Your Financial Aid Eligibility
Financial Aid Notification
When all required information has been submitted, (see Applying for Financial Aid), the Financial Aid Office will process your application, process your financial aid eligibility, and send you a financial aid notification.
In addition, students with loans may have to complete an entrance interview and Master Promissory Note, both of which done online (see Aid Programs). Students are also required to complete a KVCC Loan Request Form to accept or decline the loans that have been offered.
To check to see what documents you need to return, check your financial aid status by logging into your account on the My KV Portal (requires log in) and selecting “Finances,” “Financial Aid” and then “Missing Documents.”
Your initial Financial Aid Notification, in most cases, assumes that you will be taking the same number of credits in the spring semester as you have registered for in the fall. The Financial Aid Notification that was sent to you states the enrollment status for which the award was based. This information is listed in the second paragraph of the Financial Aid Notification that was sent to you. If the number of credits in which you are enrolled changes for the next semester, that could change your financial aid for the next semester. If you change your enrollment, check with the Financial Aid Office.
If you have not submitted all the necessary financial aid paperwork by the 15th of August or the 15th of December (for students admitted for the spring semester), a payment plan must be in place. The first payment owed is usually at least 25% of the total bill and does not include books.
Understanding Your Financial Aid Offer
To help students and families better understand their financial aid, including important information on the types of aid, FAME has developed a short video: “Understanding Financial Aid Offers” (Videos – FAME Maine)
Comparing Financial Aid Offers
Once students understand their individual financial aid offers, the next step is to calculate the actual cost of each school and compare financial aid offers. FAME’s “Comparing Financial Aid Offers” (Videos – FAME Maine) can help students and families calculate these costs and then get that critical “apples-to-apples” cost comparison of all schools a student is interested in attending. You may also use FAME’s Comparing Financial Aid Offers online comparison tool (Comparing-Awards-online.pdf (famemaine.com)).
Financial aid for Summer Courses
- If you received a Federal Pell Grant during the fall and/or spring semesters, you may be eligible to receive one for the summer, depending on your enrollment status
- You must inform the financial aid office if you register for summer classes so your financial aid can be adjusted.
- In many cases, the maximum loan amount for which you are eligible is packaged in the initial award, and half of the amount is disbursed for the fall semester, and half for spring. However, if you are eligible for a loan for the summer semester and request one, the loan will be awarded.
Financial Aid Refund
The add/drop period is the first week of each term. The second week, you can drop one or more courses, receive a grade of W and a 50% refund (but if you withdraw from ALL courses, the Financial Aid office will perform a federal refund calculation to determine if funds need to be returned to the Dept. of Education, and you could owe money.)
Your financial aid is based on the number of credit hours you are taking at the end of the add/drop period each semester. Your financial aid eligibility could be adjusted to a different amount than was shown on your notification if your enrollment changes from the time your eligibility was calculated.
Your financial aid is applied against your semester charges. If your total financial aid is greater than your total charges, you will receive a refund for the excess amount, usually about month after the start of the term. If some of your classes start later in the semester, a portion of your financial aid will have a delayed disbursement date based on the start date of the applicable classes.
It is your responsibility to let the Academic Affairs Office know if you are not attending classes. If you have not attended a class or classes at all, but you did not let the Financial Aid Office know and we find out after your aid has disbursed, we will return all the aid to the Dept. of Education and you could owe money. You cannot have financial aid for a class you never attended.