For Students
THE FINANCIAL AID DEPENDENCY OVERRIDE PROCESS: WHY WE NEED FAIRNESS
Presented by Seattle Education Access
Problem: Federal financial aid law is based on the premise that families are primarily responsible for financing a student’s education until the student is 24 years old unless certain other, narrowly defined circumstances exist (e.g. the student is married, homeless, previously homeless, a ward of the state, previously in foster care, orphaned, or a parent). The law also allows a student under the age of 24 to be considered independent, “when a financial aid administrator makes a documented determination of independence by reason of other unusual circumstances”. This decision is called a “dependency override.” The law allows considerable latitude to individual financial aid officers to make this determination.
The problem we are addressing is that this override is applied narrowly and inconsistently in colleges in Washington State. Students are often not counseled about its existence and are not advised how to properly put together the case for their applications. Additionally, financial aid officers do not apply the override consistently to similar facts, nor do they know how to assess the circumstances of the students’ lives realistically. Finally, many of these schools do not have uniform procedures in place for applying this override.
Goal: To expand the use of, and make uniform and predictable, the application of the financial aid dependency override.
Background:
Seattle Education Access (SEA) is a nonprofit established in 2002. Our mission is to provide higher education advocacy and opportunity to people struggling to overcome poverty and adversity. We help low income and marginalized youth and young adults make successful transitions to college. Over the past seven years, our staff has advised approximately 200 youth and young adults between the ages of 18 and 24 who needed and deserved dependency status overrides. When a student seeking a dependency status override comes to our office first, and receives adequate counseling and advocacy through the petition process, the override is granted about 95% of the time. However, we also frequently talk to students who come to us after they have tried and failed to secure the override by themselves. Unaccompanied, students are less likely to receive the override, and uncounted additional students are never informed that the dependency status override is an option. Some colleges are more sympathetic than others to students seeking dependency overrides.
Summary:
Clearly, the intention of the federal financial aid guidelines is to assume that families will take responsibility for financing their children’s college education whenever possible. Independent status is automatically granted when the student has been orphaned, in foster care, has been homeless, or is a ward of the state. The purpose of the dependency status override is to provide fair and equal treatment to youth and young adults whose family circumstances are similar but not formally documented. Social workers call these youth “non-system kids” – youth who are falling through the cracks in the system and not receiving state care, even though their situations are dire.
Currently, however, there is no agreed upon best practices among financial aid officers about which students should be granted dependency status overrides. Based on our direct service work with low income and marginalized youth, we recommend that the following categories of students be granted dependency status overrides.
- Youth who have been neglected or abused
- Youth with parents who are mentally ill or incarcerated
- Youth who have been abandoned, disowned by their families of origin, or cannot locate their parents
- Youth who have been raised by family members or other persons, other than their biological parents, including but not limited to youth formally in kinship care
Additionally, we recommend that financial aid officers consider these ethical guidelines for best practices:
- Make sure that all applicants know that they have the right to apply for a dependency status override and are counseled on what information they need to provide to establish independence
- Consider each case on its own merits, rather than creating rigid guidelines
- Understand that talking about an abusive childhood to strangers can be traumatizing, and show some compassion
- Do not deny dependency status overrides just because the youth is still in contact with his or her family of origin, understanding that some youth stay in contact with an abusive or neglectful parent in order to support younger siblings or because they have assumed a parental role to the nonfunctioning parent
- Understand that many disadvantaged youth live outside the legal system and many have difficulty providing formal documentation of their circumstances
Real Students, Real Problems:
The above recommendations come out of seven years of experience of conversations with low income and marginalized youth. Due to our agency’s commitment to confidentiality, the quotes below are anonymous. However, all of these examples are factual. Let’s walk through the recommendations one by one with examples from real students struggling to get the financial aid they need and deserve to finish their educations and rise out of poverty.
Youth who have been neglected or abused: Foster youth are rightfully granted independent status because their parents have failed to provide adequate care, safety, and support. However, for every child that enters the foster care system, there is another that falls through the cracks in the system and remains in an unsafe family environment. This child should not be penalized with the denial of a college education just because society has failed to adequately provide adequate protection. One youth told me, “I told the financial aid office that I couldn’t get my dad’s signature. They just said, too bad, they never told me about the dependency status override or asked me why. My dad molested me when I was a kid. I moved out at 16 and got a job and moved in with a friend and never looked back. When I called him to ask him if he would fill out the FAFSA, he said sure — if I came over and watched porn with him first. I guess I’ll have to wait till I’m 24 to go back to school.” Youth who have been adopted after infancy and later experience neglect or abandonment by their adoptive parents — which sadly happens all too often — should also be given special consideration, since they would still be receiving the same benefits as foster children if it had not been for the irresponsible behavior of the adoptive parents. Financial aid officers should understand that many of the youth who fall within this category do not have documentation of the reasons they left home. They should also recognize that these youth might be homeless, but for their own efforts. They should not be penalized for keeping a roof over their own heads.
Youth with parents who are mentally ill or incarcerated: I talked to a student who was denied a dependency status waiver even though her mentally ill single mother, who was homeless, refused to sign the FAFSA because she believed that if she did the government would track her down and she would become institutionalized. We recommended that they student try again at a different college, where the appeal was accepted. Another student told the financial aid office that she could not obtain her mother’s signature because her mother was incarcerated; the student was denied financial aid and never informed of the existence of the dependency status appeal process.
Youth who have been abandoned, disowned by their families of origin, or cannot locate their parents: Sometimes students cannot locate their parents; for example, one of our students has a father who moved to South America with no forwarding address. Another student, in order to complete the FAFSA, took a bus to a wilderness area in Oregon to track down her father, a disabled vet who was living in the woods in a tent, but could not find him. Other students have parents who refuse to talk to them; this situation is particularly likely to affect lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer students. In one student’s words, “I grew up in a conservative Mormon family in Idaho. When I came out at 16, they kicked me out and pretended I never existed, so I went to live with a friend.” Another: “I called my mom to ask her if she would fill out the FAFSA. It was the first time I had talked to her since leaving home at 17 after she found out I was queer. She told me that God wanted to save me, that I didn’t need college, I needed to come home and repent and get married or I would burn in hell. I’m 21, are you saying I need to wait three more years for college?” Again, the financial aid system should recognize that youth in this situation may not have documentation and should counsel them on what evidence will satisfy the requirement of proof of abandonment.
Youth who have been raised by family members or persons other than their parents, including but not limited to youth formally in kinship care: Clearly, children raised in kinship care have circumstances similar to foster youth, and should be given equal consideration as independents. Otherwise, we penalize extended families who take responsibility for children whose parents have failed to provide safe homes. However, I have seen a financial aid office deny a dependency status override to a young woman who had lived with her grandmother since the age of two. It should be noted that failing to provide youth in kinship care with the same consideration as foster youth disproportionately impacts low income youth of color.
As we move towards creating standardized best practices in the dependency status appeal process, here are some additional considerations:
Make sure that all applicants know that they have the right to a dependency status override: Prospective students have the legal right to be fully informed about the financial aid process and their options; financial aid offices have both legal and ethical responsibilities to make this information readily available to students. At present, prospective students are not being adequately informed about the dependency status appeal process at most campuses. Even more troubling, students report that individual financial aid officers sometimes deny that such a process exists.
Consider each case on its own merits, rather than creating rigid guidelines: The 2009 “FAFSA Fix” legislation greatly improved financial aid access for homeless youth. However, youth who are homeless but not accessing services, and youth who have been abused, neglected or abandoned but are self-supporting, continue to fall through the cracks. For example, a homeless youth who has been living in an abandoned building rather than a shelter may not be able to formally document her homeless status in a traditional way, but this does not mean that she does not deserve financial aid. We recommend that all financial aid officers receive training and supervision that emphasize the legislative intent of the override by asking themselves, “Has this student demonstrated independence through self-reliance in the absence of adequate support from their biological parents?”
Understand that talking about an abusive childhood to strangers can be traumatizing, and show some compassion: All too frequently, students report that financial aid officers listen to their appeal with suspicion and derision. Some financial aid officers assume that anyone filing a dependency status appeal is a potential fraud and their main job is protecting the institution as a gatekeeper, rather than making college accessible to low income youth. Some appeals are fraudulent, but this does not mean that it is right to assume that every new student is a liar. Sharing information about childhood abuse is painful. In the words of one student, “When I was in grade school I tried to tell a teacher at school about the abuse, and she told my mom, who told my dad. My dad beat me and just switched schools. Nothing changed and I never talked about it again to anybody. When I went to my dependency status appeal I was so scared I was shaking and crying. I don’t know what I would have done if my advocate hadn’t been there with me, I don’t think I could have made it through the door.” Ironically, youth with the greatest difficulty in talking about their private trauma are often the ones in greatest need of the dependency status override. Financial aid officers should have adequate training and supervision regarding how to provide respectful and compassionate service, and financial aid supervisors should watch for staff burnout.
Do not deny dependency status overrides just because the youth is still in contact with his or her family of origin, understanding that some youth stay in contact with an abusive or neglectful parent in order to support younger siblings or because they have assumed a parental role to the nonfunctioning parent: At some colleges, the dependency status override is only awarded if the student has had zero contact with his or her biological parents for three years. This is an inhumane policy. Some youth from abusive families — especially the oldest child — will stay in contact with the abusive parent in order to provide positive support for younger brothers and sisters. This should not bar them from receiving financial aid. On the contrary, college success for the eldest sibling often paves the way for college access for the younger siblings. Many of our students, having succeeded in college, teach their younger brothers and sisters how to do it too. One student shares, “The only reason I call home is to talk to my little sister. I worry about her all the time. I try to call when my dad is at work, but sometimes he answers the phone. He yells at me and calls me names, then he won’t even put my sister on the phone. It’s so bad that sometimes after I talk to him I throw up. The financial aid office said that if I am in phone contact with my father, then he can sign the FAFSA. But I’m afraid to go home.”
Other youth remain in contact with their biological parents because they have taken on a parenting role with a nonfunctioning parent. This is common in homes where a single parent is mentally ill or chemically dependent. One student shares, “My mom is a heroin addict. I go home every week or so to check up on her, to see if there’s any food in the house and to make sure she isn’t dead. I have nightmares that she’ll overdose and just rot in there, nobody will find her body. Even when I was still living with her back in high school, I was the one who made sure the rent was paid. I worked full time so we could pay the rent. She’s never taken care of me. When I was six I would steal her money when she nodded off and walk to the store to buy milk. She won’t sign the FAFSA because she hasn’t done her taxes in years and thinks the government will come after her for it if she signs.” This student did receive a dependency status override, but only because she lied to the financial aid office and told them she had not talked to her mother in over three years.
Conclusion:
The purpose of financial aid is to give low income students the resources they need to complete college degrees and rise out of poverty. More students would have that chance if all prospective students were informed about the dependency status override process. Financial aid officers should be educated in best practices surrounding when and how to grant dependency status overrides. Financial aid offices should be doorways to college success for low income students, not additional barriers.
Reform in the dependency status override process will be an important step towards financial aid reform, but in itself will not be enough to make college access truly democratic. Currently, countless working class families are awarded inadequate financial aid, and this issue also needs to be addressed.
