UHEAA is a Utah state government agency and part of the Utah System of Higher Education (USHE). It acts under authority delegated by the Utah State Board of Regents and is governed by a 13-member Board of Directors and Utah’s Commissioner of Higher Education.
Since 1976, UHEAA’s focus has been to help Utah students and their families plan, prepare, and pay for college. In order to accomplish this goal, we utilize USHE’s StepUp to Higher Education initiative to offer a variety of community outreach programs across Utah. We strive to create a better quality of life for Utahans by removing financial barriers to higher education.
We guide families through the financing of higher education. We teach students to save for education, pursue scholarships and grants, and borrow wisely.
The Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) not only gives students access to hundreds of billions of dollars in federal grants, student loans, and work-study funds, but many states, schools, and private scholarships require students to submit the FAFSA in order to qualify for any financial aid they offer.
Under President Obama’s FAFSA Completion Initiative, state governments can provide schools, LEAs, and other designated entities with limited, yet valuable information on individual student progress in completing the FAFSA (“secure data”). Additionally, the Office of Federal Student Aid offers aggregate FAFSA completion data for more than 25,000 U.S. high schools. These new resources can help increase FAFSA completion rates and, by extension, promote college access and success.