The College Scholarship Service (CSS) need analysis system is described in this comprehensive guide. It includes information about the basic rationale, the economic principles, and the computational procedures used in the CSS system. The chapters deal with the following: principles and practices of student financial aid administration; the history of need analysis; the theory of need analysis, measuring both parental ability to pay and student resources; special problems in need analysis; computation procedures for the Parents' Confidential Statement (PCS); computation procedures for the Financial Aid Form (FAF); procedures for processing the PCS and FAF forms; constructing student expense budgets; packaging aid resources; and PCS and FAF sample cases. (LBH)