Text message-based financial aid nudges
Program overview
- Provide students with reminders to fill out the annual FAFSA, as well information on FAFSA requirements, important deadlines, and assistance with filling out the FAFSA
- Strategies
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College access and readiness supports
- Target Population
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Students enrolled in post-secondary education
- Cost per Participant
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$5 per student
Evidence and impacts
Text message-based financial aid nudges is not yet in any of the major clearinghouses, but has demonstrated positive results in an independent, high-quality evaluation conducted by ____
- Indeterminate effect on credit accumulation
Best practices in implementation
- Partner with organizations that are already providing services and support to students in the target population, such as schools and community-based organizations; nudges can then be incorporated into existing support services.
- Deploy text messages regularly (between 17-20 texts throughout the program), with countdowns to deadlines, reminders, and links to resources over the course of the 5-month program. Be sure students and their families have enough time to act on any outreach and that early messages focus on trust-building.
- Give the counselors responsible for sending the text messages flexibility in how and what they communicate – basic reminders, offering to answer questions, and sharing resources can all be successful, but depend on the recipient.
- Wherever possible, choose counselors (the one sending the text message) with whom the student may already have a trusted relationship or recognize their name and number. This may help reduce student opt out rates and boost engagement.
- Identify available data sources allowing senders to customize outreach to students, such as where each student is in the financial aid following process.