How Scholarships Affect Financial Aid

If I Receive a Scholarship will it Affect my Financial Aid?

In some instances when you are awarded a scholarship after your financial aid has been awarded an over-award may occur. This means that the total of your awards exceed your cost of attendance. Federal regulations require FRCC to adjust aid to correct the over-award. In some cases, the adjustment may result in a further reduction of other aid (excluding the Pell grant) in order to award the scholarship.

Example: Full time independent (as classified by FAFSA) student living off campus.

$17,174 Cost of Attendance

-$0 Expected Family Contribution (EFC)

= $17,174 Financial Need

-$5,350 Pell Grant

- $1,000 SEOG

- $3,500 Subsidized Loan

- $6,000 Unsubsidized Loan

= $1,324 Unmet Financial Need 

How Financial Aid Gets Adjusted

If a scholarship that exceeds the unmet financial need ($1,324 in the example) is issued after the financial aid has been awarded, FRCC is required by federal regulations to adjust aid, except for the Pell Grant.

Following the example above, if a $2,000 scholarship is issued, there would be an over-award of $676 ($1,324 unmet financial need - $2,000 scholarship = -$676). Therefore, financial aid would be reduced by $676.

Residency Change

If your residency status changes from out of state to instate, this will change your cost of attendance, therefore, reducing your financial need.

Scholarships & Financial Aid