Enrollment Changes and Financial Aid Eligibility

Reduction in Hours

Reducing your credit hours has implications for both your aid eligibility for the current semester and future terms. Your aid eligibility is based on the number of credit hours for which you are enrolled.

Initial aid offers are based on full-time enrollment (12 credits undergraduate; 9 credits graduate); if you reduce your enrolled hours, your aid may be reduced.

Withdrawal

Federal regulations state that financial aid is earned by attending class. You have not earned 100% of your financial aid until you have attended 60% of the term. If you withdraw before this date, a portion of your financial aid has not been earned.

The unearned portion is equal to the percentage of the term remaining on the date of withdrawal. Your financial aid eligibility will be recalculated based on your actual period of attendance - you may be asked to repay a portion of the aid that had been distributed to you.

Failure to Earn Credit

If you fail to earn credit for any of your classes (receive grades of F, W, I and/or NC), federal regulations require the Financial Aid Office to assume you stopped attending your classes. To retain any of your financial aid, you must provide proof that you attended classes.

If you did stop attending class, you are treated as an unofficial withdrawal. If academic engagement can be confirmed via instructor or Canvas feedback, the latest date will be used to recalculate your eligibility.

This will result in you owing funds back to the university unless you can provide documentation of attendance past the 60% point of the term.

Satisfactory Academic Progress (SAP)

Withdrawing and failing to earn credit can affect a student’s satisfactory academic progress (SAP) towards their degree.  Students who are utilizing financial aid of any kind, even loans, must maintain SAP or they could lose their financial aid.  Students should review the university’s policy on SAP and talk to their academic advisor if they are concerned about not meeting the SAP standards. 

Federal Return of Funds Policy

Read the Federal Return of Funds Policy for withdrawals from Illinois State University.