What is PHENOM’s Financial Aid Reform Bill? And more specifically, what will it do to make students’ lives easier? The Financial Aid Reform Bill (“An Act to Modernize Financial Aid Access”) proposes creating a streamlined, comprehensive statewide financial aid system for students to access, apply to, and stay in the loop about financial aid. This legislation rests on three pillars of improvement: accessibility, accountability, and advertisement. 

In order to maximize accessibility, this bill outlines a streamlined, easy-to-use digital application process. This would include a comprehensive website that has a user-friendly interface; eligibility calculators so students figure out what programs they should apply to; a 24/7 live chat and help desk; maximum page-load times; minimal documentation requirements; mobile device compatibility; clear instructions in multiple languages; and regular feedback surveys and user experience testing. 

The website would also provide information about the appeals process. This is where accountability comes into the picture: through its proposed appeals process, this bill would create a streamlined, reliable appeals process to ensure students get the money they need to get a fulfilling yet affordable education. 

As part of the appeals process, this bill would guarantee students’ right to judicial review; allow students to recover the full amount lost to financial aid; and reimburse students for educational planning disruption, undue stress and hardship, attorney’s fees and court costs (if applicable). 

To ensure the appeals system actually works for students, this bill would also establish a Financial Aid Access Commission to monitor the quality of the appeals process and recommend changes every year.

What’s more, to ensure this Commission can fix the system if it fails students, the Commission will be required to conduct a comprehensive review of the appeals process if over 25 percent of rejected applications result in appeals. 

Especially since students not getting aid in time has been one of the greatest failures of financial aid in Massachusetts, this system would make timeliness non-negotiable. With an expedited appeals process, students would be guaranteed a response within 10 days, a final decision within 30 days, an emergency review process, and clear, written explanations of decisions. 

Finally, through investments in financial aid training for guidance counselors and advertising campaigns, we can ensure students not only hear about these programs but also have the support they need to complete the application process. 

These measures are particularly important since an embarrassingly big reason so much financial aid money went unused is students simply did not hear about it. By funding training for guidance counselors as well as advertising the entire financial aid system through media campaigns, more students can actually put the money to use.

             Context

So why is such comprehensive financial aid reform necessary? Because year after year, the people of Massachusetts have had to put up with a financial aid system that fails to give students the help they need.

There have been increasing reports of the failure of Massachusetts scholarships and financial aid to actually get to the students they’re meant for. For one thing, the sheer number of different financial aid and scholarships makes it unnecessarily confusing for students.

What’s more, not only do these programs such as MassGrant not award students funds in time; they also do not advertise themselves well enough. As a result, countless students who could benefit don’t even know they exist. 

Upon its creation in 2023, MassReconnect (free community college for adults over 25) benefitted more students than expected because it was paired with funding for promotion.

On the other hand, MassGrant PLUS, a major investment in financial aid, did not reach enough students because of the lack of advertising. (Fast forward to 2025 and MassReconnect has become redundant with the passage of universal free community college, yet legislators have not merged them to simplify things.)

An ad for MassReconnect (Bristol Community College/ Youtube). 

The creation of a singular, streamlined website with eligibility calculators and live assistance would reduce much of the confusion about the differences between MassGrant and MassGrant PLUS, for instance. In addition, students could compare possible aid from these programs with free community college to see which is the best choice for them, as the Boston Globe notes. 

This would help address the larger problem that is the dizzying number of financial aid programs in Massachusetts. As the Globe further notes, a 2017 study found that, out of the 31 financial aid programs in Massachusetts, several only served 100 students. 

Another roadblock in the success of these financial aid programs is the simple lack of guidance counselors in highschools across the Commonwealth. Our bill does not address the separate issue of insufficient high school resources; however, what it does do is allot funding to train guidance counselors to use the streamlined programs it would create. 

Finally, as a report by UAspire outlines, these programs simply do not provide enough aid for low-income families to afford college: specifically, even after grants were factored in, 53 percent of financial aid from four-year public colleges included an estimated bill before loans of $10,000 or more. 

This is a reflection of how much tuition has risen while Massachusetts has given up on investing in students: according to this same report, in 1988, MassGrant covered 80 percent of tuition and fees, but as of 2021 it only provided for 14 percent with a paltry maximum award of $1,800.41.

Moreover, as of 2021 Massachusetts ranked 14th in the amount of debt graduates had. While helpful, financial aid is only part of the solution when the powers that be have ratcheted up costs for students year after year, decade after decade.

From 2001 to 2021, Massachusetts reduced spending per student by $2000. Compared to the U.S. average of spending $5.60 per $1000 in GDP per student, Massachusetts only spends $3.30 despite also being the third-wealthiest state in the nation. When considering Massachusetts is now the wealthiest state in the nation — and considering how much more aid other wealthy states such as Washington State offer — it becomes obvious that it did not have to be this way.

Nonetheless, Massachusetts has been making impressive gains as it has increased financial aid investments in the past decade, which we can thank for free community college and a tuition-free UMass system for Pell-eligible students come this Fall. But for these programs to serve as many students as possible, we must focus on working smarter, not just harder. 

This is where our Financial Aid Reform Bill comes into the picture! Through a streamlined, singular website, a comprehensive, straightforward appeals process; and funding to train guidance counselors and advertise these programs to students across the Commonwealth, we can ensure that as many students as possible can get the college education that works best for them without being distracted by exorbitant tuition. 

While winning tuition-free college and eliminating the need for financial aid is the ultimate goal of our movement, in the meantime we must work with what we have and help students as much as we can. With the passage of this legislation, we will come ever closer to a society that values a college education as a fundamental right rather than as a money machine.