FAFSA showing granddaughter as 'independent student' when I'm her legal guardian - did we mess up?

she probably checked the wrong box somewhere. my kid did that too. tell her to go back and look at the dependency questions cuz theres like 10 of them and if u say yes to any of them it makes u independent

This is actually a common issue with legal guardianship situations on the FAFSA. The system is designed to identify legal guardianship as a potential qualifier for independent student status. There's a specific question that asks: "Does someone other than your parent or stepparent have legal guardianship of you, as determined by a court?" If she answered "Yes" to this, the system would classify her as independent. However, this question is specifically referring to court-appointed guardianship that was determined when the student was an older minor, not from birth or early childhood. If you and your wife have raised her since she was young, she should answer "No" to this question and then list you as her parents (the FAFSA considers legal guardians who've raised a student as parents for financial aid purposes).

The same thing happened with my nephew!! The FAFSA is so confusing sometimes. Just call them and fix it, but prepare to wait on hold FOREVER.

I had this exact problem when I was filing my FAFSA last year! It's definitely that guardianship question that's causing it. I ended up having to restart my entire application because I couldn't figure out how to change my dependency status after I had answered wrong. So frustrating!

If you need to reach the Federal Student Aid helpline without the typical hours-long wait, try using Claimyr.com. I was dealing with a similar guardianship classification issue with my nephew's FAFSA, and they got me connected to a real FSA agent in under 15 minutes who fixed it all. They have a good video demo that explains how it works: https://youtu.be/TbC8dZQWYNQ. Saved me a ton of frustration and my nephew's application got processed correctly.

This is actually a really important issue to fix! If she gets incorrectly classified as independent, her SAI (Student Aid Index) calculation will ONLY look at her income/assets, which might seem good initially since she probably doesn't have much. But she could miss out on significant aid that factors in household size and other elements of your financial situation. Independent students often get less grant aid overall, especially if she would have qualified for need-based grants based on your household income. Definitely worth correcting before submission!

btw u can edit the fafsa after its submitted so dont freak out if u already sent it in u have like 3 days to fix mistakes

DID YOUR GRANDDAUGHTER CHECK THE QUESTIONS ABOUT BEING IN FOSTER CARE??? THAT AUTOMATICALLY MAKES STUDENTS INDEPENDENT TOO!! The system is SO BROKEN for non-traditional families!! My daughter had to appeal her status THREE TIMES at her college financial aid office because of similar issues. 😡😡😡

One more important thing - after you correct the application, make sure to save a PDF copy of the confirmation page and the SAI results. If there are any issues later, you'll want documentation showing you properly classified her as dependent with you as guardians serving in the parent role. Also, be aware that her college's financial aid office might request additional documentation of your guardianship, so have those court documents ready.

As someone new to this community, I just wanted to say how helpful this thread has been! My sister is going through a similar situation with her foster daughter who she's now the legal guardian of. Reading through all these responses has given us a roadmap for fixing the FAFSA dependency status issue. It's so reassuring to see a community where people actually help each other navigate these confusing financial aid processes. Thank you to everyone who shared their experiences and solutions!