WASHINGTON – The financially neediest students are the least likely to apply for financial aid, according to a new study titled “The Financial Aid Challenge” by the College Board’s Advocacy and Policy Center. 

Less than 60 percent of eligible community college students completed the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) compared with 77 percent of eligible students at four-year schools in the 2007-08 academic period. During that time, full-time enrollment at two-year schools increased 24 percent nationwide. 

“The [report] highlights the startling fact that millions of dollars are left on the table each year by eligible students who just aren’t applying,” said College Board President Gaston Caperton, who added that the report is part of a series on community colleges the organization plans to release. Caperton, College Board officials, and community college experts announced the report’s release in downtown Washington on Wednesday. 

Two-year schools educate more than half of all students in higher education—primarily low-income, first-generation and minority students who often lack basic financial literacy, said Dr. George Boggs, president and CEO of the American Association of Community Colleges. 

“To see so many students who could be qualifying and are not shows a breakdown in the student aid system,” said Boggs, who also applauded the federal government’s move last year to simplify the FAFSA form and process. 

But simplification needs to happen at the institutional level as well, said Marc Herzog, chancellor of Connecticut Community Colleges. Most two-year students and their parents are mystified by the financial jargon and without clear information about their options they often remain clueless.