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There
are limits to the amount of financial aid students can receive. When a
student's financial aid exceeds those limits, it's referred to as an over-award.
There are two limits in particular: the student's cost of attendance and
the student's financial need.
Cost
of Attendance
When
students are packaged financial aid, they are assigned a budget, referred
to as the student's cost of attendance. It includes an allowance for tuition
and fees, books and supplies, room and board, transportation, and personal
expenses. The student's total financial aid awards cannot exceed his or
her cost of attendance (certain types of aid, like the Federal Pell Grant,
are excluded from this concept). Financial
Need
Generally,
schools determine a student's financial need by subtracting the student's
Expected Family Contribution (EFC), taken from the results of the FAFSA,
from the student's cost of attendance.
Cost
of Attendance – EFC = Financial
Need |
The
student's total need-based aid awards, such as grants, scholarships, additional
resources, Federal Work Study, and subsidized loans, cannot exceed the
student's financial need (certain types of aid, like the Federal Pell
Grant, are excluded from this concept).
Additional
Resources
Over-Awards
are most often created when a student receives an additional resource
that the Office of Financial Aid was unaware of at the time of packaging.
The most common forms of additional resources include external scholarships,
tuition remission, graduate assistantships, and third party contracts.
It is the student's responsibility to notify the Office of Financial Aid
of any additional resources that don't appear on his or her Award Notice.
Resolving
Over-Awards
Whatever
the cause may have been to create the over-award, the Office of Financial
Aid must attempt to resolve the over-award by either returning undisbursed
funds or reducing or canceling future aid disbursements within the same
aid year. In some cases, the student may have special circumstances that
would allow the Office of Financial Aid to increase his or her cost of
attendance to resolve the over-award. See our Extraordinary Expense Petition
page for more information. |
