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" You know that saying &amp;quot;Ask and you shall receive&amp;quot;? That&amp;#039;s how financial aid works. Don&amp;#039;t be one of the hundreds of thousands of students who don&amp;#039;t receive financial aid just because they don&amp;#039;t apply! Financial aid includes grants (free money from the government), low-interest student loans (which you pay back after graduating), and work-study (where you&amp;#039;re set up with a job on campus). Even if your family is wealthy, you&amp;#039;ll probably still qualify for some\u2014because it&amp;#039;s not just based on income. The higher your college&amp;#039;s tuition, the better your chance of getting money. Here&amp;#039;s how to get your hands on that cash! THE BASICS:   You need the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) to be considered for all aid. Here&amp;#039;s what you need to know:  Submit your FAFSA form soon (get it at fafsa.ed.gov). The earliest you can turn it in is January 1, and the latest is June 30.  Ask your parents to file their taxes early. You need info from their tax returns to apply for federal financial aid.  Make your colleges&amp;#039; &amp;quot;priority deadlines&amp;quot; (you&amp;#039;ll list which colleges you&amp;#039;re applying to on your FAFSA). That&amp;#039;s when schools set aside an amount of money that they think will meet students&amp;#039; needs. If you apply after the deadline, you could qualify for aid but not get it because the college may have run out of funds by then. (Most priority deadlines are between February 1 and March 1.)  Considering a private college? You may need to fill out the CSS/Profile form (get it at collegeboard.com).  Wait six weeks after you submit your FAFSA. That&amp;#039;s when you&amp;#039;ll get a Student Aid Report (SAR), which lists how much your family can pay. It&amp;#039;s also sent to your colleges, and they&amp;#039;ll use it to determine how much financial aid to offer you. Tip: Submit your FAFSA online and you&amp;#039;ll get your SAR in three to five days.  Ask a college for more aid if you don&amp;#039;t think you were offered enough. They often reconsider, and you just may get it! IT&amp;#039;S OKAY TO ASK FOR HELP  All these forms and deadlines can be so confusing! But each college has financial aid counselors you can call, even if you&amp;#039;re not sure you&amp;#039;re going there. Get answers to your FAFSA questions by calling 800-4-FED-AID.  Here, our favorite financial aid sites:  FINAID.ORG: a one-stop shop for financial aid info  COLLEGEANSWER.COM: college cost calculators  STUDENTAID.ED.GOV: tips from FAFSA staff  SUPERCOLLEGE.COM: financial aid timeline and free scholarship search "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.seventeen.com/life/school/advice/a8861/cash-for-college-feb06/>