FAFSA Tips: the Scholarship Question

One of our most common questions - and the most common mistake we have to have people correct - is regarding the scholarship question on the FAFSA. Now, if you have to report your scholarships as earnings on your taxes this won't apply to you, but for most students at Cornish, the scholarships you get from the school and the grants you get from the government are not reported as income. If you received scholarships from outside organizations, you'll want to check in with a tax professional about how you should handle those.

EXAMPLE No.1:
So let's say you've got a Cornish scholarship. Maybe you've got a Pell grant, possibly some of that good ol' State Need Grant if you're a Washington state resident. All of this is documented on the 1098-T form you can download from Compass or pick up in the Student Accounts office, and you're looking at your grants and scholarships as you're doing the FAFSA because you're a responsible student who has all their necessary documentation gathered, and you get to a question. This question wants to know if you've received any grants and scholarships this year.

Leave that section marked a big fat zero. 

What that question is actually asking is if you've received any grants or scholarships you're reporting as income. As an undergraduate art student at Cornish, you shouldn't be reporting the Pell, SNG, or your institutional scholarships (this includes any of you lucky so-and-so's with endowed scholarships like the Kreielsheimer or any of our other endowed funds).


EXAMPLE No. 2: 
So let's say you've got a Cornish scholarship, a Pell grant, some SNG money, and you also put in a bunch of hours last year filling out a billion scholarship applications and you wound up with a scholarship from a not-for-profit or private company for $1000. You get to that same scholarship question, and you think to yourself "Didn't that financial aid blog say something about outside scholarships?".
 Good memory! We did. If you received an outside scholarship, contact a tax professional to see if that money should be reported as income. You can contact the organization you got the money from too, and they should be able to tell you. Unfortunately, because we are not tax professionals, we cannot give you tax advice and will be unable to tell you what you should do about that $1000 scholarship as far as your taxes go. It may very well be that you don't have to report it, and in that case, the same rule applies - don't include it on the FAFSA.

We're here for you and excited to help you fill out those FAFSAs - let us know if we can give any more helpful advice by commenting here, emailing us, or dropping by the office!