With many of Desert Vista’s juniors and seniors preparing for college, it is important to be well-informed about scholarship opportunities. Free Application for Federal Student Aid (known as FAFSA) is an application used to see a student’s worthiness for many types of federal, state, and college-sponsored aid.

Many students believe they don’t qualify for aid and prevent themselves from getting financial aid by not to applying for it. General qualification requirements include having financial need and being a U.S. citizen or eligible non-citizen.

If your parent died as a result of military service in Iraq or Afghanistan after the events of 9/11, you may be eligible for an Iraq and Afghanistan Service Grant, you can apply for this in a FAFSA application.

FAFSAs are most often submitted electronically and are processed within three days. Generally it takes parents and students one to two hours to complete an application. You must be extremely careful when submitting your application, because errors result in processing interruptions and often cause a student to lose their enabled financial aid. This amounts to thousands of dollars in lost college aid.

Financial aid, particularly grants and other forms of college sponsored aid and assistance, is awarded on a first-come, first-serve basis. If a student submits their FAFSA after January 1^st each year, the better their chances are of receiving the maximum amount of financial aid possible.

Remember, applying is free. It costs nothing to apply for student aid therefore you should avoid companies charging a fee to complete the application.