Federal Title IV aid is awarded to students under the assumption that they will attend school for the entire semester for which the aid was awarded. When a student withdraws, they may no longer be eligible for the full amount of aid that the student was originally scheduled to receive. Students receiving federal financial aid who withdraw from all of their classes during the first 60% of a term, may be required to repay a portion of the federal grants that they have received. That is because a student must "earn" their financial aid and federal aid is earned for each day you are enrolled and attending classes for a particular term.
For example, if you enroll in the Fall semester on August 20 and withdraw from all of your classes on October 22, you will have "earned" 63 days worth of financial aid eligibility. The amount you have to repay will depend on the number of days you were enrolled compared to the number of days in the semester. Because there are 121 days in the Fall semester, you would have only earned 52% of the aid you received (63 days/121 days in the term = 52%). If you had received a $1500 Pell Grant award for the semester, you would have only earned $780 of the Pell Grant ($1500 x 52% = $780). Because you have received $720 more financial aid than you "earned" ($1500 - $780 = $720), you may be required to repay half of the amount you did not earn. The amount you would be required to pay back in this case would be no more than $360.
Students who stay in classes until 60% of the term is completed won't owe anything back to the federal government. For the Fall of 2018, that means you must be enrolled and attending classes until October 30, 2018 to be eligible for all the financial aid you received. If you drop all of your classes before October 30, 2018 you may be billed for a portion of the Pell Grant, SEOG and/or Direct Loan that you received in the Fall. For the Spring of 2019, that means you must be enrolled and attending classes until April 17, 2019 to be eligible for all the financial aid you received. If you drop all of your classes before April 17, 2019 you may be billed for a portion of the Pell Grant, SEOG and/or Direct Loan that you received in the Spring.
Please note: If you fail all of your classes in a term, you will have only earned 50% of the Pell and/or SEOG that you received and you may be billed for the amount you did not earn. This rule applies even if you were enrolled in classes for the whole term.
If you are required to repay funds to the federal government, you will be billed and you will have 30 days to repay the funds in full. You may be ineligible for any further financial aid at any college in the United States until you have repaid the funds in full.
Being reported to the U.S. Department of Education means that they will take over the overpayment and they will be contacting you.
If you wish to contact the U. S. Department of Education you can do so calling 1-800-621-3115.
Checks made for repayment need to include the student’s name, address, and student ID number. If you are mailing a check make sure you are doing so to:
We are not responsible for checks that do not arrive to Grossmont-Cuyamaca Community College District.
Money orders made for repayment need to include the student’ name and student ID number.
8800 Grossmont College Drive
El Cajon, California 92020
619-644-7000
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