Financial Aid Resources

No. Based on Title IX, schools are not allowed to end or reduce your merit or need-based scholarships based on pregnancy. If the student remains in good academic standing in your program, the student must be allowed to keep their financial aid and scholarships.

• For UMB, all graduate/professional students are considered independent for the purposes of financial aid and if they become pregnant, the FAFSA® would not have to be updated. UMB only uses the student or student and spouses income and asset information to determine eligibility for financial aid.
• If the student is pregnant when filing FAFSA®, but the child will be born that award year, the student should still include the child in the household size. Be sure to preserve a copy of an ultrasound and other medical records just in case FAFSA® wants to verify the application
• If the student has additional expenses such as medical expenses not covered by insurance or child day care expenses, they can request a cost of attendance increase. That request would be reviewed and considered based on medical expenses paid by the student not covered by insurance and child day care expense not to exceed the IRS allowance of $2,500. The cost of attendance is reviewed based on the academic year the expenses were incurred. For child day care expenses, financial aid is not able to cover cost associated with a nanny, childcare or anything considered tuition.

There are a lot of factors to consider when determining whether or not you have to pay back the aid you received such as:

• When in the academic semester do you plan to leave?
• Are you dropping out or taking a course while on leave?
• Is the aid institutional or federal?

Taking time off from school may have an impact on your student loans, depending on your student status during your time off. To learn more about how your extended leave of absence affects your loans, contact your loan servicer and/or lender.

• Make sure you contact the financial aid office before taking an extended absence.
  • If a student is out of school for more than 14 days, that student would be considered withdrawn for that term and any federal loans they have received would begin the grace period. In most cases, the student returns for the next term which allows them not to make payments on the loans they have received. Taking off a semester usually means the student graduates a semester after their class.
  • For any student who is out for a semester, financial aid would like to meet with the student to review their loans and provide them with repayment information as the repayment for the loans they have prior to the time off are treated differently than any new loans they may receive.