Aug. 11 -- Most students applying for financial aid for college can expect to experience delays again this year with the federal student aid process, the Department of Education announced.

Federal education officials said the department will start testing the 2025-2026 Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) in October starting with "hundreds and expanding to tens of thousands" of applicants by December.

The process is expected to allow the department to test and resolve issues before making the form available to all students.

The changes are meant to prevent the same problems experienced by many last year before they occur, U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona said in a statement.

"Following a challenging 2024-25 FAFSA cycle, the department listened carefully to the input of students, families, and higher education institutions, made substantial changes to leadership and operations at Federal Student Aid, and is taking a new approach this year that will significantly improve the FAFSA experience," Cardona said.

"I look forward to continuing to work with our partners to ensure this school year's FAFSA implementation better serves our nation's students."

The announcement comes after a group of five higher education organizations sent a letter to federal officials requesting the department push back the FAFSA release to Dec. 1.

"We are wrestling with the trade-off between timeliness and functionality," the five associations wrote in a July 23 letter to the department, "and have concluded that the consequences of releasing a product that does not come with full end-to-end functionality for students, families, state agencies, and aid administrators would be too great."

In a call with reporters Aug. 7, Cardona said his department was considering such feedback when planning the rollout.

"Our stakeholders were crystal clear: They overwhelmingly preferred the department have a December 1 launch date of a FAFSA form they can have full confidence in," Cardona said. "They want to know that when students submit their applications, their forms will be processed quickly and that their data will be accurately sent to schools within days."

The department plans to solicit "volunteers" to participate in the testing, which begins Oct. 1.

"We've heard from students, families, higher education professionals and other stakeholders loud and clear: They want a better, simpler FAFSA process, and they want to know when they can reliably expect it," said FAFSA Executive Advisor Jeremy Singer. "In close collaboration with partners, FSA is confident we will deliver not only a better product, but also a smoother process than last year. One that makes higher education more accessible and within reach for more Americans."

FASFA, which students must submit to be eligible to be considered for federal grants and loans, had typically been released Oct. 1 for the next school year, but last year's rollout was delayed to December after changes were made to the application process.

According to NPR, student data wasn't processed with colleges and universities until March, and financial aid offers were delayed until April.

The result was a 10% drop in the number of students completing last year's application compared to the previous year.

Feedback from this year's staggered rollout will be used to identify and address system problems.

The students and institutions included in the early tests have not been released but are expected to be revealed in the coming weeks.