A few years back when I first started in the college financial aid field I went to my first staff meeting. As the new kid on the block, I stayed quiet and soaked it all in. By the end of the meeting I was convinced that I had made the biggest mistake of my life. How was it possible, I wondered, that even though the entire staff was speaking English, I didn't understand a word of what they were saying. Within an hour, I had turned from optimistic newcomer to defeated flunky. I skulked back to my desk and checked the job postings.

Six years later, I have a better chair and a new flat screen monitor, but I'm still in the financial aid field - my life revolves around FAFSA forms, student loans, college scholarships, and student grants. Sometimes hours go by without feeling as though I'm completely over my head in federal speak, new regulations, and ever changing policies. On a good day I even leave work knowing I helped someone accomplish something. I am a college financial aid counselor. It's part of my professional identity; part of who I am. My colleagues and I exist in a professional borderland where institutional rules and policies co-exist with state and federal financial aid regulations. To be successful in this job means being comfortable with change, having an ability to make complicated material clear to students and parents, communicating confusing policies concisely, and loving eating at your desk.

To students, we can be their heroes or the bane of their collegiate experience.

A lot depends on how well informed the student is on the financial aid process and how well the financial aid officers at your institution counsel their students before potential problems arise. As a counselor, I spend a lot of time dispelling rumors and misinformation that students pick up here and there from well intentioned but unreliable sources. For example, I know I'm in trouble when a student beings a sentence with "At my sister's college...' or "At my other school..." It's not that what follows is necessarily wrong, but that it simply doesn't apply in your situation or at this school.

Herein lies the gist of the Student Financial Aid Rule #1: Be prepared to know nothing. Let's face it, you're a rank amateur at this, right? Why else would you be reading this? Just like me at my first days in this business, you probably have a pit in your stomach as if you're going to be tested on this in the morning. The good thing is that there is no test. And whatever mistakes you may have made can be corrected. The best advice as you embark on the search for funds for your higher education, is to rely on the experts who have done the leg work already and can guide you through the rough patches and the nuances of your own personal situation. You deserve to reap the benefit of someone else's hard work for two reasons. First, because the next few years of your life will be better spent focusing on your educational goals rather than stressing about financial matters. And second, it is quite possible that your education will be the most costly investment you'll ever make in yourself. You should be able to look back on the subsequent years and feel this was money well spent.
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