by Carlos A Soto for CourseAdvisor

Every day, news articles report findings on the increased pay you may enjoy if you achieve a higher education degree. For advancing your career, increasing your earning potential, or fulfilling a lifelong dream, going back to school is a great idea any way you look at it.

Paying For School So School Pays Off For You
Once you've found the education program you want to enroll in, how do you pay for it? Start with filling out the free federal financial aid application (FAFSA). The U.S. federal government is the largest single provider of college financial aid, providing over $70 billion in aid to nearly 10 million students and their families.

Before You Fill Out Your Financial Aid Application...

• Learn about federal financial aid eligibility requirements. See Federal Financial Aid: Who Is Eligible? for details on this topic.
• Get accreditation and licensing information from the school you wish to apply to.
• Find out your school's loan default rate. You might not qualify for some types of aid if the school you want to attend has a high default rate.
• Look up the school's financial aid office: location, hours and advisory process.
• Research the financial aid assistance available, including federal, state, local, private and institutional financial aid programs
• Review the procedures and deadlines for submitting the financial aid application for each available financial aid program.
• Find out the school's criteria for selecting financial aid recipients. Your financial need, the type of assistance, and amount of financial aid you are eligible for are determined by the school's criteria.
• Make sure you understand the school's criteria for determining whether you're making satisfactory academic progress, and what happens if you're not. (Whether you continue to receive federal financial aid depends, in part, on whether you make satisfactory academic progress.)

Filling Out Your Financial Aid Application

• Get a PIN. (Maybe two!) A PIN is your FAFSA Personal Identification Number. With a PIN, you and your parents can fill out your federal financial aid application forms online quickly and conveniently. Apply for your PIN online at www.pin.ed.gov. Keep in mind these two things:
• You may need 2 PINs. You need a PIN, and if you are a dependent, your parents will need a PIN, too.
• It takes 2-5 days to get your PIN(s), so it is very important to apply for your PIN well before you fill out a FAFSA. To avoid last-minute stress, apply for your PIN(s) right after January 1st.
• Doublecheck your work to make sure you don't leave anything out of your federal financial aid application form.

Carefully review your SAR when you receive it

• Your SAR is your Student Aid Report, which will be sent to you some time after you successfully complete your financial aid application. Your SAR will list your Expected Family Contribution and confirm the info you provided on your FAFSA. The schools you selected in the FAFSA will use your SAR to determine what federal - and possibly non-federal - financial aid you qualify for.

Source:
"Funding Education Beyond High School," Guide to Federal Student Aid, 2007-2008, U.S. Department of Education, Federal Student Aid (http://studentaid.ed.gov/)

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Carlos Soto is a Content Editor at CourseAdvisor.