Verification is a federally mandated process that requires selected students to further attest that the information reported on their Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) is accurate and complete. In this brief, we estimate institutional costs of administrating the FAFSA verification mandate and consider variation in costs by institution type and sector. Using data from 2014, we estimate that compliance costs to institutions in that year totaled nearly US$500 million with the burden falling disproportionately on public institutions and community colleges, in particular. Specifically, we estimate that 22% of an average community college’s financial aid office operating budget is devoted to verification procedures, compared with 15% at public 4-year institutions. Our analysis is timely, given that rates of FAFSA verification have increased in recent years.

验证是联邦政府下达的程序，要求选定的学生进一步证明其免费联邦学生资助申请（FAFSA）中报告的信息准确且完整。在本简介中，我们估算了执行FAFSA验证任务的机构成本，并考虑了机构类型和部门的成本差异。根据2014年的数据，我们估计当年机构的合规成本总计近5亿美元，尤其是公共机构和社区大学的负担成比例下降。具体来说，我们估计社区大学的平均财政援助办公室运营预算的22％用于验证程序，而公立4年制机构则为15％。我们的分析是及时的，