After Accusations of Misleading Aid Applicants, Harvard Clarifies Online Instructions

Harvard’s Office of Admissions and Financial Aid recently made changes to its aid instructions a week after being listed among 110 colleges that may have been misleading financial aid applicants, according to the Democratic staff of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.

The Committee’s investigation indicated that Harvard’s financial aid instructions informed applicants to fill out the FAFSA and CSS/Financial Aid PROFILE “without any explanation of use or purpose.”

In a letter to U.S. Secretary of Education Arne S. Duncan ’86,  Maryland Congressman Elijah E. Cummings—the ranking Democrat on the committee—wrote that students may be paying to send the PROFILE form to colleges when they only wish to apply for federal financial aid. In such circumstances, students would only need to fill out the free FAFSA and not the PROFILE. Leading students to believe otherwise, Cummings added, could be in violation of the Higher Education Act.

Recent changes to the instructions on Harvard’s financial aid site, though, now indicate the specific purpose for the CSS and FAFSA forms.

Bolded headers in the PDF instructions on the site now explain that the FAFSA “determines eligibility for federal aid” and the PROFILE  “determines eligibility for Harvard aid.”

Several other universities, such as Yale and the University of Pennsylvania, have also decided to change their financial aid instructions in the wake of Cumming’s investigation and letter to Duncan.

In an email, Cummings wrote that he was glad to see schools taking action.

“I have been very pleased with the quick responses of many schools that are correcting their instructions on their own without waiting for formal action by the [Education] Department,” Cummings wrote.

He added that he thinks that, since he released his letter, Harvard has made its aid instructions more precise.

“It appears that Harvard has made changes to its website to more clearly communicate the uses of the financial aid forms its requests of applicants,” Cummings wrote.

As more institutions make efforts to ensure their financial aid instructions are clear, Cummings said that he plans to be in contact with schools to follow up on the changes they are making.

“We will be monitoring the actions of all institutions identified in my letter, and we intend to follow-up directly with many of these schools and the Department of Education to determine next steps,” Cummings wrote.

When asked about the changes made to Harvard's financial aid instructions, Faculty of Arts and Sciences spokesperson Jeff Neal emphasized that the University is striving to make sure all aid information is accurate and clear.

“We continuously review the information we provide to applicants and students—both online and in many daily interactions with financial aid officers—and will continue working to ensure that our students have the clear guidance they need to access the federal and Harvard-funded aid to which they are entitled,” Neal wrote in an email.

—Staff writer Theodore R. Delwiche can be reached at theodore.delwiche@thecrimson.com.