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Financial Aid Policies and Procedures

Satisfactory Academic Progress (SAP)

All students who receive any type of financial aid must make satisfactory academic progress in their degree program in order to maintain continued eligibility for financial aid beyond their initial semester or year at Pace. Standards of academic progress for financial aid are defined by Pace University in accordance with guidelines established by federal or state regulation. These standards are designed to ensure that students do not continue to receive aid if they are not earning credits toward their degree and maintain a grade point average that will make it possible for them to graduate within a reasonable time frame for their level of enrollment.

The requirements for maintaining satisfactory academic progress for financial aid are different and independent from the requirements for remaining in good academic standing with the student's school or division. The student should check with his/her dean's office to ascertain what academic requirements must be met to stay in good academic standing in his/her school or division of the University. The requirements for maintaining satisfactory academic progress for financial aid are applicable to all financial aid recipients regardless of their school or division within the University or their academic standing within that school or division.

There are two separate sets of satisfactory academic progress requirements that must be met by Law financial aid recipients. The first is for students who receive any type of federal financial aid and/or aid from Pace University's own grant, scholarship, and award programs. The second set of requirements is for students who receive any type of grant or scholarship from New York State, primarily the TAP program (Tuition Assistance Program). If aid is received from New York State and federal or institutional programs, both sets of requirements must be met. All the requirements are outlined in the following sections.

Satisfactory Academic Progress Requirements for Law Students Receiving Federal and/or Pace University Funded Financial Aid

The academic progress of each Law student who is receiving financial aid will be reviewed at the end of each spring semester. The student must meet the following satisfactory academic progress requirements to receive financial aid for any subsequent semester from any of the following federal or institutional aid programs:

Federal

  • Federal Work-Study
  • Federal Direct Student Loan
  • Federal PLUS loan (PLUS loan for graduate or professional students

Institutional

  • All Pace University Scholarship programs *
  • All Pace University Grant and other Award programs *
  • Selected Pace University Tuition Remission programs

*Recipients of Pace University's various scholarships, awards, and grants must also meet the stricter requirements of these programs regarding the cumulative QPA and other criteria required to maintain continued eligibility for these academic-based programs.

Satisfactory academic progress is subject to a two-fold criterion. Students must have the required cumulative quality point average (QPA) and must pass a certain percentage of the total credits attempted. Both the required cumulative QPA and the percentage of passed credits to attempted credits increase with the number of attempted credits.

Pace Law School Satisfactory Academic Progress Standards

Cumulative Credits Attempted: 1-25
Required Percentage Passed: 50%
Minimum Cumulative QPA: 2.30

Cumulative Credits Attempted: 26-50
Required Percentage Passed: 60%
Minimum Cumulative QPA: 2.30

Cumulative Credits Attempted: 51-75
Required Percentage Passed: 65%
Minimum Cumulative QPA: 2.30

Cumulative Credits Attempted: 76-90
Required Percentage Passed:70%
Minimum Cumulative QPA: 2.30

Cumulative Credits Attempted: 91-126*
Required Percentage Passed: 70%
Minimum Cumulative QPA: 2.30

  1. The cumulative QPA (Quality Point Average) is the average of all quality points achieved for all courses taken during all semesters at Pace toward the current degree program.
  2. The following will be considered to be credits attempted and passed:
    1. Credits for courses for which the student received grades of "A" through "D"
    2. Credits for courses for which the student received grades of "P"
    3. Transfer credits accepted toward the current degree program
  3. The following will be considered to be credits attempted but not passed:
    1. Credits for courses for which the student received grades of "F"
    2. Credits for courses for which the student received an "I-F" (incomplete failure)
    3. Credits for courses for which the student received a "W" (withdrew)
    4. Credits for courses for which the student received an "I" (incomplete)
    5. Credits for courses for which the student received grades of "I-R" (if the grade of "I-R" remains for more than one major semester after the semester in which the course was taken)
    6. Credits from courses that the student has repeated. Credits for courses for which the student received grades of "K" (pending) or "AUD" (audit no credit) are not considered to be credits attempted or passed.

Special Note Regarding Repeated Courses
All courses taken at Pace are counted as attempted credits even if they have been taken again. If a student fails a course and then repeats it in a subsequent semester and receives a passing grade, the credits for the first time the course was taken are counted as attempted but not passed and the credits for the second time the course was taken are counted as attempted and passed. If the student has authorized the Student Accounts Office to recalculate the QPA after the completion of a repeated course, the grade for the first attempt at the course is not considered in the calculation of the QPA.

Special Note Regarding Withdrawals
Courses from which a student has withdrawn are counted as attempted but not passed, even though they do not figure into the calculation of the QPA. Students should consider carefully before withdrawing from courses because it does affect the student's ability to meet the standards of academic progress.

Special Note for Resuming Students
All course work toward the Law degree program at Pace University is counted when determining whether a student is making satisfactory academic progress. Students who have taken some time off from attending the University should expect their progress from semesters before they left to be included in the determination of their academic progress.

Academic Progress Waiver Provisions for Recipients of Federal and/or Pace University Funded Financial Aid

A student who is not making satisfactory academic progress may request a one-time waiver of these requirements. Waivers are granted only in cases where the student has demonstrated that the academic progress criteria were not met due to extraordinary circumstances occurring in the student's life, generally beyond his/her control. Extraordinary circumstances might include:

  1. Severe and long term illness or injury to the student making it a physical impossibility or hardship to successfully complete courses that had been started.
  2. Death of an immediate family member that creates serious emotional stress or, in some cases, serious financial stress or uncertainty.
  3. Serious emotional distress as a result of mistreatment (i.e. rape, physical abuse).

Circumstances that, generally, do not warrant an academic progress waiver include:

  1. Not liking the course or professor.
  2. Being too busy at work, particularly if it is the same job the student had before the semester started and nothing out of the ordinary has occurred in the company.
  3. Deciding after the semester starts to take some time off to work.

An Academic Progress Waiver may only be used once as an Law student, so its use should be carefully considered and timed. During the waiver period, the student must make up any academic progress deficiency. If a waiver is granted, the student will be given a maximum of two semesters to achieve satisfactory academic progress.

A waiver may be granted only when the following conditions are met:

  1. Detailed documentation must be provided to verify the extraordinary circumstances that warrant the waiver. The documentation must include an explanation of how these circumstances resulted in the loss of satisfactory academic progress and why these circumstances are not expected to cause further problems.
  2. Based on the documentation and the student's academic record, there must be a reasonable expectation that all future academic progress requirements will be met. (Please note: Successful appeals of academic standing with the dean of the student's school or division at Pace and waivers of the good academic standing requirements for New York State aid granted by the TAP coordinator's office do not constitute a waiver of academic progress for federal or institutional financial aid. In addition, documentation submitted to either the office of the academic dean or the TAP coordinator's office to support an appeal of academic standing is not shared with the Office of Student Financial Services. Students must submit such documentation separately to the Financial Aid Office when requesting an academic progress waiver for federal or institutional financial aid.)