To be eligible for financial aid, graduate students must meet those criteria as outlined on the Eligibility page of the Financial Aid Office website.
To apply for financial aid, students must complete the following steps:
- Obtain a Federal Student Aid ID (FSA ID) from the U. S. Department of Education at fsaid.ed.gov. If you have misplaced your original FSA ID. Please visit FSA ID website for assistance.
- Complete and submit a Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) at www.fafsa.ed.gov. SUNY Poly’s Federal School Code is 011678.
Students are encouraged to complete the FAFSA as soon as possible after January 1. Students can submit the FAFSA using estimated adjusted gross income and income tax paid values. Upon submission of your official, completed federal tax return to the IRS, please update the FAFSA to show the actual amounts reported to the IRS.
If your federal taxes have already been completed and filed with the IRS, please use the “IRS Data Retrieval Tool” when completing the FAFSA. This will allow you to bring certain income/tax information from the IRS website into your FAFSA. Note that your taxes must have been submitted/processed by the IRS at least 3 weeks previously if filed electronically and 8 weeks if sent to the IRS by mail.
Complete information about the financial aid application process is available on the Financial Aid Office website under Apply for Financial Aid area.
The primary responsibility for meeting educational costs rests with the student and his/her family. The SUNY Poly Financial Aid Office uses the expected family contribution (EFC) generated from the FAFSA as the basis for the student/family contribution.
SUNY Poly gives priority in the awarding of financial aid to those students with the greatest financial need. Financial need is determined by subtracting the expected family contribution from the student’s estimated cost of attendance.
While SUNY Poly does not have a deadline for applying for financial aid, we encourage our students to apply by March 1 each year. Applications are processed on a rolling basis starting in early March.
A financial aid award letter will be sent to each student who has been accepted and whose financial aid application is complete.
The U.S. Department of Education randomly selects some financial aid applicants to be verified. In those cases, the Financial Aid Office will request additional documents including an institutional verification worksheet and W2 forms. If you were unable to use the IRS Data Retrieval Tool when completing the FAFSA, an IRS Tax Transcript will also be required. These documents must be reviewed and necessary corrections made before financial aid is awarded.
If there has been a significant decrease in the student’s income from the prior year, a Special Condition form may be submitted to the Financial Aid Office along with supporting documentation. The Financial Aid Office may be able to use the current year’s estimated income rather than the prior year’s actual income to determine your eligibility for federal financial aid.