Once your FAFSA is submitted it needs to be processed, which can take up to three business days. You will get an email from Federal Student Aid once your FAFSA has been processed, or if there are errors and it cannot be processed. Then MVCC has to bring in your FAFSA to the school, which can take up to five business days. After we bring in your FAFSA, we will reach out to you if more documentation is needed (example: if you were selected for verification).

NYS TAP applications can vary. When you are finished with your FAFSA there is a direct link to take you to the NYS TAP application. If you missed that link, you will have to wait for your FAFSA to be processed before you can log on to complete your TAP application. You will receive an email from NYS TAP prompting you to complete the application. The processing of a TAP application may take from three to five weeks.

FAFSAs must be completed every school year. MVCC's school year technically starts in the summer. So, for example, the Summer of 2024, Fall of 2024, and Spring of 2025 are all covered by the 2024-2025 FAFSA. Other schools may have summer at the end of their semester, so if you are planning to attend summer classes at another institution you should clarify which FAFSA you need with that school's Financial Aid Office.

To check the status of your appeal, follow these steps:

• Log into your MyMV account
• Click on Financial Aid Menu
• Click on Eligibility
• Click on Academic Progress

Yes. Pell pays out 100% each year, and at 600% (12 semesters) you can no longer receive the Pell Grant. Student loans are limited to a total of $57,500 for undergraduates; no more than $23,000 can be subsidized. To get up-to-date information, you can go to studentaid.gov and retrieve your information.

This question could have many different answers. Here are some things you can check:

• Remember, school years for the FAFSA are Fall and Spring.  For example, the Summer 2025 semester will use the 2024-2025 FAFSA, and the Summer 2025, Fall 2025, and Spring 2026 semesters will use the 2025-2026 FAFSA.  So make sure the FAFSA you filed is for the correct year you are attending.
• Did you list Mohawk Valley Community College in your list of colleges on the FAFSA? The FAFSA is only sent to schools you list. To add MVCC, you need to log back into studentaid.gov and then click “make a correction” and add our school code 002871 in the schools.
• Did you complete all the requirements (if needed) from Mohawk Valley Community College? To check on your requirements needed, do the following steps:
  • Log into your MyMV account
  • Click on Financial Aid Menu
  • Click on Eligibility
  • Click on Student Requirements
  • On the drop down box, choose the semester for which you are trying to get Financial Aid

If none of these work, please call the Financial Aid Office at 315-792-5415 or email us at finaid@mvcc.edu.

Refunds are given out on the seventh and 11th weeks of the semester. You will receive a notification via email from the Business Office to let you know that you have a check. Since the first check is only half of the funds, it must cover your entire bill before you would get money for an overage. This is why a majority of the refund checks fall on the 11th week, when you have a refund.

To know how much your refund will be, you need to log into MyMV. On the top of the page you will see all your charges* and below you will see your financial aid. You need to subtract your financial aid from your charges. If you come up with a negative number that will be a refund.

*You will only see charges after you are registered for classes.

All students who file a FAFSA are automatically considered dependent until they are 24 or have a special circumstance. Special circumstances are:

• You have a child that you support
• You are in foster care, orphan, or ward of the court
• You are married
• Active duty/veteran of the armed forces
• You are in a legal guardianship

We will need documentation (court documents) for most of these special circumstances to consider someone as independent. All students put their custodial parent’s information or parent who provides more than 50% of their support. You do not have to file under the parent that claimed you on their tax return.

We cannot retrieve your FSA ID information for you; however, we can assist you in the process. Please stop into Payne Hall and our Help Desk staff can assist you in retrieving your FSA ID information. That being said, sometimes the problem is larger than what we can help with and you may have to call FSA ID customer service to get help with your FSA ID. The Federal Student Aid contact number is 800-433-3243.

If you have a negative amount on your account after your charges (tuition, fees, housing) have been paid and you have completed the Financial Responsibility form, you can use this overage at the bookstore.  This starts two weeks before classes begin.  You will need your MVCC ID to use your overage funds at the bookstore.

Book bundle charges are included on the bill unless you opt out of it.  Book bundles are rented books that can be picked up at the bookstore.  For more information on the book bundle or to opt out of it, please visit https://www.mvcc.edu/pack.   

Yes, it can. If you purchase a meal plan it will be placed onto your account along with the cost of your tuition and fees. Any financial aid that you receive will go onto your account and be paid toward your bill. You will need to make sure that you are receiving enough financial aid to cover the cost of everything.

Student loans DO NOT need to be repaid while you are enrolled in at least 6 credit hours in school. When you are no longer attending (or enrolled in less than 6 credits) your loans will go into a six-month deferment (no payment is due while a loan is deferred). You will get mail and emails from your loan servicer telling you when your first payment is due. If the payment is too high for you to make, please call your servicer to try to make another payment plan. There are several payment plans that make paying your loans more affordable, or you may even qualify to not make a payment yet if you are unemployed. To find your servicer, log onto studentaid.gov and look at your loan information.

Every semester the Financial Aid Office assesses your academic progress to make sure you are meeting federal and state guidelines. Even if you had an appeal approved for the past semester, you are going to be re-evaluated at the end of each semester. Sometimes, even if you do very well you may still need to do an appeal because of prior attempted credits/GPA. To see the requirements for federal and state, aid please visit www.mvcc.edu/financial-aid/SAP.

If you are going to withdraw from your courses, please complete the official withdrawal paperwork. When you withdraw, we will need to perform a Return to Title IV calculation, which means we will calculate how much financial aid you have technically earned based on your date of withdrawal. We will then send back any aid that was disbursed onto your account that you have not earned. If you attend more than 60% of the semester, you are able to keep all financial aid funds that had been disbursed. Click here for more information.

If you want to drop a class, the first question is: Will you be below 12 credit hours? For example, if you go from 16 credits to 13 credits you are still full-time and your aid will not be affected (TAP may be affected if you are repeating a course that you had passed previously). If this is the case, then check with Financial Aid.

If you are dropping a course and, for example, are going from 12 credits to 9 credits then your financial aid will change depending on when you drop the course. If you add/drop classes before the census date, your financial aid will change depending on how many credits you are enrolled in. If you drop just one course and it is after the census date, your financial aid typically will not change, but you should check with the Financial Aid Office before you do so if you are going below full-time. If you drop ALL courses then we will have to do a Return to Title IV calculation and you should go to our page about withdrawal and the impact on financial aid.

Please keep in mind that if you are receiving financial aid because of an approved appeal then you should not withdraw from any class. Also, if you withdraw from a class, the credits from that course will still be counted as attempted credits when the financial aid calculates if you pass the federal and state standards to keep receiving financial aid.

This depends on how many credits you are enrolled in and what kind of aid you are eligible for.

• Federal Aid: If you receive a Pell Grant, the grant is paid out by how many credit hours you are attending. Three to 5 credits is under half-time, 6 to 8 credits is half-time, 9 to 11 credits is three-quarters time, and 12 credits and over is full-time. Depending on how much Pell Grant you are eligible for, you could receive a grant based on your credit hours. Student loans can only be used if you are attending college at least six credits.
• State Aid (NYS TAP): TAP is for full-time students (12 credit hours and over).  Part-time TAP and Aid for Part-time Study are for part-time students (Must be registered for a minimum of 6 credit hours, and up to 11 credit hours).  You can find the Aid for Part-time Study application on our  applications and forms page labeled Aid for Part Time Study Application.