To be eligible for financial aid, you must meet minimum enrollment requirements. Any change of enrollment status during the year could result in a revision in the financial aid offered.
If you reduce your credit load or officially withdraw from the University during a term for which you have already received financial aid, all or part of the funds that have been disbursed to you may have to be repaid or returned to the funding source. This may cause an owing balance to Northwest University.
The amount to be repaid for returned financial aid will be determined by the length of time you were enrolled.
Minimum Enrollment Requirements
Your initial Financial Aid Offer assumes you will enroll for 12 – 18 undergraduate credits per term.
Credits are reviewed after the add/drop period. Your enrollment at that time will be your financial aid enrollment.
If you registered for fewer than 12 undergraduate credits, your Financial Aid Offer may need to be adjusted. If you plan to enroll for fewer than these credits, please contact Student Financial Services right away.
If you register for five or fewer undergraduate credits, you will not be eligible for financial aid, unless you are a Pell Grant recipient. Pell Grant recipients can receive funds if enrolled for a minimum of three credits.
Dropping a Course
If you drop a course after the add/drop week, which is the first seven days of the term, you will be responsible for the tuition related to that course and there will be no changes to your financial aid. However, the drop in credits may affect your academic progress. Please review the Satisfactory Academic Progress policy to ensure you are in compliance.
Withdrawing from the University
If you completely withdraw from all classes, you need to contact the Registrar’s Office right away to document your last day of attendance. The last day of attendance will determine the amount of tuition that will be refunded. If there is not a documented last day of attendance then it will be assumed the withdrawal occurred after 50% of the semester has passed.
Once the withdrawal has occurred or been determined, tuition and financial aid will be reviewed for possible adjustments. Tuition will be charged based on the percentage of time the student remained enrolled.
The tuition charged will be as follows based on the documented day of withdrawal.
- 20% during the second week of semester charges
- 32% during the third week of semester charges
- 44% during the fourth week of semester charges
- 56% during the fifth week of semester charges
- 68% during the sixth week of semester charges
- 80% during the seventh week of semester charges
- 92% during the eighth week of semester charges
- 100% after the eighth week
Please be aware that if you withdraw from any courses, those courses are considered “attempted” and therefore are included in calculating if satisfactory academic progress requirements were met.
Return of Financial Aid
According to federal regulations, federal funds must be returned to federal programs based on the percent of the term that a student is no longer enrolled. Student Financial Services will determine how much of a student’s aid was “unearned” as defined by the federal regulations, and then return the “unearned” aid in the following order to the programs from which the student received the aid:
- Federal Unsubsidized Stafford Loan
- Federal Subsidized Stafford Loan
- Federal PLUS Loan
- Federal Pell Grant
- Federal Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grant (FSEOG)
- Other Title IV Programs
If a refund was received prior to withdrawing from the University, then those funds need may need to be repaid, depending on the date of withdrawal.
In addition, Northwest University grants and scholarships will be removed from the student’s account during the semester of withdrawal at the same percentage as the federal funds.