Congratulations! You just got accepted to college. The next notification you’ll receive: a financial aid offer, telling you what it will cost. 

But experts say those financial aid letters are notoriously indecipherable and often misleading, making it difficult to determine college cost comparisons or even know how much you’ll owe. This episode of College Uncovered peels back the curtain on financial aid offers and provides advice on what students and parents can do to get the best deal.

The University of Michigan at Ann Arbor is proposing a new “disruptive activity policy” that prohibits people from interrupting campus events, activities, and other university operations. Once finalized, it’ll be one of the first policy updates at a public college in response to protests over the Israel-Hamas war.

The proposal reflects that Michigan leaders are taking a more stringent approach to handling a recent uptick in campus activism, a trend that’s playing out nationwide. Students, meanwhile, say the policy infringes on their free speech.

The rocky rollout of a new Free Application for Federal Student Aid has already forced almost a quarter of the nation’s states to bump back their local scholarship application deadlines. Now, U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona is urging them to move that goal post once again. 

Many local officials say they’ll do what’s right for students, but they also note that pushing the deadline back too far could have its own unintended consequences.