FAFSA changes trip up colleges, students
Tomo Chien
February 12, 2024
Good morning. It’s Monday, and I’m heartbroken. Onto the five USC, Los Angeles and California stories you need to know for today.
Also: Shoutout to my colleague Riley Cooke who got a feature in the San Francisco Chronicle for her ace reporting on an active shooter at UC Berkeley. Riley writes our Morning, Cal newsletter.
1.
At first, it sounded great: The Free Application for Federal Student Aid — the notoriously convoluted form commonly referred to as the FAFSA — would be shorter, easier to complete and would ensure that more students could access the financial aid they need. But when the new form debuted this admissions cycle, things got worse. Technical glitches locked families out. Those that did manage to submit the form may receive incorrect aid estimates. And in late January, the FAFSA had seen fewer than half of the 1.5 million applications it saw at the same time last year. “Do you have a lost class because of this?” said a college financial aid director.
2.
The couple who inadvertently sparked the 2020 El Dorado fire in San Bernardino County by setting off a pyrotechnic smoke machine during their gender reveal party was ordered to pay $1,789,972 in victims’ restitution, and the husband will serve a year in county jail. The fire burned 22,000 acres, killed one wildland firefighter, injured 15 people, destroyed five homes and forced hundreds to evacuate. “Resolving the case was never going to be a win,” said the San Bernardino County district attorney.
3.
A helicopter crash near the California-Nevada border left six people dead, including the prominent CEO of one of Nigeria’s leading banks. The helicopter was bound for Boulder City, Nevada after departing Palm Springs, and witnesses said they saw the chopper crash in rainy and wintry conditions. Herbert Wigwe, the banker, led Access Bank PLC and was described as a “visionary leader” whose “impact will forever be felt.” Federal aviation officials are investigating the cause of the crash.
4.
Seven million Californians live in flood-prone areas, but only 1 in 4 homes in those regions are covered by flood insurance — leaving thousands to repair the damage from last week’s devastating storm out of pocket. Blame lax enforcement and homeowner apathy. Flood coverage is mandatory for anybody who obtains a federally-backed mortgage for a property in a flood zone, but regulators and lenders don’t do a very good job of policing the policy. And, ultimately, it can be hard to get people to care. “People wear out hearing they’re going to die from earthquakes, fires and floods, and they get numb,” one expert said.
5.
An LA County principal was put on administrative leave after pretending to shoot people with finger guns and telling one student “boom, you’re dead” during an active shooter drill. Washington Elementary principal Nina Denson then allegedly took to the intercom to share that seven students were dead. “Oh he was really upset,” one parent said of her first-grader. “The one shocking, surprising thing he said as a 6-year-old was, ‘I’m just really glad none of my friends died.’” The school district said the drill was not in line with its protocol.