Electronically Signed Camper Financial Aid Application Made Easy

Electronically signed camper financial aid application

this conference will now be recorded hi welcome how to sign your financial aid application my name is christina winstead and i'm the assistant director for outreach at the washington student achievement council i work with the 12th year campaign today we're going to talk about how to sign your financial aid application this is for both you and if applicable your parent so we're going to learn about how to sign a fafsa how to sign a wafsa how parents sign a fafsa or a wafsa help and resources and of course your next steps the reason why this is so important is that if you have an unsigned application they cannot process it so if you and if your parent is required if you are dependent and your parents required if neither of those signatures are there or maybe you're just missing your parents signature they can't process it so we want to make sure and this is very common to see missing signatures listed so i want to make sure that you are able to complete your application and get the signatures that are needed on the application for processing for the wafsa you're going to have a signature process that is electronic so when you complete your application you're going to enter in your first name your last name your password the city that you're in and then your current state that's it the password is going to be what you used what you created when you started the wafsa that's going to be your signature right there then you're going to select the parent to sign the application if applicable so if you're considered dependent then they're going to determine who your parent is using the who is my parent infographic we also have a video in this series to determine whose information you need to complete your financial aid application that is the person who's going to sign your application so for the wafsa you're going to select this little image that looks like a person plus and what that is is you signifying a parent that you want to invite to sign your application so then you invite that parent by including their name and their email address and then it emails them the application to sign themselves and so they're going to sign it the same way putting their information in once that's done you have completed the application now for the fafsa you're going to use your fsa id so you're going to create your fsa id before you start the application and you use the same fsa id to sign your application when you're getting ready to complete your application you'll also enter your fafsa pin so that's going to be a it's basically your save key so it's not a pin but a save key that you enter in it's typically between four and six digits that you create before you start the application you're going to enter that in to show that you're the person who started your application so you're going to need your save key and your fsa id to sign your application you're going to enter in your fsa id your username you can use your email address or mobile number if they've been verified if you did not verify your email address or mobile number you can't use it here if you haven't created an fsa id you can click on create an fsa id and do that right then and there then you're going to put your fsa id password in if your parent is signing this and they have not created an fsa id it's a great time to take them over they can create their fsa id and then sign with an fsa id if your parent does not have an fsa id because they cannot create one totally fine they're you're going to click on other options to sign and submit and you're going to select signature page so for student signature you'll put your information in and for parent signature they'll put their information in it can be either parent that's listed that can sign it so if your parents are married or maybe you have a step parent and your parents are remarried you're going to want to make sure you can use either or parent that is providing the information once that's done it's going to process process successfully so what's going to happen is you're going to submit the application and then they're going to make sure that it's it's processed you're going to make sure you're completing the 2021-2022 fafsa or wafsa this is the year that you're going to be going to college and it's important that you have the correct year on there if you're sending a print and signature page send it as soon as possible i highly encourage you to send that as soon as you print it up within the next day or two it's just one of those things that it takes a little time to process and i want to make sure you have plenty of time to have it processed if you don't have access to a printer you can submit without a signature and they'll send you what's called a student aid report and you can sign that document and send it back in if you need more help or have questions we have a couple options for you the first option is otter it's a texting service that's free for students and it helps you navigate financial aid so you can always text otter 24 hours a day seven days a week you can start by texting high otter to 360-928-7281 otter is here to help you if you have a question in the middle of the night maybe uh it's been keeping you up maybe you know you woke up and oh my gosh i have a question about this you can text in your financial aid questions i really love this service because it allows you to get information all throughout the day when you're needing it versus when we are available the other service that we have is our 12th year campaign events where you can get free assistance in completing a financial aid application at one of our virtual fairs so your next step is to determine how you and your parent if applicable are going to sign your application so determine who's going to be signing it and how you're going to sign it and if you're using a signature page you're always going to send it in as soon as possible because it'll take a couple weeks for them to process it those are your next steps for financial aid this is part of a series of videos for financial aid advising day so there are lots of topics for you to choose from all the videos are under typically under 15 minutes they're usually about 10 minutes long and have resources to help you with this process if you get stuck or have any questions please feel free to reach out to us to your high school counselors to otter we don't know you have questions until you ask them so please feel free to reach out we want to make sure you have all the support you need to complete your financial aid application so you can pursue your post-secondary options thank you so much for watching our video we hope you enjoy the series