GC Guarantee FAQ:
- Who is eligible to receive the scholarship?
- Any student who is Pell grant-eligible when they come to GC and who maintains at least a 2.5 cumulative GPA at GC will receive the GC Guarantee Scholarship.
- Are transfer students eligible to receive the GC Guarantee?
- Yes, so long as they meet both the Pell eligibility requirement when they begin at GC and the GPA requirement at the end of each Fall term.
- What if I start in the Spring term? Will I get the scholarship the first year?
- Yes. Students who start in the Spring and are Pell grant-eligible will immediately receive the GC Guarantee on the financial aid package for the following fiscal year without regard to the GPA requirement. In subsequent years, though, they must have a cumulative GPA of at least 2.5 to receive the scholarship.
- How will I see this scholarship show up on my financial aid package?
- The scholarship will not show up during a student’s freshman year, but for each subsequent year at GC, a scholarship will appear that is equal to all tuition increases since the first year that the student arrived. The effect is that the cost of tuition will not increase for four years.
- What if I don’t graduate in four years?
- All GC scholarships are only guaranteed for four years, but students can appeal to receive scholarships for an additional year. If granted, this appeal would apply to the GC Guarantee Scholarship as well.
- When does the GC GPA need to be at least a 2.5 cumulative?
- All current students are packaged for the upcoming academic year during the Spring semester; therefore the cumulative GPA that will be evaluated will be at the end of the previous Fall semester. If the student achieves a 2.5 cumulative GPA at the end of the Fall term, then they will receive/continue to receive the scholarship. Similarly, if a student falls below a 2.5 cumulative GPA at the end of the Fall semester, but then achieves at least a 2.5 cumulative GPA after the Spring or a Summer term, the student will not be eligible for the GC Guarantee Scholarship for the following fiscal aid year.
- What is a cumulative GPA?
- The cumulative GPA, or Grade Point Average, is a way of quantifying how a student is doing overall at GC. Only classes taken at GC are calculated in the cumulative GPA. Very roughly, a 4.0 is equivalent to an overall A, a 3.0 to an overall B, a 2.0 to an overall C, and a 1.0 to an overall D. A 2.5 cumulative GPA is equivalent to a BC grade.
- What happens if my cumulative GPA drops below a 2.5?
- The GC Guarantee scholarship will not be applied for the following year, but no scholarship that has already been applied will be removed. In other words, if a student in her first year fails to achieve a 2.5 GPA at the end of the fall term, then she will not receive the GC Guarantee for the second year and would need to pay any increase in tuition and fees. If a student in his third year, however, has already had the GC Guarantee Scholarship applied twice (once going into the second year, and again for the additional increase going into the third year), then fails to achieve a 2.5 GPA at the end of the Fall term in that third year, then he would not receive any additional GC Guarantee scholarship to cover any increase in tuition and fees going into his fourth year, but he would not lose the GC Guarantee scholarship that he earned in his first two years.
- What if I drop below a 2.5 GPA and lose the scholarship, but then get above a 2.5 by the end of a subsequent Fall? Can I earn the scholarship back once I’ve lost it?
- If a student earns less than a cumulative 2.5 GPA at the end of a given fall, he will not have the GC Guarantee scholarship applied for the following fiscal aid year. However, if in a subsequent fall, the student’s cumulative GPA reaches or exceeds a 2.5 again, then that student would receive a GC Guarantee scholarship equivalent to any increase in tuition and fees for the following year. The reapplied scholarship would not cover any increase that occurred while the student was not eligible to receive the scholarship. In other words, while the student’s tuition and fees would likely have gone up a bit during the time when he was not eligible to receive the scholarship, tuition and fees would then effectively “freeze” at that new rate moving forward if the student meets the GPA requirements again.
- Does the GC Guarantee cover potential increases in Room and Board (housing and food) as well?
- No. This scholarship is designed to cover tuition increases, and therefore any increase in room and board will not be covered by this scholarship.
Please contact Financial Planning with any other questions regarding eligibility