MSNBC has this report: Devising a battle plan for college financial aid.

This article explains what to do when the college financial aid letter arrives this spring, and you aren’t certain how you will make the numbers work:

Double-check your aid application, looking for any errors that might have made your finances seem stronger than they are. Then list anything that has changed since the application was filed two or three months ago. Has the family’s income dropped due to a lost job or a reduction in working hours or shrinking commissions? Has the turmoil in the stock market reduced your investments’ value?

Your request for more aid is not limited to the topics covered in the aid application. Most forms, for example, don’t count the value of the family’s home. But perhaps you were planning to take out a home equity loan for college costs. If you can’t get one now because home prices have fallen, be sure to say so.

Perhaps your living expenses rose for some unavoidable reason, like the need to help out an elderly relative. Or maybe your employer has cut back on reimbursements for business expenses. Tell the college. …

Keep in mind that financial aid officers are not paid a lot, and probably don’t like hearing about the hardships of people who make more. Also, they do this all day, every day. They can smell a con job a mile away.

Obviously, you should be polite and businesslike — no ranting and raving, no threats. Don’t use the words “negotiate” or “bargain,” as this might seem offensive. Say that your son or daughter desperately wants to attend that college, that you’ll do anything necessary to make that possible, but that you just can’t manage without a bit more help.

Be specific about your request. Don’t just say “we need more,” say how much more.

I haven’t seen my daughter’s financial aid letter yet for her sophomore year. But I went into very specific details when submitting the package in late February. We knew, by that time, that my husband would be taking a pay cut. We also estimated what our home is worth based on actual sales and listings from our neighborhood.

So my daughter’s financial aid office had ALL of the critical information in its file by the requested deadline. Nothing has changed – good or bad – on our financial situation during the past two months.

But about this “appeal” concept: I did use that during my senior year in college.

I had a very nice scholarship package from my college department during my junior year.

The endowment fund did not earn as much interest as expected the following year. There wasn’t as much money to go around for scholarships. I was off the list. And with the class schedule I would have my senior year, my part-time job prospects were limited. (I could only take a job during fall semester, and it didn’t pay much.)

I wrote a letter saying a four-year private partial scholarship I earned as a high school student would be lost if I dropped out even for a semester, that I was applying for all available federal aid, and that all I really needed to finish off my senior year was XX amount of scholarship money.

I got what I asked for.

It wasn’t much.

I did not have a lot of spending money that year to have much of a social life.

But I did have enough to get the tuition, textbooks, room and board paid.

And I graduated on time.