Students are required to report all scholarships to the school. There are reasons for this. People typically say that the total of all aid cannot exceed COA. If there is any federal aid awarded at all, this is true … but it can also be true if there is no federal aid (and yes, there have been instances in which students have been able to receive aid that exceeded COA, but that is frankly too rare to bother discussing here).
Students who receive any kind of federal aid, including unsubsidized loans, cannot receive more than the school’s published cost of attendance (COA). Any federal aid (including loans) would have to be reduced if the total of all scholarships + federal aid exceeds COA. (Currently, a student could theoretically receive a full ride + Pell, but this very rarely occurs for several reasons, including school and association awarding policies that will reduce those awards in the amount of Pell received.)
Students who receive any aid from a school cannot receive more than the school’s COA. The school will reduce its aid if outside scholarships + school aid exceeds COA. There could possibly be a school that doesn’t do this, but I am not aware of any … but they would only be able to do this if the student isn’t receiving any federal aid, including loans. Pell could theoretically put them over COA … but every school I know has a policy that mirrors the federal policy of reducing its own aid to avoid all aid exceeding COA.
Students who are only receiving outside scholarships must still report these scholarships to the school. Some outside scholarships have a policy that they can only be used to cover tuition or that they can’t cover costs in excess of COA. I used to process these scholarships, and I often had to certify the total of tuition-only scholarships received or how much aid the student had already received.