anyone on here know much about pheaa grants for pa residents? please send me link or in right direction if this is overasked question. thanks
Is your Google broken???
I literally copy/pasted your … pheaa grants…into google and easily got the link…
http://www.pheaa.org/funding-opportunities/state-grant-program/index.shtml
What did you want to know? Isn’t your son already in college? Did you qualify last year?
yes, kid is in college, mommdc, i will pm you.
ok, i will get more detailed on this thread than i care to but maybe it will help someone else down the road. first, mom2, in politeness, your comment was on the rude side. yes. my google works and i actually called pheea this afternoon, thinking they were open until 9pm. i got through and spoke with a nice young man, who forwarded me to pheea’s grant section. however, the grant section closes at 5pm. i called my son’s financial aid office twice within the last 2 weeks, only to learn they close at noon on Fridays(one of the days that i called) and i got stuck on hold for a long time the second time i called. sooooo. that is why i am here. i thought maybe some of the CC folks could help me, esp any PA residents.
this year, my kid only qualifies for a $500 subsidized loan and the rest of the loan money is unsubsidized. he does not qualify for work study. i think only the subsidized loan is considered “need” based in the financial aid world? so if im correct, is he unlikely to qualify for a pheea grant??? i have more paperwork from pheaa that we need to do and if he is unlikely to qualify for a grant anyway, i may not complete this paperwork. there is no mention in his financial aid award letter that he is expected to be eligible for a pheea grant. he is a pa resident and attends college in pa. also, if anyone who knows more about this is willing to pm me, i would prefer to message on this one, i will be glad to post general info on here as i learn more to help other Penna residents down the road. i think pa residents are going to know the most on this one and thanks!!!
There are income limits. Apparently it goes by your EFC and how much unmet need you’ve got. http://www.pheaa.org/funding-opportunities/state-grant-program/pdf/2014-2015/Program-Manual.pdf
In any case, you get to keep the lovely certificate. 
If you indeed had only $500 of need, that would make sense because I think I read somewhere that the minimum PA grant is $500. If you have EFC over $10,000 you would get a PA grant for 10% of need. The basic gist of the calculation, tuition plus fees, $1,000 for books, $4,000 for educational expenses. $32,000 max. Then subtract EFC and any Pell grant from that= need. Then percent of need met by PA grant is dependent on EFC.
For example school costs $18,000 tuition and fees, add $5,000 for other costs = $23,000
If EFC is > $10,000 then PA grant is 10% of need
$23,000 -$11,000 EFC = $12,000 need, PA grant amount would be $1,200
Anyhow, that’s how I interpreted the program manual
ok. for future people asking about pheaa, this is what i learned. pheaa wanted us to complete rest of paperwork anyway. so we did and it’s on the way to pheaa. they were very nice but could not answer my underlying question of is my kid even likely to be eligible at all until they had the missing info, which was my spouse’s SSN. as a footnote, pheaa had all of our financial data available, including spouse’s income, which was on fafsa and we sent in fafsa after we completed tax return.
we also called son’s university, which is Temple, and i mention this as other schools may handle this differently. when Temple posts its financial aid award letter, it will list its best estimate of what a pheaa grant would be. since nothing was posted in my son’s case, Temple does not expect my son to be eligible for a pheea grant. lessons from this; make sure you put both parent’s SSN’s on the FAFSA if you and/or your child is a pennsylvania resident. although FAFSA only requires one parent’s SSN, PHEAA requires both and not having both will tie up the PHEAA process. yes, it appears to be an easy fix but it still adds time to overall process. also, if you want to contact anyone for clarification, it has to be done during normal business hours. again, not suprising but it took me awhile to get hold of anyone at Temple. better to call both pheaa and a school’s financial aid office in the morning. when we get an official response from pheaa, i will repost. also, communicate with your school’s financial aid office when an issue arises. other schools may handle the pheaa grant issue differently(it sounds like some wait for a notification from pheaa before they mention the grant possibility).
yes, i realize a lot of this sounds very basic to those on the outside looking in. however, in looking up pheaa grants on CC, i found earlier posts with parents who were having trouble getting more detailed info from pheaa and asking for help so this issue comes up at times. my hope is my info here will help others down the road.
@ctl987 - Thanks for the info! I have a question. Does this mean that kids (from divorce situations) who qualified for the PHEAA grant and who used their mom’s info for FAFSA won’t get the grant if their dad has a six figure income? I know a couple of people in this boat (who oddly enough are going to Temple). They qualified for the full tuition scholarship and the reasoning was that now they’ll get both the Pell grant and the PHEAA and that will cover some of their room and board and then the parents (Dads mostly) will be easily able to cover the difference.
I don’t know, I would think however the FAFSA treats it as far as custodial parent income, PHEAA would also, but not sure. Can they try out the net price calculator at Temple and see what it comes up with?
I did not know about the soc sec number issue before @ctl987 told me. I put both our social security numbers on FAFSA. Maybe PA wants them both to verify state residency or to see if you filed a state tax return? Not sure.
i don’t know and i don’t think they’d be knocked out of the grants for this year is my best guess. i am married and i filed a joint return so im not in same situation they are regarding pheaa grant eligibility. do you know if they have gotten their financial aid letters from Temple yet? i am curious myself because if i;d like to know if Temple indicated in their financial aid letters whether they expected these students to get a pheaa grant or not. if they have their financial aid letters from temple, they for the most part should be allowed to rely on what Temple told them although there is some variability in the pheaa grants from year to year which is why the pheaa grants are only estimated at this time.
next year could be different if the fafsa captures that the non-custodial parent helped with expenses. i don’t know that it will but they should be aware of that possibility, as it could affect their financial aid eligibility, particularly for the pell and pheaa grants next year or perhaps for their junior year, depending on which semester Dad helps out. by this i mean, if Dad helps them in 2015, it might be reportable on the fafsa filed in early 2016. if he waits until spring 2016 to help out, then if it is reportable, it would be reportable on the fafsa filed in 2017. i would also suggest they get on Temple’s financial aid webpage to see if they have an ethical obligation to report any such assistance to Temple as soon as they receive it. if they have an ethical obliagation to report such help immediately and do not do so, that could backfire on them. it would probably be wise to get on the federal government’s webpage for financial aid to see how they are supposed to handle this situation as well. i imagine the federal govt discusses that scenario somewhere although it may be buried.
Regardless, Temple is a true bargain with the full tuition scholarship so they can likely make things work financially if they go to Temple. congrats to them on the stats to get the full tuition scholarship!
Also if you have included a PA 529 account as part of assets reported on FAFSA, make sure you list that and the amount on the online PHEAA grant form. They deduct that I believe for PA grant purposes.
something else occured to me. it may only be neccessary to have both parent’s SSN’s for pheaa if the parents are married and living together. For children of separated and divorced parents in pa, i would suggest checking with pheaa before you file the FAFSA to see if they need both parents’ SSN’s or they only want the SSN of the parent that you live with. i assume the grant dept would be best people to ask and they are only open til 5 EST.
as suspected, here is my son’s grant status with pheaa. “You are ineligible since you did not demonstrate sufficient financial need to qualify for a Pennsylvania State Grant.” ahhh, the joy of beaurcracy. would have prefferred to just been told by Pheaa above was strong possibility rather than make us go through extra hoops to complete paperwork.
and also, despite my grumbling on this, i think it is very cool of pa to provide these grants to say many of its residents and if pheaa uses tax revenue towards these grants, i am proud to have my tax dollars help with this.