You are expected to remain enrolled/attending the courses for which you are receiving financial aid.  Any change in your enrollment status or lack of attendance for a given semester may result in the reduction or cancellation of your financial aid.  

ATTENDANCE

Effective Spring 2021, attendance for financial aid is verified once grades post at the end of the semester, or at the time of withdrawal.  If unable to verify attendance, your aid may be adjusted or canceled.

-Failure to Establish Attendance in One or More Courses in the Semester

If you fail to establish attendance for a course that you are receiving financial aid for, your financial aid may be adjusted or canceled.

-Failure to Establish Attendance in the Semester

If you fail to establish attendance in the semester that you are receiving financial aid, your aid will be canceled and returned to the applicable program(s).

-Ceasing Attendance

After beginning attendance in the semester, if you drop a course(s) or cease attendance, your financial aid may be reduced or canceled. Please see the sections titled "Enrolment and Financial Aid Freeze Date" and "Withdrawals"  below for more information.

ENROLLMENT

Most financial aid programs have minimum enrollment requirements. Find out more information.

Pell Recalculation Date/ Financial Aid Freeze Date

The Pell Recalculation Date (PRD), sometimes referred to as the freeze or census date, is a date in the semester when the Financial Aid Office evaluates your eligibility for grants (federal, state, and institutional). This is true even if you are not receiving the Pell Grant.

The PRD is also used as a means of finalizing your Cost of Attendance (COA). On the established PRD, both your hours of enrollment as well as your COA will be frozen.

The standard practice of OSFA assumes you will be attending full-time (12 hours undergraduates, 9 hours graduates) during the entire academic year, if not, your financial aid may need adjusting.  Financial aid adjustments will begin approximately a month prior to your scheduled disbursement date.

Once your financial aid has disbursed, you may be required to repay some or all or the aid disbursed to you as a result of enrollment changes that occurred prior to the Financial Aid Office freezing your hours of enrollment and COA.  Dropping courses may also affect your future financial aid eligibility.   Please contact a financial aid administrator at financialaid@lamar.edu before you drop a course to determine how your aid may be affected.

WITHDRAWALS

Title IV (federal) funds are awarded under the assumption that you will attend school for the entire period for which the assistance was awarded. If you withdraw (officially or unofficially), or are administratively withdrawn for any reason, including medical withdrawals, you may no longer be eligible for the full amount of Title IV funds that you were originally scheduled to receive.  

Although we do not encourage withdrawing at any time during the semester, if you withdraw from courses ON or BEFORE the 60% date you may owe parts or all of your federal financial aid back to the Department of Education and/or Lamar University.  The 60% dates are  below, however due to the many enrollment possibilities not all 60% dates are listed.  You may contact your financial aid counselor at financialaid@lamar.edu for more information.  To learn more about Return of Title IV, visit the Financial Aid Handbook.

Although state and institutional grants are not part of this calculation; other institutional and state policies apply. If you withdraw prior to the Financial Aid Freeze Date/Pell Recalculation Date (PRD), these grants will be canceled, which may leave you with a balance owed to Lamar University.