Thanks everyone for the clarification! The FAFSA really needs to add better explanations for all these columns and numbers. I found my actual SAI in the confirmation email from Federal Student Aid - it's a single number that will be shared with all my schools. The column numbers were just the order I entered schools, which doesn't affect anything. Such a relief!

Great to hear you found your SAI! You're absolutely right that the FAFSA interface could be way clearer about what all these numbers mean. For anyone else reading this thread - your SAI (Student Aid Index) is the key number that matters for federal aid eligibility. Lower SAI = more potential aid. The college list order numbers are just cosmetic and have zero impact on your financial aid packages. Each school will use your SAI plus their own institutional aid policies to create your offer. Good luck with your applications!

btw i got stuck on the signature page like 4 times and had to restart, what finally worked was creating a whole new fsa id and starting over, super annoying but it worked

Wow, thank you all SO much for these incredibly helpful tips! As someone who's been dreading this process, you've given me so much more confidence going into it this weekend. I'm definitely going to: - Use Firefox or Safari instead of Chrome - Do it late night/early morning (2-5am sounds perfect for my schedule) - Break it into multiple sessions like Avery suggested - Take screenshots of every completed page - Have all my documents organized beforehand - Use incognito mode if I run into issues The tip about not using the back button is huge - I would have definitely done that and probably lost everything! And knowing that the SAI calculation is different from EFC helps set expectations. One follow-up question for everyone: For those of you with complicated family situations (like separated parents), did you run into any specific issues in the contributor section that I should be prepared for? My parents are separated but not divorced, so I'm not sure how that will affect the application process. You've all been amazing - this community is exactly what first-gen students like me need! 🙏

its working for me now! just got in and finished my app. try again maybe????

So glad to hear you got in and everything is working now! I had a similar issue last month where the site was down for maintenance and I was panicking about deadlines. For anyone else still having trouble, I've found that the FAFSA site tends to work better early in the morning (like 6-8am) when there's less traffic. Also, if you're still getting errors, try switching from WiFi to mobile data or vice versa - sometimes it's a network routing issue. The key is not to panic about deadlines when it's clearly a system-wide problem. Financial aid offices are usually very understanding about these technical issues since they affect so many students at once.

UPDATE: We got it fixed! After trying everything suggested here, what finally worked was having my son login, remove me as a contributor, wait 24 hours, then add me again. But the key was entering my email in ALL LOWERCASE - even though my FSA ID email has capitals. The form showed up in my account this morning! Now working through it and hoping for no more glitches. Thank you everyone for your help and commiseration! And special thanks to those who suggested not starting over - that saved us from making things worse.

So glad to see you got it resolved @PaulineW! I'm dealing with this exact same issue right now - my daughter sent me the contributor invitation over a week ago and nothing shows up in my dashboard. I've been stressed about the deadlines too. Going to try your solution tonight with the all lowercase email and removing/re-adding as contributor. Really appreciate everyone sharing their experiences here - it's frustrating that we have to troubleshoot a government system ourselves, but at least we're helping each other! Will update if this works for us too.

Thanks everyone for the advice! I think I'll accept the full subsidized amount ($3,500) but try to reduce the unsubsidized portion to $3,000 instead of $4,000. I found a weekend job that should help cover the difference. And I'll try to put aside at least $50/month to pay the interest on the unsubsidized loan while I'm in school. Really appreciate all the insights!

Great plan Ali! Just wanted to add one more tip - when you make those $50/month interest payments on your unsubsidized loan, make sure to specify that the payment should go toward INTEREST ONLY, not principal. Sometimes loan servicers will apply payments to principal first, which won't prevent the interest capitalization you're trying to avoid. You can usually do this online or by calling your loan servicer. Also, keep records of all your interest payments - it makes things easier when you graduate and transition to regular repayment. Good luck with the weekend job!