Financial aid applications are rolling in. Formulas are being tested. Your committee is working in overdrive, reviewing and organizing applicants. Decisions are being made. Final decisions are being made. Now, it’s time to send out notifications to those receiving financial aid, and to those not qualifying.
After the intensity to reach those final decisions, you’re exhausted. Searching for the right words has left you banging your head against the desk. Do you personalize your letters? Create a template and simply plug in the qualifying and/or nonqualifying names? What are others doing? Will your financial aid processing software inform qualifying and nonqualifying families?
First things first, stop banging your head against your desk and exhale. After the craziness of the financial aid application season, sending out award notification letters is the easy part—we promise.
Now, after you’ve relaxed, hopefully a little excitement has crept back in. It’s time to award some families! Admission Officers have been talking about this very topic on the ISM e-List for the past few weeks. As you can imagine, everyone has a different approach. Some are lengthy, while others are short and to the point. Some are personalized, while others are templated. However, what’s important to remember as you sit down to craft your letters are the following three points.
Remind your parents of your school’s policy. It’s a good policy to remind your parents of your school’s financial aid guidelines. This doesn’t have to be lengthy, but you should outline your school’s available funds and the rules your Financial Aid Committee follows to draw their conclusions. Mention the documents needed to submit in completion for consideration, and by what deadline. This is an easy way to begin both your award granting letters and your nonqualifying notifications. It sets the pace for the rest of the letter.
Tell them their award status. After you’ve reminded families of your school’s policies and guidelines, you’ve set the tempo for letting them know if they qualify or not. If they do not qualify this year, it’s good policy to inform them of why not. If they do qualify, include the grant total and their adjusted tuition.
Inform them of additional steps they need to take. Some schools send out follow-up letters with instructions on how to receive their awarded grant. If possible, keep it simple and include instructions for families receiving aid. This saves both your office and the family time. You may also want to include instructions for families not receiving aid on how to appeal the decision.
