campus Cruiser which will show an updated amount of a refund. It is important to note, that not all types of aid are able to be refunded to students. Lottery tuition assistance can only be used to credit tuition and many scholarships have a stipulation that they cannot be refunded to the student. So if you have a question about your particular refund, please contact our office at financialaid@gvltec.edu

The majority of students who receive some form of a refund, do so by obtaining a student loan. Student loans are processed differently than grant and scholarship aid and therefore, the refund checks are also processed differently. Scholarships and grant aid are automatically applied to student accounts on our disbursement date which is 9/8/09 for the Fall 2009 semester and 2/1/09 for the Spring 2010 semester. Loans are also disbursed on that date, but only if they have been certified. The certification process takes 4-6 weeks from the date that you turned in your award letter. When we certify a loan we send a request to the lender that you have chosen, and request the loan amount that you have signed for on your award letter. Once the money is released from your lender, those funds come to us and we then transfer those funds to our business office for them to process a refund check.

Our business office legally has 10 business days to process a refund check. This means that even after your financial aid has been credited to your account, it may still be up to 2 weeks before your refund is actually mailed out or direct deposited. Our business office sends out refunds every Friday. For the Fall 2009 semester the first batch of refund are slated to be sent out on September 18^th, 2009. Refunds will be sent out every Friday after until the end of the semester.

I hope this answers some of the questions that I have heard regarding financial aid refund checks. As always, if you have further questions do not hesitate to leave a comment and a financial aid advisor will respond as soon as possible. Thank you for your time!

How This Blog Works...

When I began the process of creating this blog I really did not have a clear and defined picture of what all this blog could accomplish. I knew what the goal was, to provide financial aid information to you, our students, and provide an interactive community where financial aid questions and topics are discussed, but I did not realize how much impact it could have. The overwhelming response of comments and feedback from this blog have encouraged and empowered me to do more.

With that said, I would like to take an opportunity to give a quick display of all of the features on this blog, and explain how you can use this blog in the most effective manner possible!!

First: Read the Posts! The goal is to update this blog with new and current information via a post 1-2 times per week. Within these posts I will cover a wide spectrum of financial aid topics. I also will be sure to include a post for any new or pressing information within financial aid that you need to know.

Second: Search the Blog! With over 16 posts, and constantly growing, there is a mountain of information at your fingertips. Simply put in your keyword search on the search bar at the top of the blog, and you will be directed to any posts that contain the keywords you are interested in. If you do not feel like reading through all of the posts this is a great tool for you.

Third: Search the Topics! If you have a question about a specific topic check out the "Most Popular Topics" links on the right hand column. If you see your topic listed there, simply click on that link and you will be directed to all of the posts which contain information regarding that topic. This is great as a reference tool.

Fourth: Subscribe!!! If you are like me, you have way too many things to do in one day and sometimes they all run together. Wouldn't it be nice to be notified every time that this blog is updated....sort of like your own personal assistant. Well you can accomplish this by simply clicking on the "Stay Connected" links on the right hand column and subscribing to this blog. Any new posts will be automatically directed to your viewer of choice. How easy is that!?!

Fifth and Final: Comment!! This is the most effective and therefore most popular feature on this blog: the ability to interact with financial aid officers as well as fellow students. If you read through a post and have a question about a financial aid topic, simply leave a comment with your question and a financial aid officer will respond via a follow-up comment. You can have personal access to the financial aid office without leaving the comfort of your living room... You can also find previous comments left by financial aid officers very useful for answering your questions.

I hope this has given you a small taste of the impact this blog can have.

We are always searching for ways to improve and become better, so please feel free to leave a comment and let me know what you would like to see in this blog!

Sign up for Direct Deposit!!

The Greenville Tech Business Office has just unveiled their new direct deposit system. Our direct deposit system will work just like any other direct deposit system that you may have in place at your job. The main goal of this new system is to streamline the financial aid refund check process.

Hundreds of students receive financial aid refund checks every semester, and up until now, all of those checks have been printed on paper, and then mailed to those students. This new system will allow student's refund checks to be directly deposited into their bank accounts once the refunds are processed through the Business Office. This will eliminate any checks being lost in the mail and will also decrease the time that it takes for students to receive their financial aid refunds.

We feel that this new system will allow us to provide even better customer service through a decreased wait time in our lobby from students waiting for refund checks. It is our goal to continuously improve our processes and we feel that the new direct deposit system will be a great improvement to our financial aid refund process.

So, hopefully I have convinced you that you should take part in this exciting new opportunity, the next question is: “How do I sign up for direct deposit?” Easy! Simply log onto Campus Cruiser, then click on the Web Advisor tab at the top of your screen. Scroll down to the Financial Aid section on the left hand column and then click on “FA Refund Direct Deposit”. This will bring up a screen that will prompt you to input your bank account numbers and routing numbers and other information. Once this has been submitted, you should receive a confirmation, and everything is set up! Now you can sit back and relax, because your financial aid refund will come directly to your bank account once it has been processed.

As always, if you have any questions about this new direct deposit system or any other financial aid topics, please contact us at financialaid@gvltec.edu or for immediate assistance, 864-250-8128. Thank you!

What Do I Do Next?

Registration for the 2009 Fall semester started last week and student traffic in the financial aid office is beginning to increase. We have seen a huge increase (already 34%!!) in the number of FAFSA applications that are sent to our office and we anticipate that this will equate to an increase in the number of students who receive financial aid in the next academic year. Since many of you have already applied for financial aid and many of you have already received an award letter from us, I wanted to tackle the topic of: “What to do now?”

You submit your FAFSA early; you complete your verification; you receive your award letter back in the mail; you accept all of your financial aid and complete your promissory note and entrance loan counseling so you will be able to borrow a student loan; you register for your classes; you are now done with all of your necessary steps and cannot wait to begin your classes……but what do you do next?

Many students decide to use a book voucher which allows them to purchase their textbooks using an advance on their financial aid awards. If you have completed your financial aid you should have a book voucher available to you when they begin on August 12 at 10:30 AM immediately after Convocation.

Many students who receive financial aid rely solely on financial aid to cover their tuition bill. If you have registered for classes for the Fall 2009 semester you have already received a billing statement from our Business Office. This statement serves to inform students that 1.) They have an outstanding tuition bill because they registered for classes and 2.) If students do not have confirmed financial aid then they will need to make plans to pay for their tuition by the dates specified on the billing statement. If you have submitted an award letter back into financial aid accepting your awards, this means you have confirmed financial aid. We will transfer financial aid awards to the Business Office in the beginning of September and pay off your tuition bill if you have sufficient financial aid to cover your tuition bill.

So, if you have completed all of these steps then a “Congratulations!” is in order. You can now sit back, relax, and prepare your mind for your Fall classes.

The Importance of Financial Aid

It seems like every time we switch on the news all we hear about are more lay-offs, another bad day on the stock market, another swindler stealing billions more of our hard earned money, or another sign that we are spiraling downward, further into a recession. This might not seem like encouraging news, especially first thing in the morning, but with the current state of our economy, financial aid has become more important than ever.

Financial aid may have the reputation of being only for those who do not make any money or for those who only want to take out student loans, but in reality we have a lot more to offer. We do have numerous programs, such as the Federal Pell Grant, the Federal Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grant, Federal Work Study and the SC Need Based Grant that are based on a student's financial need. However, we also offer the SC Lottery Tuition Assistance which is not income contingent. In addition to grants we administer hundreds of scholarships every year. Many of these are awarded through the GTC Foundation. Many other scholarships are awarded by organizations from around our community.

If you have sought out all of the grants and scholarships that you are eligible for and still have a need for additional funds, we do offer loans through the Federal Stafford Loan Program. These loans have low interest rates between 6.0%-6.8% and you can defer the payments until 6 months after you graduate.

The most important piece of advice I would offer concerning financial aid is simply to apply! By not applying you virtually erase any chance of receiving any sort of financial aid. You can complete an application at www.fafsa.ed.gov .

If you have any specific questions please refer to other posts on this blog where I have tackled various financial aid programs and offered numerous hints and tips on how to make your financial aid experience the best it can be.

As always, please contact us at financialaid@gvltec.edu with any additional questions!

A Week of Rest

Next week, June 29-July 3, Greenville Technical College will be closed. It will be a great opportunity for the entire college to get rested and rejuvenated before the rush of the Fall semester begins. As students, you can also take this week to be proactive with your financial aid.

• If you have not submitted a FAFSA for 2009-2010 you should do so next week. You can go to www.fafsa.ed.gov to complete one.
• If you have submitted your FAFSA and have gotten a request back for more information, please gather those documents and return them to our office on July 6th.
• If you have gotten an award letter for the 2009-2010 academic year, please sign the letter and return it to our office on July 6th.
• If you have any questions regarding your financial aid awards please consult our website at http://www.gvltec.edu/financial_aid/ . There is a wealth of information available here that should answer most of your questions.
• If you would like to take out student loans and have not received them in the past, please complete an entrance loan counseling session at http://mappingyourfuture.org/ and a promissory note with your lender.

Hopefully these quick tips will help you get ahead while the college is closed. When we return on July 6th, we do anticipate an increased volume of student traffic. With that in mind, please strive to make every trip to the financial aid office productive. Make sure you have all of the requested documentation with correct signatures. Please make sure you know what questions you would like to have answered so you can avoid return trips.

Overall, we are excited about entering into Fall registration. We have a full staff this year who are ready to serve you. We have made some changes in financial aid over the past year that are intended to make your financial aid experience much more efficient and effective.

As always, if you have any questions, please contact the financial aid office at 864-250-8128 or financialaid@gvltec.edu .

Let us know how we can serve you!

Am I being audited by financial aid???

No you are not being audited. However, you have been selected for verification. You can think of this as a similar process to being audited, except at the end you won't have to pay back money and fees if the numbers don't add up!

If you receive a letter in the mail from the Financial Aid Office informing you that you have been selected for verification, then you are joining roughly 30% of students around the country who have to go through this process. The reason you were selected is so the Department of Education can verify that the information you submitted on your FAFSA is accurate according to your tax returns. Any discrepancies can be cleared up during this process. While we will look at your financial information, we will also verify your family situation. Many times students are selected for verification because of a unique family situation that we need additional clarification on. This is just to ensure that we can give you the maximum amount of financial aid that you qualify for.

One of the most important aspects of verification is the paperwork (I know you are excited!!). However, by turning in ALL of the requested documents and verifying that the appropriate signatures are in place, you can ensure a smooth verification process.

One more note: whenever you receive notice that you were selected for verification, turn your documents in as soon as possible. The quicker you turn them in, the quicker we can process them, and the quicker we can get your file completed and award you your financial aid!

Look at this process as quality control. Without these benchmarks built into our system we would not be able to offer the extensive options within financial aid that allow you to go to school!

As always, if you have any questions regarding this process or anything else concerning financial aid, please contact our office at 864-250-8128 or financialaid@gvltec.edu.

Thank you and we look forward to hearing from you!

New Scholarship!!

As promised we are trying to give you, our students, every opportunity to fund your education outside of student loans. I just received a notice for a new scholarship that you can apply for.

The Greenville Chapter of Las Amigas, Incorporated Scholarship.

The scholarship is up to $1000 per academic year. You must be a high school graduate or have received a GED. You must live in the Greenville area and you must be accepted by any Techincal College or already attending a Technical College as an undergraduate.

Applications are available in the Financial Aid office.

Please apply soon as the deadline is rapidly approaching!!!

FAFSA Made Easy!

Adventures in Education, is a non profit public service program that helps students plan and complete their journey through higher education. They have developed a series of video guides that will walk you through the FAFSA process.

If you are like me and learn much better through visual teaching, this video series may give you the confidence you need to start and complete your FAFSA.

Here is the link to the video series:

http://www.aie.org/FAFSAMadeEasy/videoarchive_english.cfm

As always, you can complete the FAFSA online anytime for FREE at

www.fafsa.ed.gov

For Greenville Tech Financial Aid info. please visit our website at:

http://www.gvltec.edu/financial_aid/

Understanding Academic Years

I have met with a lot of students recently who have completed their FAFSA for 2009-2010 and want to start taking classes this summer. In lieu of that mistake, and to hopefully avoid any future confusion, I wanted to spend a minute and talk about academic years and how financial aid works within those academic years.

When we award financial aid we have to award within specific boundaries. These boundaries are mandated by the Department of Education and we refer to them as “Academic Years”. An academic year runs from August –July, which translates into a fall, spring and summer semester sequence. So if a student wanted to submit a FAFSA and receive financial aid this summer, he or she would still be considered in the 2008-2009 academic year because we have not reached the fall semester yet. Once we reach the fall semester, we will begin awarding financial aid based on the 2009-2010 academic year FAFSA results.

At GTC we have many programs with various start and end dates so it is always important to note which academic year your classes fall within before you submit your FAFSA to be qualified for financial aid.

As always, you can submit a Free Application for Federal Student Aid at www.fafsa.ed.gov

If you have any questions, comments or concerns, please feel free to leave a comment and a financial aid officer will respond shortly. 

Help us help you!

Even though this blog has only been around for 2 weeks we have seen a large response. Financial aid is a topic that crosses the mind of every student in some capacity. With the economic times that we are all facing, financial aid may be an even more important component of your education. For many students, without financial aid, education is simply not a possibility. 

We understand this and we want to help! Please let us know what topics or questions you would like to see covered. We could spend days adding information to this blog but if it does not benefit you, our students, then we have not done our jobs. We want to give you the information you need to have an efficient and effective financial aid experience. 

So please leave a comment about what type of content you would like to see covered in this blog and we will make it happen.

Thank you!

Financial Aid Book Vouchers!!

With the summer semester rapidly approaching we are also about to enter into the season for book vouchers. What is a book voucher? Basically a book voucher works like an advance on your financial aid awards. Consider it a line of credit against your financial aid awards. To determine which students will get book vouchers and how much they will get, we run a simple calculation. We add up all of the financial aid that a student will get for the current semester, then deduct all tuition and fees. The remaining balance is money that can be made available in a book voucher (Remember that this is just an advance on your financial aid, not a separate award). Many students who elect to receive student loans may have thousands of dollars that have been “over-awarded” to them after tuition and fees have been paid. It is important to note that we also put limits on how much a student can use in a book voucher. The limits for summer 2009 are as follows: Full time- $900, ¾ time- $700, Half time - $500. If a student has paid for his entire tuition, used a book voucher and still has financial aid awards remaining, this money is mailed to the student in a refund check. NOTE: **Refund checks are typically mailed 4-6 weeks after classes start**

Book vouchers can be a great way to pay for your books and supplies without having to pay for these items out of pocket. However, not everyone is eligible for a book voucher. In order for a student to receive a book voucher he/she must do one of the following:

·         Submit a FAFSA for 2008/2009 and turn in all requested documentation to the financial aid office. We must have your FAFSA information before we can determine how much financial aid you will receive in the summer 2009 semester. If you have submitted a FAFSA but we have requested additional documentation, ALL documents must be submitted before we can issue a book voucher.

·         If you have received an award letter from financial aid you must return this to our office.

·         For students who received financial aid in fall 2008 or spring 2009 semester, you must have requested enough financial aid in the summer 2009 semester to fund your book voucher. **Student who only receive lottery tuition assistance will NOT be eligible for a book voucher**

·         If this is your first time receiving student loans you MUST have completed entrance loan counseling and have completed a master promissory note with your chosen lender before we can issue a book voucher.

If you meet these criteria for a book voucher you may print one from your campus cruiser account via web advisor beginning May 11^th, 2009. Book vouchers will be available until May 29^th. Book vouchers may also be printed at the GTC campus bookstore.

As always if you have any questions please feel free to leave a comment, question or suggestion and a financial aid officer will respond!

GTC Admissions and Registration Center

This short video will give you an introduction to GTC's Admissions and Registration Center or "ARC". This is basically your "one stop shop" where you can find all of the necessary people and places to get registered at GTC, apply for financial aid, enroll in classes, buy your books, even grab a tasty treat. 

Avoid Long Lines and Frustration?? Am I Dreaming?

Spring is in the air! There is always something exciting about the first blossoms of spring and knowing that within a few short weeks the temperature will be warming up and we will be well on our way to summer. In financial aid, we are in the middle of spring time also. We are enjoying the calm before the storm, and by “storm” I am referring to Fall registration. So, you may be thinking “How in the world can I avoid standing in those long lines at Financial Aid?” If you were not thinking that and were still focused on summer vacation, fear not, you might still find this useful!

FAFSA Tips and Pointers!

• Start Early! By submitting your FAFSA early (beginning January 1st, 2009) you will ensure yourself access to ALL of the financial aid award programs, and the opportunity to have all of your financial aid completed before you begin classes. Complete your FAFSA here: http://www.fafsa.ed.gov/ Also make sure you are aware of Greenville Tech's Priority Deadlines: http://prod.campuscruiser.com/q?pg=home_news&tg=News-detail&id=111178&cx=22.168
  


• Be Accurate! We all realize that the FAFSA can be confusing. So, consult the guide on the FAFSA’s website that walks you through the process. By ensuring that your information is accurate, you will greatly decrease the length of time it will take to complete your financial aid file.
  


• Follow Up! Once you submit your FAFSA, expect a letter from our office letting you know if we need any additional information, or letting you know all of the financial aid you have been awarded. If we have requested any documents to be returned…make sure they are returned in a timely manner.
  


• Read! There will always be instructions that accompany any financial aid mailing. Take a few moments to read all of these instructions and you could potentially avoid a trip to the financial aid office, or solve your problem with a simple phone call. Remember, financial aid does not have to be confusing; make it rewarding!
  


• Be Thorough! Double checking and triple checking your financial aid forms is always a good idea. Once again, by ensuring that your forms are accurate and complete, you exponentially decrease the time it will take to complete your financial aid file. Make sure all necessary steps are followed to receive certain awards (Complete Entrance Loan Counseling at http://mappingyourfuture.org/ and a Master Promissory Note with your chosen lender: http://www.salliemae.com/ , https://www.wachovia.com/personal/page/0,,325_496,00.html, http://www.slc.sc.edu/students/signapromissorynotempn.aspx if you have been awarded a student loan).
  


• Remain Positive! Make your financial aid work for you. Take advantage of all financial aid that has been awarded to you and use it as a tool to empower your future. Take advantage of the resources and information around you and take a proactive step in your financial aid. By remaining focused and positive you can ensure that your financial aid package is best tailored to you.

All of these tips can greatly impact the effectiveness of your financial aid experience. Our financial aid staff is devoted to helping our students obtain the best financial aid awards packages available. By following these tips above we feel that you will have a more rewarding experience in financial aid and truly benefit from all that financial aid has to offer!

We Want To hear From You!

Why a blog? Because at Greenville Technical College we have embraced education. We feel that by educating you, our students, about financial aid, we can play an active role in your future. This blog is intended to be a source of information and guidance. We will devote our time to communicating with you about all of your financial aid related questions. We want you to ask questions! In order to create an environment of good conversation, we ask that your comments and questions be respectful and appropriate. It is our goal to make the financial aid process less confusing and more rewarding, so…let the conversation begin!