Statement Concerning Messiah College's April 1 Priority Deadline
(Please note: With the advent of the Early FAFSA process for the 2017-2018 academic year, allowing students to begin to complete the FAFSA as early as October 1, 2016, most students will have filed their FAFSA long before the April 1 deadline. However, all of the information below remains accurate because Messiah College has chosen not to change its priority deadline, thus giving students as much time as possible to complete financial aid applications.)
All of our application materials emphasize our April 1st priority deadline. Some documents mention a March 1st recommended filing date, which should allow filers to easily meet the April 1st priority deadline.
This deadline applies to forms of aid for which the recipients are actually chosen by Messiah College. Among others, these include the Messiah College Grant, Federal Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grant, Federal Perkins Loan, Federal Work-Study and Institutional Work programs. The deadline does not apply to forms of aid for which we do not choose the recipients, although these programs might have their own deadlines. Examples are state grant programs, the Federal Pell Grant and the Federal Stafford Loan Program. (You can apply for a Federal Pell Grant or Federal Stafford Loan until close to the end of the academic year.)
This deadline is a receipt deadline; your FAFSA results must be received in our office by April 1st. Therefore, we recommend that you submit your FAFSA by March 1st so that it has time to go through the process and be received in our office by April 1st. If you cannot have your FAFSA completed with accurate information in time to mail or electronically submit it by March 1st, YOU SHOULD SUBMIT AN ESTIMATED APPLICATION AND THEN SUBMIT CORRECTIONS WHEN ACTUAL DATA IS AVAILABLE (Note: Very few students should be in this situation for the 2017-2018 academic year because the use of prior prior year tax data means that all but a few people should have been able to complete their 2015 taxes by the time they file the 2017-2018 FAFSA). We realize that your estimate might not be completely accurate, but it is more important that you meet the deadline. Submitting an estimate is completely acceptable and there is no reason that an estimate cannot be done.
We receive Free Application for Federal Student Aid results electronically from the Federal Central Processor. The date this electronic data is received at Messiah College will be the date which is used to determine whether or not the deadline has been met.