As you prepare for the 2025-26 award year, you may want to implement the new College Financing Plan template.
The Department of Education recently announced the release of the 2025-26 College Financing Plan (CFP), formerly known as the Financial Aid Shopping Sheet, a tool that colleges can use to notify students about their financial aid package. The standardized form will simplify the information prospective students receive about costs and financial aid, allowing them to make comparison and informed decisions.
When the Department first released the CFP in July 2012, they asked schools to voluntarily commit to using it starting with the 2013-14 award year. The Graduate and Professional School CFP was released in 2020 to address the needs of graduate and professional school students.
The annual update to the CFP, which includes the forms, HTML specifications file, a technical guide, and a set of Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs), is located on the CFP webpage.
Questions about the CFP should be directed to collegefinancingplan@ed.gov.
