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Hello! I’m Rodney Harris, Senior Financial Aid Counselor at University of North Georgia. As our offices are currently closed, we have produced this video so that you may begin your process of applying for Financial Aid and give you a better understanding of the basics.

Hopefully this will allow you to get a head start on the application process and we are available to answer your questions by our office email, finaid@ung.edu. 

First step in the process would be to visit our website where we have a wealth of knowledge as well as the ‘Financial Aid Answers 24/7’, as you see with the arrow. What this is, is a link to videos that will explain the basics in more detail, such as videos on what financial aid is available, as well as how to understand your award and how to complete the FAFSA.

The FAFSA is the Free Application for Federal Student Aid. It is available at . The FAFSA does need to be completed each year. So for instance if you are coming- if your first semester coming in is Summer 2020, you will need to complete the ’19-’20 FAFSA year. You will also be required to use your 2017 federal tax information. If you’re beginning in the fall semester of 2020, you will then use the 2021 FAFSA using 2018 tax information.

This is what the FAFSA application website looks like. You want to make sure that when you are dealing with federal financial aid that the website ends with ‘.gov’. That lets you know that you are on the official website and not on a supplemental website that may assist you in the process, but not be the official website. So always look for that ‘.gov’ ending in the address bar.

What type of aid is available through the FAFSA process? The Pell Grant is available to low-income households. It is a grant and it does not need to be paid back. Federal Work Study is a funding limited program that allows students who apply for the work study funds to earn income on a bi-weekly basis through an on-campus job. This also does not need to be paid back as the student does work for the funding. However, every student who completes a FAFSA should be able to receive federal direct student loans. Please remember that these are loans and they must be paid back. So borrow carefully.

The other form of aid that is most popular is the state aid known as the HOPE scholarship and the Zell Miller Scholarship.

The HOPE scholarship pays approximately 90% of the standard tuition rate. This means that it does not apply to mandatory fees or room and board costs—simply to the tuition. It does require a 3.0 overall high school GPA in order to be eligible coming out of high school, and transfer students would need to have a transfer GPA of a 3.0 as well in order to be eligible. Eligibility would be determined by the Financial Aid Office. So, if you do not see that award, if you’ve already completed your FAFSA, but you feel that you are eligible, you will want to contact us so that we can look into it further.

Zell Miller Scholarship operates very similar to the HOPE scholarship, the only exception is that it pays 100% of the standard tuition rate, where again, HOPE only pays 90%. Zell Miller does have a higher qualification of 3.7 overall high school GPA, and a testing component of 1200 on the SAT or a 26 on the composite score for the ACT.

Now if you have already completed the FAFSA process and want to view your award, you simply need to login to your Banner account and click on the ‘Financial Aid’ tab, and then click on ‘Award.’ It will then take you to what year you wish to view your award. Remember if you are doing the ‘20-‘21 FAFSA for Fall 2020, you’d want to select that award year in the drop-down box. At that point you’ll be able to see your award and accept your award offer.

Again, that is just a quick overview of what is available through the Financial Aid Office so that students can get a head start on the application process while our offices are closed. We are available to help you, however, at our email address finaid@ung.edu. 

Thank you, and have a nice day.