The FAFSA blunders haven’t let up. Now the Education Department has a credibility issue.

Early this year the Education Department shared what appeared to be objectively good news.

Millions of college financial aid forms – commonly referred to as FAFSAs, or Free Applications for Federal Student Aid – had been successfully submitted, the agency said in an announcement on Jan. 30. Federal officials had also updated their aid calculations to make it “as simple and easy as possible for families to get help paying for college,” according to the agency.

But tucked into the fifth paragraph of that bulletin was a troubling tidbit: Colleges and universities would not receive students’ financial aid data until the first half of March, more than a month later than the government had promised.

It was the first time the agency acknowledged the setback, another wrench thrown in the financial aid process for colleges and students. Many schools, it turned out, did not get a critical mass of the records they needed until the end of March.

What’s more, the “update” the department touted as a victory was more of a correction to a massive problem. In crunching the numbers for how much millions of families could afford to pay for college in the next school year, the agency failed to account for inflation. Amid mounting scrutiny, officials course corrected. The January announcement was part of that reset.

Yet the dissonance between the department's seemingly rosy missives and the realities students have been facing prompted some to accuse officials of spreading a “false positive narrative.” Critics argue the federal government’s less-than-transparent messaging cast a pall over one of the most important higher education reforms in recent decades.

“It’s hard to trust anything by now that the department is saying,” said David Sheridan, the director of financial aid at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs.

Read more: Colleges to Education Department: We don't have enough time to process FAFSA information

Widespread frustration with the information coming out of the Education Department has only grown in recent months, eroding Washington’s relationships with colleges, high school guidance counselors and the students they serve.

Even some staffers at the Office of Federal Student Aid, the branch of the Education Department that administers the FAFSA, were miffed at their bosses’ handling of the rollout, two agency officials not authorized to speak publicly told USA TODAY.

And the problems haven't let up. On Monday, the agency revealed it botched another set of applications, shortchanging hundreds of thousands of students on financial aid. Officials promised they would reprocess those applications by mid-April, practically guaranteeing more delays for some.

The department also underestimated how much money roughly half a million students could put toward their college bills next fall. Whether some penny-pinching schools will ask the government to recalculate those numbers remains to be seen.

In the meantime, FAFSA applications are down by about a third from last year, which means colleges across the country may be on the cusp of an enrollment nightmare.

Among college officials, the mood is grim.

“The rollout of the new FAFSA has been plagued by issues of broken trust, data integrity, and missed deadlines,” Justin Draeger, president of the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators, said in a statement Tuesday.

Read more: Millions of students may have just weeks to compare college financial aid offers

When the government gives students money to help pay for college, it isn't just handed over. The financial aid process is full of obstacles. Special employees at colleges and high schools are specifically tasked with helping students navigate those barriers. In this fraught year, it's plainer than ever that a vast array of people stands between students and the government officials shaping their lives.

The chaos has only increased students' reliance on all those people in the middle. Yet even for the really plugged-in wonks like Ryan Dulude, the director of financial aid at the Community College of Vermont, keeping up with the Education Department’s curveballs hasn’t been easy.

“In a successful partnership, you need clear transparency and communication,” he said. “They have some work to do to be able to reestablish that trust.”

This week the department revamped its website and said it would issue daily updates over the next month. In statements posted Monday and Tuesday, Rich Cordray, the chief operating officer for the Office of Federal Student Aid, said the agency is eager to develop more of a direct line of communication with schools.

“Our top priority is to make sure schools, families, scholarship organizations, and states have the information they need to bring higher education in reach for more students and families,” he said.

The government estimates the new, shortened version of the FAFSA – which is now much easier to complete for most people – will open the door to college for hundreds of thousands more low-income students. But the blunders of the last few months have prompted some to ask: At what cost?

'Tell it to them straight'

Sara Miller isn’t sleeping enough.

She’s the executive director of Green Halo Scholars, a nonprofit in the Chicago suburbs that helps low-income and first-generation students navigate the transition to college. Coaching a few dozen students through the FAFSA glitches in January and February, she watched as some of them became disheartened.

“You just see the discouragement in their eyes,” she said.

Immigrant families had some of the worst trouble. Ismaray Govea, a freshman at Florida International University, didn’t submit her FAFSA until the end of February because of complications with proving her dad’s identity. She's one of millions of students waiting for an aid offer to come through later than usual.

“If the leadership isn’t working, it slowly trickles down to the students,” she said.

The Education Department says the glitches in the form have been largely resolved. Yet internally, staffers say the blame for at least some of the problems lies with private contractors, who received millions from the federal government to prop up the new financial aid system.

Republican lawmakers and some agency staffers put the onus on leadership. They say the top brass at the Education Department became too preoccupied with canceling billions in student loan debt while the new FAFSA, they argue, fell by the wayside.

“I am incredibly sad,” said Arthur Wayne Johnson, who oversaw the Office of Federal Student Aid for the Trump administration. He resigned in 2019 and became an advocate for broad student loan forgiveness.

As millions of students wait for aid offers, the Government Accountability Office, a federal watchdog, is investigating concerns with the FAFSA rollout. It has opened several probes at the urging of congressional Republicans, though both sides of the aisle have found a rare source of agreement in criticizing the errors with the new form.

In the end, students may not care who’s to blame for the mess.

“Students just want you to tell it to them straight,” Miller said. “That’s what I want from whoever’s in charge.”

Zachary Schermele covers education and breaking news for USA TODAY. You can reach him by email at zschermele@usatoday.com. Follow him on X at @ZachSchermele.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: The FAFSA mess has eroded faith in Biden’s Education Department