2021 NASFAA Benchmarking: Salary Update Brief
For more than two decades, NASFAA has conducted benchmarking surveys about financial aid administrators and offices. From these surveys, NASFAA produces a biannual benchmarking report on the earnings of individuals with similar characteristics and roles, and creates its Staffing Model, which demonstrates how offices with similar characteristics are staffed.
Due to the onset of COVID-19, NASFAA made the decision not to administer the survey used to update its Benchmarking Report containing information on salaries, staffing, and financial aid campus relations in 2020. Instead, NASFAA worked with the College and University Professional Association for Human Resources (CUPA-HR) to produce a brief with updated financial aid-related salary information for publication in 2021. NASFAA will resume data collection for, and publication of, its biannual benchmarking report in 2022.
Key Findings
Overall Salaries
In 2019-20, chief student financial aid officers earned a median salary of $93,067, and student financial aid counselors earned a median salary of $43,445. The highest-paid role, chief enrollment management officer, earned a median salary of $169,582, while the lowest-paid role, student services coordinator, earned a median salary of $37,945.
Race/Ethnicity and Salary
In 2019-20, chief student financial aid officers who identified as white earned a median salary of $92,475; however, their racial/ethnic minority (defined as non-white) peers in the same job title earned a median salary of $93,840, or 1.4% more.
Sex and Salary
Men's salaries exceeded women's salaries at every level except for student financial aid counselors, where females earned an average of $115 more. For chief student financial aid officers, the median salary for women was $89,100, while their male counterparts earned $99,050, or 10% more.
Publication Date: 3/15/2021