Financial Aid FAQs
Southern New Hampshire University utilizes the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) to determine need.
No. The only form required is the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA).
You may submit a FAFSA after January 1. The priority filing deadline is March 15.
After this date we will still award financial aid, however certain funds may not be available.
Normal processing time for the FAFSA is approximately seven to ten days if submitted electronically; four weeks for mailed submissions. Students striving to meet the priority date are advised to keep the processing time in mind. Mid-year transfer students must ensure that loans processed at other institutions are adjusted by their previous schools to reflect their actual enrollment end dates at those schools.
Yes, you will receive a Student Aid Report (SAR) from the Department of Education. Your SAR will summarize the information you report on your FAFSA. Your SAR will contain comments that will alert you if further information is required to process your FAFSA. Please check this information carefully to make sure it is accurate. If further information is required please contact the Office of Financial Aid for assistance at 603.645.9645 or finaid@snhu.edu.
If your FAFSA information is complete, an Expected Family Contribution (EFC) will appear on page one of your SAR (Student Aid Report). The EFC will be based on the financial information you provide on the FAFSA, and your school will use it to award your financial aid.
No. The EFC is subtracted from the cost of attendance at the college. The cost of attendance varies from college to college. The result is a calculation of the student's financial need or eligibility for financial aid. Aid eligibility at a particular college is a function of both the cost of attendance and the expected family contribution.
Once the FAFSA information has been received, accepted freshman and transfer students should receive an award letter in early March (approximately). Returning day students will receive their awards after spring grades have been posted (approximately early June).
Charges will be listed on the Financial Aid Award Guide.
The average increase is 4-5%.
Academic scholarships are awarded to incoming freshman and transfer students through the admissions office. If an academic scholarship is not awarded at the time of admission, a student can earn an institutional academic scholarship after their first full academic year if they have maintained a cumulative grade point average of 3.0 or greater.
Annually, at the end of spring semester the Office of Financial Aid (OFA) will review students cumulative GPA’s.
No. If a freshman/transfer is awarded a specific amount in an academic scholarship (i.e. $7000) this amount will be renewed each year as long as the student has maintained the cumulative GPA of 3.0 or greater.
Typically, the day before classes begin, a work-study job fair will be held. Supervisors or representatives are available to talk with students about job openings being offered in their areas. Job openings are also listed on the Student Employment webpage and on the bulletin board in front of the Office of Financial Aid in Exeter Hall.
A student should work no more than 8-10 hours a week.
FWS is not a loan. Once a student has found a job, they work and earn the amount they have been awarded for the academic award year. This money doesn’t go towards the bill; this is money that students can use to cover some of their incidentals (i.e. movies, personal needs). The advantage to the FWS program is that when a student completes the FAFSA for the upcoming year, the earnings they made are listed as Worksheet C and are taken out of the student’s AGI.
It is important that the OFA be informed of all outside scholarships a student receives. Each award is reviewed on a case by case basis and if the scholarship affects the award, loans and work-study are typically reduced first before the SNHU Need-Based Grant is reduced.
As long as a FAFSA is completed yearly, and the student still meets all eligibility requirements, the student will be awarded a Stafford loan. They will be awarded more Stafford loan funds as their grade level increases.
The federal government sets interest rates on student loans; therefore, interest rates on Stafford and PLUS loans are the same for all lenders. However, lenders offer a variety of ways to save you money on the cost of borrowing alternative student loans. We do have a listing of commonly used lenders with whom we have developed relationships and who are familiar with SNHU families. We strongly advise that families research lenders before making a commitment. For alternative loans you should consider: repayment benefits, services available, interest rates, fees (taken at origination and/or added at repayment), credit criteria, co-signer options, etc. Ultimately, the decision is up to you (and for alternative loans, your credit history).
Choosing a lender is a very important personal decision and by law, staff members in the Office of Financial Aid can not make this important personal decision for any student or family. SNHU is happy to certify an educational loan from any provider. Details for loan options may be obtained by viewing our Educational Loans information section.
Yes. Parents can work with their lender(s) to have their loans consolidated into one monthly payment with one lender.
Deposits are refundable until May 1st.
Please contact the individual coaches for more information on athletic scholarships.
If there are extenuating circumstances (i.e., loss of employment, medical expenses not covered by health insurance, one time distributions), an appeal may be submitted after the student has received an initial award letter. Home repairs, car repairs, credit card debt, weddings, and/or other life expenses are not considered extenuating expenses for an appeal. It is recommended you speak with your financial aid counselor to see if you have grounds for an appeal.
Financial Aid is not intended to cover 100% of your unmet costs. The “gap” should be covered by the student, parent, parent loans, alternative loans, payment plans, or outside scholarships.
It doesn’t matter if you are claimed on your parents’ taxes or whether you live with them or not. You are considered a dependent student on the FAFSA if you are unmarried, younger than 24, not an orphan or ward of the court, not a qualified veteran of the armed forces, not pursuing a master’s degree, or you don’t have a legal dependant child.
A student’s FAFSA may be selected by the Department of Education for a process called verification. Students selected for verification will be asked to provide additional documents (such as a copy of your federal income tax return) to the Office of Financial Aid. These documents will be used to either confirm or correct information submitted by the student and/or parent on the FAFSA. Since a student’s financial aid eligibility is based on information provided on the FAFSA, any changes in the data may affect a student’s financial aid award. For this reason, awards will not be finalized until verification has been confirmed.
Notice of selection will be stated on the Student Aid Report (SAR) sent to you from the Department of Education. If you are selected, please contact the Office of Financial Aid immediately. The verification process, once all required documents are received will take four to six weeks to complete.
The Office of Financial Aid uses the cost of a computer as determined by Computing Resources. This amount can be added to the cost of attendance in order for families to finance the cost through a Parent PLUS or alternative student loan.