ED: FSA Conference Registration Open Through January 23
By Hugh T. Ferguson, NASFAA Managing Editor
The Department of Education (ED) has provided more details for its upcoming in-person Federal Student Aid (FSA) training conference, announcing on Wednesday that registration is now open and that attendance will be limited to 2,000 attendees who are invited to register via a lottery system. The lottery system application will remain open until January 23, in order to “ensure fair representation of our partner schools.”
According to the guidance, only one representative will be allowed to attend per institution – as defined by the six-digit OPEID. All sessions will be presented as general sessions, without breakouts or concurrent presentations, with a focus on changes to the Title IV programs resulting from the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA). An agenda will be made available “in the coming weeks,” and attendees will have the opportunity to ask questions during the sessions. Conference sessions will be recorded and made available on the FSA Training Conference website “shortly” after the conference’s conclusion.
Schools will be notified about their selection status on or before January 30, 2026 and will be able to update their designated participant if selected. If selected, instructions to make that change will be provided in a confirmation email.
The conference will be held from March 4-6, 2026. For full details, check out the FSA FAQs and direct any additional questions to [email protected].
Publication Date: 1/15/2026
Nedi G | 1/15/2026 12:12:38 PM
It's been unecessarily virtual only since at least 2022. Most of us were worried it will never go back to an in person event.
This may be the right way to open it and slowly ramp it back up regardless of who is currently in charge considering the institutional knowledge lost due to both RIFs and 5 yrs since it last ran.
So, I actually applaud them for this step as long as they learn from it & scale it in the subsequent years. Can't wait to see their faces and how they react to our in person criticsm.
Emily M | 1/15/2026 12:8:24 PM
So no livestreaming option, but only allowing 2,000 in, and have to wait to view recordings until after conference is complete. Not confident that's going to happen in a timely manner, so we could be mid-way through March before getting these updates that are mere months away from implementation. What a joke :(
David S | 1/15/2026 10:11:21 AM
They might as well have just stuck with doing this conference virtually instead of limiting it to a fraction of the size it used to be. Add to that the fact that most of the staff who used to present sessions and be available for assistance were RIF'd, and that people working at schools with traditional admissions calendars spend the month of March chained to their desks, and that so many schools have slashed travel budgets (in some cases because the White House arbitrarily killed funding without advance notice), and this event may be going from "can't miss" to "why bother?"
David V | 1/15/2026 9:44:35 AM
Are you kidding me? I truly hope schools will rethink their decision regarding attending the event. I have a strong suspicion that the conference might not be as informative as it ought to be, especially considering how late they announced this “registration” and that the event is less than two months away.
Daniel D | 1/15/2026 8:13:27 AM
The employees in FSA are generally great, career public servants...so I can only surmise that this debacle of a conference has to do with the leadership in ED.
You must be logged in to comment on this page.