The past few months have been a test for the student financial aid office at Saint Louis University. The office has worked overtime, trying to process and distribute financial aid packages to prospective students. Like financial aid administrators across the country, staff at this Jesuit research university in Missouri have been dealing with the delays and technical glitches that have accompanied the rollout of the new, simplified Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA).

"We actually did five months' worth of work in a few weeks," said Alex DeLonis, assistant vice president of student financial services at Saint Louis University. "It put a lot of stress on the team," he added, "and it also put a lot of stress on management and leadership to make sure everyone felt supported and didn't get overly burned out."

Financial aid professionals say their jobs are rewarding because they provide students with access to college. But the botched FAFSA rollout is just the latest challenge for staff in a field already facing shortages and turnover.

The first major overhaul of the FAFSA in 40 years was supposed to make the process of applying for federal aid, such as student loans and Pell Grants, simpler. But things went wrong from the start: The U.S. Department of Education released the new form at the end of December, nearly three months later than the usual October 1 release date. Colleges didn't begin receiving FAFSA applicant data until March—delaying the critical information needed to craft financial aid packages. Then various technical glitches emerged, causing many applications to need reprocessing.

"All we're hearing is frustration and exhaustion," said Jill Desjean, senior policy analyst at the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators (NASFAA). "It's really been a tiring process and cycle."

The Education Department has worked to address the issues that arose and provide assistance to financial aid offices. However, these problems have still taken a toll. "It's been one blow after another," Desjean said. "It's that feeling of, 'Oh no, here we go again.' It feels like financial aid administrators just can't catch a break this year."

"I call it post-traumatic FAFSA stress disorder."

At an April 10 congressional hearing on the Education Department's fiscal 2025 budget, U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona said he understands the predicament financial aid administrators are in. Cardona said the department is working "around the clock" to ensure students get the information they need to make informed college decisions. "I understand the challenges our students, families, colleges, and financial aid administrators are facing. There is nothing more important to the Department of Education right now," Cardona said.

In February, the Education Department allocated $50 million to nonprofit organizations to help under-resourced colleges process financial aid forms. The department has also offered colleges some regulatory flexibility, such as reducing verification requirements for FAFSA applicants and pausing until June new reviews designed to check whether institutions meet various federal standards.

Despite these efforts, Heather Hensgen, a business analyst on the financial aid systems team at University of Maryland Global Campus (UMGC), said the past few months have been "quite stressful" for the team. Things are finally starting to settle down. But for two or three months, the team received daily updates from the Education Department and Oracle, which provides software to campuses for processing FAFSA applications and creating financial aid packages, about FAFSA errors and issues.

Hensgen said she couldn't believe the FAFSA information coming from the Education Department was accurate. She added that Oracle's software also hit snags because the company was also dealing with the department's various delays. According to Hensgen, UMGC's financial aid team needed to figure out what was happening, try to explain the progress to students, and then adjust the university's systems for processing aid applications. The biggest challenge was tracking whether the errors they encountered while processing FAFSA applications were due to issues at the Education Department or because Oracle's software wasn't working properly due to the agency's delays and glitches. They had to track which update fixed which issue, she said.

"I call it post-traumatic FAFSA stress disorder because now that I feel like we've gotten through it, it feels like we've been through a tornado," Hensgen said.

DeLonis said the uncertainty and stress of the past few months to get families the information they need to make college decisions "is something I've never experienced in my career." "Talking to my team and colleagues in financial aid across the country, they all feel the same way," he said. As of the end of May, the university had distributed financial aid packages to most families who submitted FAFSA applications, DeLonis said.

More turnover to come?

According to a report released last month by NASFAA and CUPA-HR, nearly 56% of the 298 financial aid professionals surveyed in 2023 said the likelihood of leaving their jobs within the next 12 months was "somewhat likely" to "very likely." More than half said they were interested in exploring opportunities outside higher education. As for reasons, financial aid staff primarily cited wanting higher pay, the ability to work remotely, and flexible work hours.

"We've been struggling with turnover and high attrition since the pandemic," Desjean said. After this year, "we'll see more people reporting burnout, turnover, and difficulty filling positions."

At Saint Louis University, the 30-person financial aid team experienced some turnover during this cycle, but the number of departures seemed "not too abnormal," DeLonis said. He couldn't determine whether anyone left due to the increased workload. DeLonis said that over the past few months, all staff in the Saint Louis University financial aid office experienced peaks and valleys in work hours. Its systems team "worked around the clock to get our financial aid packages up and running," he said. "These are automated, electronic, and require a lot of technical support."

To ease the workload, the financial aid office recently hired a new systems analyst, he said.

UMGC's 12-person financial aid systems team, on the other hand, didn't need to work overtime and managed to maintain a healthy work-life balance, Hensgen said. She explained that the team is "resilient" and everyone pulled together to get the job done. The team had zero turnover during the cycle, she said.

Frank Ballmann, director of federal relations at the National Association of State Student Grant and Aid Programs (NASSGAP), said the financial aid community "changes millions of lives every year." Despite the difficult work, it's hard to walk away because people in the field know how crucial it is to continue, Ballmann said. However, if things aren't resolved by next year, many employees' willingness to continue working under stress may change. "If this is just a one-time glitch and next year's FAFSA cycle goes smoothly, people will get over it," Ballmann said. "But if next year is like this year, you'll definitely hear a lot of people talking about burnout and it being time to change careers."

"Like climbing Mount Everest"

On May 30, Cardona announced steps the Education Department will take to modernize and improve the Office of Federal Student Aid (FSA). These steps include a "comprehensive review" of FSA's organization, management, workflows, business processes, and operations. The department is also bringing in an independent consulting firm to make recommendations on how to improve the office.

Meanwhile, FSA recently announced that its chief operating officer, Rich Cordray, will step down at the end of June. It will bring in Jeremy Singer, president of the College Board, as an executive advisor to oversee FAFSA work for the 2025-26 aid cycle. Such improvements to the office's operations could be crucial for the financial aid industry.

Looking ahead, Desjean said she doesn't expect a "repeat of this year's disaster" next year because the Education Department won't be building a brand-new system again. This month, the department announced it remains committed to launching the new form on October 1 for the 2025-26 FAFSA cycle. The agency said it won't make any additional major changes to the form and will skip this year's public comment period. Desjean has some confidence the department will launch on time, but she's not sure the department will have the entire process ready by then—such as allowing students and schools to make corrections. However, she also hopes the department doesn't rush to "get it out by October 1 and then find out things don't work" because it "feels like it has to save face," she said.

For the financial aid administrator profession, it's crucial that the Education Department runs the FAFSA process smoothly next year, Desjean said. If next year doesn't go well, "this year's problems will be magnified," she said. Hensgen expects there will still be some issues next year, but she still predicts a much smoother cycle. "I'm sure we'll have some issues, but that's just financial aid work," Hensgen said. "I hope lessons have been learned and that the future won't be as bumpy as this year—because this was literally like climbing Mount Everest."