What Financial Aid Changes Mean for Students and Colleges

According to the poll, cost was a major influence in the college selection process for three-quarters of those intending to apply for aid. Eighty-two percent said receiving earlier insight into their financial aid award would cause them to think more positively about a college.

How are colleges responding? Seventy-seven percent of enrollment professionals said they planned to deliver their financial aid awards earlier than in previous years.

Specifically, 69% said they would shift the timing of final financial aid, and 56% planned to provide earlier communication of pricing, aid eligibility and estimated award letters for prospective students. Forty-eight percent planned to implement both of these strategies.

Asked how the impending changes would affect their role with their institutions, 36% of college professionals polled said they felt "excited and invigorated," 40% were "concerned" and 38% were "curious."

Although most institutions appear to agree on the need to accelerate the delivery of financial aid insights, no clear consensus emerged in the survey about changes to their admissions timeline.

While more than half of the students and families said they wanted earlier admissions decisions, and more than a third of institutions had plans to shift admissions timing, a large percentage of institutions were not yet ready to move their admissions process earlier.

However, many planned to shift their admissions strategy in other ways. Half of respondents said they would engage prospective students more aggressively in their junior year, and a quarter said they would institute an early-decision or early-action program. College professionals said the two biggest obstacles to change were matters beyond their control: finalization of state aid awards, and finalization of Pell grant tables.

The shift to earlier aid and admissions by some institutions promises to increase the competition between colleges, according to Cegment.

Schools will be challenged to nurture the relationship with prospective students for a longer period. Some will allocate more attention to students between admission and deposit, during which students may be wooed by competitive offers.

Cegment found that 79% of what it called "non-selective" institutions were likely to make changes in the enrollment cycle in order to lure students away from highly selective ones. Seventy-three percent of "selective" colleges were also likely to make changes.

In contrast, only 53% of "highly selective" institutions said they were thinking about making significant changes.

How will these changes affect future enrollment cycles? Eighty percent of the respondents said institutions that fail to shift their admissions and financial aid cycle earlier will be at a competitive disadvantage relative to their peer institutions that do so.