Speaking at the National College Access Network (NCAN) conference earlier this week. Mark A. Brown, COO of Federal Student Aid (FSA), talked about the importance of making college accessible.
Brown, a retired Major General in the U.S. Air Force who was named COO of FSA in March, spoke to more than 1,000 attendees at the NCAN conference, which had the theme “Racing Toward Postsecondary Success.” His topic, “The Future and Vision of Federal Student Aid,” comes amid national discussion about how to make college more affordable and how to simplify the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA).
“Without question, the strength of the NCAN and the FSA partnership is our common understanding of why we must collectively bring our best efforts and the best talents we can find together to address the complex and worsening challenge of college affordability,” said Brown. “We collectively have to address the financial literacy and public issues that have fueled this current state. I’m convinced we can dramatically improve repayment outcomes by ensuring that students start their higher education journeys not only with greater access and more dollars, but by being better informed up front and by having better tools to understand how their journey could or should come to a successful end,” he said.
Brown said that FSA is developing tools and resources for practical planning, providing students and families a platform that would allow them to easily learn about, apply for, receive and repay federal student aid in a digital way. The 2019-20 FAFSA form is now available to students and parents through the myStudentAid mobile app and fafsa.gov website. FSA is continuing to develop content and tools for the app that will assist users throughout the process.
Planning and financial literacy should begin long before the FAFSA application is submitted, Brown said, adding that FSA is also working to improve retention rates, graduation rates and cohort default rates at minority serving institutions.
“I valued hearing Mark Brown’s explicit commitment to address the inequity in our current higher education system and how FSA can play a role in the solution,” said Laura Keane, chief policy officer of uAspire, an organization focused on college affordability and removing financial barriers. “Yes to modernizing FSA customer service to students and families. Yes to providing stronger financial literacy-based tools to communicate financial aid with more transparency.
“We can support students with better information and tools for their decisions, but improved communications alone won’t open doors to higher education without also addressing insufficient aid and financial gaps—even after student loans—today’s students face to cover the full costs to complete their postsecondary degrees,” she added.
