As if applying to college isn’t difficult enough, navigating through financial aid can be a journey of its own.

Valerie Strauss of the Washington Post reports:

Five flaws with college financial aid letters

College acceptances — and rejections — are now out and millions of students are trying to figure out how they are going to afford to go to college. Complicating that effort are financial aid letters sent from colleges, which can be so confusing as to be indecipherable. For help making sense of these important letters is Mark Kantrowitz, senior vice president and publisher of Edvisors.com, a web site about planning and paying for college. He is also co-author of the bestselling book, “Filing the FAFSA,” which is available for free download at www.edvisors.com/fafsa-book.

By Mark Kantrowitz

It is the season of crushed college dreams. Even when your high school senior is admitted to a top college, you may have to tell him or her that you cannot afford to pay for it. Your student got in — Yay! — but the college is denying him or her the financial aid needed to afford to enroll without graduating with an unreasonable amount of student and/or parent loan debt.

But, first, you and your child will have to decipher the financial aid award letters. For students who apply for financial aid and are determined to be eligible, the financial aid award letters arrive in late March or early April, at about the same time as college admissions decisions. Some colleges have well-designed financial aid award letters, but many award letters are incredibly confusing and, perhaps, deliberately arcane and obtuse.