Dream Team Chronicles
January Edition
INTERN'S CORNER
Monthly reminders to inspire, motivate and encourage you to be successful, happy and healthy!
Freshman Corner
10 Ways To Reduce Stress
01. Listen To Music: Music has mystical powers to change brainwave patterns and to reduce your state of stress fairly quickly. I recommend classical or acoustic related music for the best stress reduction effects.
02. Breathe Deeply And Intentionally: Deep breathing is one of the best ways to change your brainwaves and heart rate. Deep breathing slows your body down, puts you into a state of ease and relaxation and calms the nervous system.
03. Turn Off ALL Electronics: This is tough in our highly technology centric culture but it’s a powerful practice. Cell phones, tablets, computers, televisions and any other electronics can cloud your body and mind creating EMF (electro-magnetic frequencies) which actually create more stress on your body. Turning these off reduces EMF’s as well as gives you peace and quiet which is desperately needed to reduce stress.
04. Play With Your Animal(s): Animals are stress reduction ninjas! Cats and dogs are furry cuddly creatures that make great companions and help to reduce stress. You actually reduce stress just by petting your pet! can you believe that? Specifically petting a cat helps to lower blood pressure and the cat’s pur actually has therapeutic benefits! incredible huh?
05. Dance! Dancing is a creative art form to move your energy and create something and release something else. Dancing (even if it’s slow movement back and forth to your favorite song) is great for so many reasons. It’s exercise, art, and a creative stress reduction therapy.
06. Smile (even if it’s fake): Smiling helps to change your psychology and physiology in a positive way. It tricks your brain into being happier and works throughout your whole body.
07. Go For A Walk: Walk for 10 or 15 minutes, preferably outside but if that doesn’t work for you then inside is fine too. Walking reduces stress hormones and boosts endorphins which are happy brain chemistry.
08. Visualize Something Peaceful: Visualization is a powerful practice to take your mind in it’s current state, completely uplift it and drop it into a new reality. Visualization allows you to go from being in a stressful situation or environment at work, school or home and to be on a beach in Hawaii in a minute flat! Visualization changes your state of stress to a state of ease and bliss. A beach, a Rainforest or something nature oriented seems to work best!
09. Be Grateful: Sometimes we are stressed because simply because we are not grateful. When you have traffic on the freeway, or don’t have that one ingredient to make your recipe the best it can be or didn’t perform at work the way you would have liked you can be very hard on yourself and be your own stress inducer. Being grateful and having an attitude of gratitude is a very valuable practice to feel happier and reduce stress. Being grateful for your first-world luxuries and lifestyle should be an everyday practice. People ALL over the world are struggling to find water, food and shelter and we get stressed here over losing a video game or not having exactly what we want when we want it? Gratitude is a positive practice that will hep you long-term. I recommend thinking of a few things you are grateful for before even stepping out of bed in the morning to start on a good ans positive note.
10. Sit Less And Stand More: A lot of us hold tension in our neck and back from bad posture caused by sitting in an office, in our car or at school all day. We are not made to sit all day! We are much healthier when we stand. I actually spend about half of my day working while standing, right now I am standing while typing this. Standing helps to increase circulation and reduce tension. Tension caused by stress will be held in your neck, back and body by standing more often you can and are stretching to relieve this.
PSAT SCORES
This month the counselors went over PSAT scores with the freshmen! We met with each of the freshmen discoveries and gave them their official scores, created their College Board account, and linked their accounts to Khan Academy. Khan Academy looks at the scores of each student and offers different practices based in the areas that they need to may need improvement. Their login information is saved in their Naviance account so it is not forgotten. All current sophomores and juniors have created a Collegeboard and Khan Academy account. They should not create a second account. Below we have an video about the importance of linking PSAT scores to Khan Academy.
SOPHOMORE CORNER
Sophomore check-ins started this month and will continue until the end of the month. These check-ins are a great way for the counselors to touch base with every sophomore individually and have an honest conversation about how the year is going.
Topics include:
review of grades
social-emotional check-in, including stress level
“career cruising” results review (our Career Day in April is a great way to link their career interests with real life representatives!)
career pathways/classes to help prepare for career goal
goals/things to work on
All counselors enjoyed these brief meetings immensely and are looking forward to getting to know these students even more. We love our sophomores!
JUNIOR CORNER
Understanding Financial Aid
The world of paying for college is an alphabet soup of abbreviations. One of the most important ones for you and your clients to know and understand is the EFC. EFC stands for "Expected Family Contribution." Knowing your client's EFC is critical in making informed buying decisions and finding a college they can afford.
Let's look closer, dispel some EFC myths and talk about how your client can use it in their college search. The federal government uses the Free Application for Federal Student Aid or FAFSA (yes, another acronym!) to determine a family's EFC. This number will determine how much aid they will qualify for.
Federal student assistance can come in the form of:
- Pell Grants
- Subsidized Stafford Loans
- Federal Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grants (FSEOG)
- Perkins Loans (Terminated as of October 1, 2017)
- Federal Work-Study (FWS)
Determining your client's "need"
Your client's financial need is calculated by subtracting their EFC number from the cost of attendance at the college they choose. The difference between the two is their "need."
(In this piece, we're going to focus on the FAFSA calculation of EFC, or what's called the "Federal Methodology." Most colleges use FM; however, some of the most prestigious universities use radically different formulas called the Institutional Methodology and Consensus Methodology. (You can read more about the key differences here.)
The government uses three different worksheets when calculating EFC depending on the student's status. Are they a dependent student? An independent student without dependents other than a spouse? Or an independent student with dependents other than a spouse? For details on how to define "independent," refer to the government's EFC formula worksheet found here.
Let's focus on dependent students – those who receive more than half their support from their parents or guardians.
7 EFC myths debunked
1. My client's EFC will be a number my client can afford to pay towards their child's education.
Probably not. What the formula says your client can pay and what they can actually afford to pay aren't even close most of the time. Your client will probably gasp at the amount the government expects them to contribute to their child's college education every year. (The EFC is an annual amount.)
Families with a combined adjusted gross income of around $150,000 can expect to have an EFC that exceeds $30,000 for the year just from income. This is more than the annual cost of most state schools. So, for dual income mass affluent families it is not uncommon for EFCs to soar to $70,000, $80,000, $90,000 per year, with the largest driver being parental income. (Learn more about helping high income families cut high the cost of college.)
2. Your client's home equity will impact their FAFSA EFC.
No. Your client's home equity is not used in the EFC calculation. Some of the alternate methodologies take a home's value into account, but not the Federal Methodology. This can make a huge difference in a family's EFC from one school to the next if they use the Institutional Method!
3. If your client didn't qualify for aid last year, they won't qualify this year.
Not necessarily. Things like financial aid policies at colleges and your client's own income/asset figures can change year-to-year. It's always best to file the FAFSA every year just in case.
In addition, the EFC is one number for the entire family. If your client's have an EFC of $30,000, that number would be split if they have two students enrolled in college at the same time–roughly $15,000 each! Many families may not qualify when they have one student in school, but very well might when they have overlap. If a family has children that are one academic year apart, it is quite possible at certain institutions that the first year of college would be full price but years two, three and four would cost the family roughly half as much out of pocket – as long as you know how to shop for the right schools.
4. The EFC number equals what my clients will pay for college. Any additional cost exceeding that number will be paid for by the college.
Earlier, we said your client's "need" is the cost of attendance minus their EFC. However, not every college out there can meet your client's need 100%. In fact, most can't. Only a handful (about 60) can guarantee 100% need met for students. Most schools are only able to meet 50 to 60% of a family's demonstrated need, leaving what is affectionately called "unmet need". Understand your client's "net cost" to attend the school they are considering after all financial aid is applied and how they will pay for all four years down to the penny before committing to that school.
5. Saving less money will improve EFC.
Yes and no. Income of the parents and the student has the greatest impact on the EFC number. A parent's assets (cash, savings, investments—other than retirement) are assessed at a rate of 5.64%, and they have an asset protection allowance based on the age of the oldest parent. In comparison, a parent's income can be assessed at a rate up to 47%. Student's income is assessed at 50% and their assets at 20%. In most cases, it's not the assets which will drive up your client's EFC…it's their income.
However, if you can afford to, sometimes using savings to pay down consumer debt is a good idea. You'll look "poorer" on paper with less savings, and colleges don't care about the amount of their outstanding debt. A little better financial footing for families going forward as they approach paying for college and managing their cash flow during the college years is always a good idea.
KEY POINT – So why not just save for college in a cash value life insurance policy? Some would suggest to your clients that they not fund 529 plans and instead put all their money in a cash value life insurance policy. It is true that the cash value of life insurance is not assessable on the FAFSA. It is also true that the money will enjoy many of the same tax benefits of a 529 plan. However, there are a few more things to consider when comparing these savings tools. For dependent students, 529 plans are considered parental assets and are assessed at a maximum of 5.64%. Many states also offer a state income tax deduction to residents for dollars they invest in their home state's 529 plan. One thing that is rarely discussed by an insurance agent is the ongoing cost of insurance and other fees associated with a permanent life insurance policy that frequently far exceed a 5.64% assessment of the asset when filing the FAFSA. You may qualify for additional need-based aid by not having an assessable asset, but as we discussed financial aid is not "guaranteed" by any stretch. Act as a fiduciary and help your clients carefully compare the carrying cost of the insurance and the benefit of sheltering the asset from the financial aid formula versus investing in a low cost 529 college savings plan to reach their college goals.
6. Putting money into accounts in your client's child's name is the best way to save for college.
Nope. Bad idea. Assets in a student's name are assessed at a higher rate (20%) than those in a parent's name (5.64%). Assets in your client's student's name will drive up their EFC.
7. If your client won't qualify for need-based financial aid, knowing their EFC is useless.
Your client might be surprised. Knowing their EFC can be a great tool not only for planning for the future (how much will you be expected to pay) but also for your client's college search.
If your client's EFC is $24,000 and State School A costs $19,000 per year, they will not be eligible for a federal aid award. Your client's EFC is higher, so you'd be expected to foot the whole bill. However, say Private School B costs $52,000 per year and will meet 100% of your client's need. Suddenly your client may be receiving potential financial aid in the amount of $28,000—something to consider as they start your college search.
How do you know what your client's EFC will be?
A simple way to figure out your client's EFC is to take advantage of an online calculator like this one.
Don't wait to calculate your client's EFC. Figuring out the number in middle school is a good idea—way before your client's college search begins. Does your client need to be saving more in a 529 than they expected? Should they be saving less in 529? Do they need to get some assistance to create a plan to minimize their student's future student loan debt? Early is better than later in this case!
SENIOR CORNER
80% of students have applied to College. If your child has not made any post high school plans with their counselor, please encourage them to make an appointment to do so. Many students have already received acceptance letters. Students should bring their acceptance letters to the school counseling department. We will make copies of the letters. Additionally, it is a very nice gesture when students write thank you letters to those individuals who wrote letters of recommendation for them.
2017-2018 Counselor Breakout
Mrs. Taryn Villano-Corso
Seniors A-E 2018
Juniors A-D 2019
Sophomores A-D 2020
Freshman A-D 2021
Mrs. Alyssa Giedra
Seniors F-Ma 2018
Juniors E-L 2019
Sophomores E-L 2020
Freshman E-L 2021
Mrs. Kelley Brochu/ Mrs. Vesneski (Long Term Sub)
Seniors Mc-S 2018
Juniors M-R 2019
Sophomores M-Sa 2020
Freshman M-Sm 2021
Ms. Aisha Mobley
Seniors T-Z 2018
Juniors S-Z 2019
Sophomores Sc-Z 2020
Freshman So-Z 2021
WOLCOTT HIGH SCHOOL COUNSELING DEPARTMENT
Email: amobley@wolcottps.org
Website: www.wolcottps.org
Location: Wolcott High School, Bound Line Road, Wolcott, CT, United States
Phone: 203-879-8157
Twitter: @dreamteamwhs