Going to College
The time has come - you're graduating high school and moving on to college. Congratulations! Going away to college is actually a great way to move on from divorce or a rocky family situation. You gain independence, and the effects of divorce fade somewhat. No more child support for your parents to fight over, and less contact with your parents can often add up to less stress for you. However, before you can go away to college, there are some important facts you should know about divorce and college financial aid, among other things.
When you apply to college, if you live in the United States you have to fill out something called a FAFSA - the Free Application for Federal Student Aid. For children of divorced families, it's pretty complicated. You can find the more official advice for children of divorced parents here: http://www.finaid.org/questions/divorce.phtml and at this link it goes into more detail about cases in which parents will not contribute financially to your college education: http://www.finaid.org/otheraid/parentsrefuse.phtml, but since it's a bit difficult to read, I'll give you the basics of it here.
Essentially, unless you're legally independent, you have to have one of your parents fill out a FAFSA form. The parent who will complete the form is generally the one that you live with most often. This is actually different from custody. For example, my parents had joint legal custody of me and my dad claimed me on his taxes (part of the divorce settlement), but I lived with my mom. So she was the one that did the FAFSA for me, and it was only her income that counted. If you lived with both parents equally, there's a tie-breaker. You only count the parent that gave you the most financial support during the past 12 months. This is really important, because by only claiming one parent's income on your FAFSA you are generally more eligible for financial aid.
One additional thing that you do have to count is child support and alimony. Also, if the parent you currently live with has remarried, you have to count that stepparent's income on your FAFSA.
Even if you are certain you won't qualify for financial aid - let's say that your parent that you live with is a multimillionaire - you should still have your parent fill out the FAFSA. That's because in many cases the amount of money your parents make and the amount they're willing to contribute to your college isn't necessarily related. For example, when I first went to college my mother filled out the FAFSA. According to the FAFSA report, I didn't qualify for financial aid. However, I did qualify for many merit-based scholarships. These scholarships were based on my grades and test scores, and didn't take into account financial need, but I still had to fill out the FAFSA in order to get them. It's just one of the rules of most scholarships - even if they don't care about your financial need, you still have to have completed the FAFSA. For this reason, I high recommend all students to fill out the FAFSA, regardless of your parent's salary.
In order to fill out the FAFSA, your parent must have completed their taxes. The earlier, the better, because until they complete them you can't fully complete your FAFSA (although you can do an estimate using their previous year's tax returns, but that's just a short-term fix and eventually you'll have to submit their current tax returns).
Now that you know how to fill out the FAFSA, hopefully you're on your way to getting financial aid to help you pay for college. I wish you luck! You can fill out the FAFSA here: http://www.fafsa.ed.gov/.
When you apply to college, if you live in the United States you have to fill out something called a FAFSA - the Free Application for Federal Student Aid. For children of divorced families, it's pretty complicated. You can find the more official advice for children of divorced parents here: http://www.finaid.org/questions/divorce.phtml and at this link it goes into more detail about cases in which parents will not contribute financially to your college education: http://www.finaid.org/otheraid/parentsrefuse.phtml, but since it's a bit difficult to read, I'll give you the basics of it here.
Essentially, unless you're legally independent, you have to have one of your parents fill out a FAFSA form. The parent who will complete the form is generally the one that you live with most often. This is actually different from custody. For example, my parents had joint legal custody of me and my dad claimed me on his taxes (part of the divorce settlement), but I lived with my mom. So she was the one that did the FAFSA for me, and it was only her income that counted. If you lived with both parents equally, there's a tie-breaker. You only count the parent that gave you the most financial support during the past 12 months. This is really important, because by only claiming one parent's income on your FAFSA you are generally more eligible for financial aid.
One additional thing that you do have to count is child support and alimony. Also, if the parent you currently live with has remarried, you have to count that stepparent's income on your FAFSA.
Even if you are certain you won't qualify for financial aid - let's say that your parent that you live with is a multimillionaire - you should still have your parent fill out the FAFSA. That's because in many cases the amount of money your parents make and the amount they're willing to contribute to your college isn't necessarily related. For example, when I first went to college my mother filled out the FAFSA. According to the FAFSA report, I didn't qualify for financial aid. However, I did qualify for many merit-based scholarships. These scholarships were based on my grades and test scores, and didn't take into account financial need, but I still had to fill out the FAFSA in order to get them. It's just one of the rules of most scholarships - even if they don't care about your financial need, you still have to have completed the FAFSA. For this reason, I high recommend all students to fill out the FAFSA, regardless of your parent's salary.
In order to fill out the FAFSA, your parent must have completed their taxes. The earlier, the better, because until they complete them you can't fully complete your FAFSA (although you can do an estimate using their previous year's tax returns, but that's just a short-term fix and eventually you'll have to submit their current tax returns).
Now that you know how to fill out the FAFSA, hopefully you're on your way to getting financial aid to help you pay for college. I wish you luck! You can fill out the FAFSA here: http://www.fafsa.ed.gov/.