We started Meadow because of a belief that higher education is a key to economic mobility and that everyone should have access to it.

We knew that we could reduce barriers to entry if we increased transparency about cost.  And we knew that the first partners we needed in our journey were fierce and fearless financial aid leaders.

And today, we celebrate all of you.

Working in financial aid is tough.  The list of things you need to do, every day and all at once is seemingly endless and includes things like:

• Maintaining compliance with federal, state, and institutional regulations.
• Processing FAFSA applications and verifying required documentation for aid eligibility.
• Counseling students and families on financial aid options, eligibility, and payment plans.
• Designing your financial aid plans and packages, creating a plan to maximize the aid for students within an often constrained budget
• Awarding scholarships and grants, ensuring funds are distributed accurately and on time.
• Managing loan disbursements, including federal, state, and private loan programs.
• Conducting financial literacy workshops to help students understand budgeting and managing debt.
• Reviewing special circumstances and handling appeals for financial aid adjustments.
• Coordinating with other departments like admissions, bursar, and student accounts to align financial aid with enrollment.
• Managing work-study programs, including tracking student hours and payments.
• Staying up to date on financial aid policies and attending regular training sessions.

And perhaps one of the biggest: keeping your sanity and composure even when the news from ED feels like it gets worse every day.

And yet we see you do it.  We watch you adapt when you need to; come up with a plan, revise it, and come up with another one.  We listen to you as you wrestle with what is best for students and families, consider the needs of your teams, talk about how to communicate it all.  We hear you constantly thinking of others; and only as an after-thought thinking of yourselves.  We know you make hard choices and brave decisions.  We know you sometimes smile on the outside while raging on the inside and at other times take deep breaths and keep calm and carry on.

We thought a lot about how to do this right.  What could I say in a blog post to capture it all? And every idea fell short.

So here are some of our team members, sharing what financial aid did for them.  The best way we know to say thank you for your hard work is to show you the impact it has on others.

‍

From all of us here at Meadow, thank you and happy Financial Aid Day!

‍