Student Financial Aid

The cost of financing a college education is an important consideration for students. The staff of the Student Records & Financial Services Center is available to help students plan for the financing of a Canisius education. Students seeking federal financial assistance must complete the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA). The FAFSA may be obtained on-line by clicking here.

General eligibility requirements:

To be considered for student financial aid, a student must meet the following requirements:

  1. Study at least half-time at an educational institution approved by the federal government. It may be located in New York, in another state, or in a foreign country;
  2. Be a U.S. citizen or permanent resident alien;
  3. Be a resident of New York State for 12 months (for New York State financial aid programs);
  4. Be in good academic standing and making satisfactory academic progress;
  5. Have no outstanding debt from a previous student loan default and must not owe a refund on any federal grant at any institution;
  6. Demonstrate financial need or meet individual program or scholarship requirements;

Education Loans

  • A loan is money the student borrows. It must be paid back.
  • A loan is a serious obligation.
  • Students should borrow only what they need. Education loans are for tuition and fees, room and board, books, transportation and personal expenses.
  • An education loan cannot exceed the student’s total educational costs minus other student financial aid and, if required, a student contribution. Education loans have lower interest rates than most other types of loans.
  • Federal Direct Student Loans
    Graduate students are eligible to apply for a Federal Unsubsidized Direct Loan of up to $20,500 per year. Interest accrues on the Unsubsidized loan while students are in school. The aggregate loan maximum for graduate students is $138,500. (This maximum includes Stafford and Direct loans borrowed for undergraduate study.)

How to Get a Loan

Two factors must be considered to determine Federal Unsubsidized Direct Student Loan eligibility: educational costs and other financial aid the student will receive. Therefore, all students must submit a Free Application for Federal Student Aid before a Student Financial Aid Specialist can process a Federal Direct Loan. The school must report these figures to the federal government and certify the student’s enrollment status. Borrowers are required to complete an electronic Master Promissory Note (e-MPN). Information about the e-MPN and instructions for submission can be found at studentaid.gov.

Paying Back a Loan

The student is responsible for the following:

  • Repayment of the amount borrowed,
  • Interest on the amount borrowed,
  • Fees paid at the time he or she receives the loan check.

When a student gets a loan, the terms of repayment are explained. The student must be sure to understand all repayment terms before signing the loan’s promissory note. If the student fails to meet these terms, he or she is in default and the entire balance of the loan becomes due.

Costs

The interest rate for all 2023-24 graduate Federal Unsubsidized Direct Student Loans will be the current fixed rate which is 7.048%. Students who borrow through the unsubsidized Federal Direct Student Loan will accrue interest while in school. An origination fee of 1.057 % of the amount borrowed will be deducted from the loan at disbursement.

Federal Direct Graduate PLUS Loans

Graduate students may borrow from the Federal Direct Graduate PLUS Loan Program. Students may borrow up to the cost of attendance minus any financial aid received. A credit check is required. Interested students may apply online at www.studentaid.gov.

Costs

The current fixed interest rate for PLUS Loans for 2023-24 is 8.048%. Interest begins at the time of disbursement. An origination fee of 4.228% of the amount borrowed will be deducted from the loan at the time of disbursement.

Repayment

Repayment of the Direct Graduate PLUS loan begins 60 days from full disbursement. Students may request a deferment of principal and make interest-only payments while enrolled.

Financing Options

The following options are available to assist students in financing a Canisius education:

Griffin Payment Plans

This plan allows students to budget tuition payments over a full academic year. An annual fee of $100 ($50 per semester) is charged. Further information is available at the Student Records & Financial Services Center.

Other Information

Over-Awards

Each year a number of financial-aid recipients are “over-awarded.” As a result, refunds are withheld, and, in some cases, students are billed for funds already disbursed. This problem arises because of the length of time needed to match funds from various institutional sources and/or outside agencies against the individual student’s record.
To avoid this problem, students are urged to notify the Student Records & Financial Services Center promptly when they receive additional funds from any source not listed in their award letters or when a student changes his or her enrollment status.

Financial Aid Check List

To be evaluated for possible financial aid, the student must submit the following forms each academic year:

  • Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) is available on-line at www.studentaid.gov.
  • If requested, Federal Income Tax transcripts for the appropriate calendar year and/or other requested verification of income, including child support. These should be returned to the Canisius University Student Records & Financial Services Center.

Students must re-apply for financial assistance each year. The academic year begins with the summer session and continues with the fall and spring semesters. If you attend in the fall and spring and then wish to attend Canisius University again the following summer session, you will need to complete a new FAFSA because the summer session begins a new academic year.

Satisfactory Academic Progress – Title IV Federal Financial Aid

The U.S. Department of Education provides baseline criteria for financial aid offices to use in developing policies to govern all Title IV Federal Financial Aid funding.  Title IV Federal Financial Aid programs include Pell, SEOG, TEACH, Federal Work-Study, and Direct Loans.  Recipients of Title IV Federal Financial Aid will be reviewed on both a qualitative (GPA) and a quantitative (percentage of coursework completed) at the end of every semester to ensure that they are making sufficient progress toward degree completion.  Withdrawing from classes may result in a failure to meet the quantitative requirement.

Meeting the Federal Title IV Quantitative Requirement

The quantitative requirement measures completed credits over attempted credits in a given term and is based on a student’s enrollment status at the end of the drop/add week at the start of each semester.  All students must complete at least 67% of the coursework that they attempt in a given term.

Meeting Canisius’s Title IV Qualitative Requirement

The qualitative requirement measures cumulative GPA (CGPA).  All students must maintain a CGPA of 2.8 or greater in their graduate level program.  This coincides with the minimum requirement to graduate with a graduate degree at Canisius.

Maximum Time Frame

Federal regulations also monitor “maximum time frame”, which requires all students to complete their degree program within 150% of the published program length.  As an example, students enrolled in a graduate program that requires 30 credit hours earned to graduate are eligible to receive Title IV aid for no more than 45 credits.  Once a student has reached “maximum time frame”, they will automatically lose eligibility for Federal Title IV aid without the option to appeal.

Grace Period and Loss of Title IV Aid

After the first term during which a student does not meet any (or all) of the satisfactory academic progress requirements, the student will be placed on a one-semester warning.  During this warning period, the student can remain eligible for Title IV funding, but it is the responsibility of the student to regain eligibility.  At the end of that subsequent semester of enrollment, the student’s academic progress will again be evaluated.  If the student has again failed to meet any (or all) of the satisfactory academic progress requirements, they will lose eligibility for Title IV aid with the option to appeal.  If circumstances warrant, a waiver may be granted by Canisius.  Students will be notified via their Canisius email when they have failed to make satisfactory academic progress.  A student will regain Title IV eligibility once they are in good standing for both the qualitative and quantitative SAP requirements.  They will be notified via their Canisius email.

Appeals and Waivers

Students may appeal a satisfactory academic progress loss by completing and submitting a written appeal to the Student Records and Financial Services Center.  Appeals are intended only to accommodate extraordinary or unusual cases that have affected a student’s academic performance and must be submitted with appropriate documentation.  If an appeal is approved, a probationary waiver is granted, which may include specific conditions for the student to meet in order to regain eligibility for Title IV aid.  If those conditions are not met after the student’s next semester of enrollment, the student will lose Title IV eligibility without the option to appeal. The student will be notified of the status of their appeal via their Canisius Email before the beginning of the next term or within 21 days of their appeal. 

Appeals may be granted if situations beyond the students control prevent the student from maintaining satisfactory academic progress.  An appeal will be granted only when there is a reasonable expectation that the student will be able to meet the successive steps for financial aid eligibility as specified in the tables below.  Reasons for which appeals may be granted include:

  1. Personal medical problems
  2. Family medical problems
  3. Severe personal problems
  4. Other circumstances beyond the control of the student

Successful Completion of Courses

To be counted as successfully completed and earned hours, the student must receive a grade of A, B, C, D, P or XP.  Withdrawals (W), incompletes (I/IP), or failures (U, NG, F, FX or X) are counted as attempted hours but are NOT counted as successfully completed and earned hours.

Incomplete Grades

If a student can convert an incomplete grade into a complete grade before the start of the third week of classes of their subsequent semester of enrollment, the grade and credit hours can be counted in determining the student’s academic progress.  The student must submit proof of grade completion to the financial aid office in advance of this deadline in order to be considered.  Federal regulations stipulate that if the student does not convert the incomplete grade in advance of the end of the third week of their next semester of enrollment, the student is not making satisfactory academic progress, even if the grade is replaced at some point thereafter.

Transfer of Credit from Other Schools

Transfer credit that is awarded from other schools will be included in both the attempted hours and the earned hours when evaluating the quantitative and maximum time frame measurement of the SAP policy.  Transfer credits do not count in the GPA (qualitative) measurement.  A student that brought in 12 transfer credits and has passed 15 of 25 credits at Canisius will be at a 73% quantitative measurement and therefor be passing the SAP requirement 67%.

Remedial Coursework

Canisius does not currently have and courses that qualify as remedial.

Repeating Coursework

Students who are dissatisfied with their grade in a course may repeat the course once (exceptions may be approved by the appropriate associate dean in consultation with the department chair). When a student repeats a course, the original course and credits are excluded E from the earned credits/GPA and the new course in included.  The class will be included in attempted hours but only the class that is passed will be included in earned hours.  Thus, affecting the quantitative calculation but not the qualitative.

Academic Forgiveness

Students can apply for the Academic Forgiveness program at Canisius University. Academic Forgiveness can be given to students who have left the College for a specific period or to students while they are enrolled at Canisius.  Because State and Federal regulations prohibit students from benefiting from Academic Forgiveness programs in regards to Title IV and State Aid, Financial Aid will need to continue to evaluate Title IV and State eligibility using the students original record. 

Academic Reset

Academic reset relates to undergraduate students who are changing their majors, or previously undeclared students who are now declaring a major. These students may petition the associate dean for academic forgiveness for up to five (5) courses taken in the two semesters previous to the request. Only courses in which the student earned a grade of C-, D, F, or FX are eligible for forgiveness. The associate dean will consult with the department chair of the new major to consider the request. If approved, the associate dean will notify the Student Records and Financial Services Center that the student has been approved for academic forgiveness, listing the courses affected by the approval.

  • Courses with a failing grade which have been forgiven will remain on the student’s academic transcript with a grade of “X” listed to indicate that the course is part of the academic forgiveness policy and not included in the calculation of the grade point average.
  • Courses with a C- or D grade which have been forgiven will remain on the student’s academic transcript with a grade of “XP” listed to indicate that the course is part of the academic forgiveness policy and not included in the calculation of the grade point average. Credit hours are earned with a grade of XP.

Courses involved in an academic reset will not count into the GPA measure of SAP but, will count in the percentage of completion and maximum time frame calculation of SAP.

SAP Requirements

The following explains the requirements for eligibility for Federal financial aid (FWS, Teach Grants and Federal Direct loan). Students must successfully earn 66.7% of their overall attempted credit hours and maintain a 2.8 GPA.

Satisfactory Academic Progress – Canisius University Endowed Aid

Canisius students may be awarded grants and scholarships from The Canisius Endowment.  Endowed scholarships are generally gifted from Alumni, Businesses and friends of the College.  Endowed scholarships are awarded in accordance with the wishes of the donors and are therefor not subject to Title IV or State rules regarding SAP. While the student remains in good standing or on academic probation, they will be eligible for endowed aid as long as the stipulations of the donor are met.  To find out more about academic standing, please visit the Canisius University academic catalog.

Return of Title IV Funds

It is the policy of Canisius University to return federal funds which have been dispersed to a graduate student who has withdrawn or stopped attending the University to the Federal Title IV programs in compliance with the regulations of the Department of Education.

In order to be eligible for and retain federal financial aid (Title IV) funds, students must maintain enrollment in classes for the entire semester.  Failure to do so results in a recalculation of aid funds and may result in a return of unearned Title IV funds.

If a student leaves the University prior to completing a semester, the Student Records and Financial Services Center may recalculate eligibility for Title IV funds.  Recalculation is based on the percentage of earned aid using the following Federal Return of Title IV funds formula:

Courses whose length is less than a full semester (module), will also be subject to a Title IV review if a student withdraws before the end of the course.

Percentage of payment period or term completed = the number of days completed up to the withdrawal date divided by the total days in the payment period or semester.  (Any break of five days or more is not counted as part of the days in the semester.)  This percentage is also the percentage of earned aid.  Funds are returned to the appropriate Federal program based on the percentage of unearned aid using the following formula: 

Aid to be returned = (100% of the aid that could be disbursed minus the percentage of earned aid) multiplied by the total amount of aid that could have been disbursed during the payment period or semester.

If a student earned less aid than was disbursed, the University will return a portion of the funds and the student will be required to return a portion of the funds.  When Title IV funds are returned, the student borrower may owe a debit to the University.

If the student did not receive all of the funds that were earned prior to withdrawing, a post-withdrawal disbursement may be due.  If the post-withdrawal disbursement includes loan funds, the student must give permission before the funds can be disbursed.  The University may automatically use all or a portion of the post-withdrawal disbursement of grant funds for tuition, fees, and room and board charges.  Permission is required to use the post-withdrawal grant disbursement for all other University charges.  Students will be notified of post-withdrawal disbursement eligibility within 30 days of the date of withdrawal determination. 

The University will return the Title IV funds within 45 days of the date it determines the student withdrew.  Title IV funds will be returned to the Department of Education in the following order:

  1. Unsubsidized Direct Loan
  2. Subsidized Direct Loan
  3. Graduate PLUS Loan
  4. Other Title IV Assistance
  5. Other state
  6. Private and Institutional Aid
  7. Student