CENTRE —  Administrators at the Centre campus of Gadsden State will offer free student financial planning workshops to all prospective college students.

The Gadsden State Cherokee financial aid department will hold one workshop Tuesday, Feb. 26 at 6 p.m. The second free workshop will Feb. 28 at 10 a.m. Both will be held in room 130.

Administrators will be on-hand to inform all participants about the student financial aid process and assist individuals in filing out their Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FARSA) applications.

The workshops, made possible through the federally-funded Opening Doors College Access Grant, are being conducted with assistance from the financial aid department at the Gadsden campus, according to Chad Steed, coordinator for Academic and Student Support Services at Gadsden State Cherokee.

“This is our fifth year to do an event here at Gadsden State Cherokee and it's for graduating high school seniors and their parents to get more information about federal aid, scholarships, grants and loans,” Steed said. “We do this to help them navigate the various avenues for funding college.”

Steed said students do not have to be considering attending Gadsden State to attend either of the workshops.

“All federal aid is the same, across the board,” Steed said. “Basically, the students will be able to get some basic information about how to apply and what they will need to be able to present in case they need to provide more information for tax purposes.”

Steed said the workshops are simply a community service of the campus. Financial aid planners from Gadsden State will be at both meetings.

“They will be here to talk about changes that have occurred in the financial aid process and how to apply for FARSA,” Steed said. “They will also talk about scholarships and other ways to apply for college.”

Steed mentioned work study opportunities and private loans as other possible outlets for college funding for students who do not qualify for assistance.

“For those students they will be able to tell them if the loan is a good one and also talk to them about interest rates,” he said. “They'll talk for 30 minutes or so and then answer questions.”

Steed said if individuals bring their filed tax returns someone will be able to help them apply for financial assistance on-site after the workshops. And Steed said the workshops are not just for teenagers and young adults.

“We are targeting our graduating high school seniors because they are traditional college students, but more and more we are seeing, especially at this campus, almost a fifty-fifty split of traditional and non-traditional students,” Steed said. “We're seeing a big shift of adult learners coming back to school so we invite anyone with questions to come.”