Students urged to apply for FAFSA before priority date

MARQUETTE — Current and future college students hoping to get financial aid in the fall should keep one upcoming date in mind for submitting their applications. March 1st is the priority date for filing FAFSA applications, the Financial Aid office on Northern Michigan University’s campus offers help to anyone throughout the process.

“It’s more of a priority date, but they can apply later” said Christine Larson, the Associate Director of Financial Aid at NMU. “Some programs will run out of funding, or have other priority dates. So March 1st is when we recommend so we can help them get the maximum amount possible.”

While that date isn’t a hard deadline, filing the applications before that date will help ensure that students are able to receive the maximum amount of funding available for financial aid. And some places might charge you during the filing process, but at NMU that is never an issue.

“There’s plenty of free help out there,” said Larson. “So if a student has questions, regardless of whether they’re coming to northern, they can make an appointment to stop by or call us if they have brief questions. Or they can stop by with their information and we can help them file it. So there’s plenty of free help available, so we do recommend students avoid paying for help.”

For links to the online FAFSA application, click here.