Help!! I’m an incoming freshman for 2026/2027 and I’m in a situation with Financial Aid. I’m a first-gen student coming from a very low income household and I made sure to submit my FAFSA (-1408 SAI) back in October and had it processed to hit the Jan 15th priority deadline for the Cougar Promise as well as other grants. Because of their clerical error, my FAFSA didn't "match" or show up as received in their portal until April, even though the government has it timestamped from October.
However, after checking my financial aid package a few weeks back as of today it said I was getting 0$. I called and they said the SSN on file was off by one digit. Today I checked my updated financial aid package and there was no cougar promise (deadline on Jan 15). All I got was the pell grant and no Cougar promise. Could they be offering each one by one or is this the complete package I will be getting. This feels unfair because I did my part months in advance and the delay was caused by a mistake on the school's end. Without Cougar Promise, I’m not going to afford this as over 50k in debt is far too much.
For reference a sibling of mine with stats a bit better than mine got payed to attend school while I'm having to pay 50k. Has anyone successfully appealed a "Priority Deadline" miss due to a school error? Who should I be talking to besides the front-desk people at the Welcome Center? Any specific tips on who to email or what documents to bring would be life-saving. Thanks in advance for any help.