UPR scholarship to offset the tuition increase

When the Fiscal Plan raised the cost per credit at the UPR and eliminated tuition waivers, the Legislature created this scholarship to close the gap between what studying costs and what the Pell Grant and other aid cover. It is the UPR’s, it comes from the yield of the Endowment Fund, and it goes to undergraduates as well as graduate students. The most important thing to understand: having Pell does not knock you out; what knocks you out is Pell and other aid completely covering your financial need.

Five requirements, all in Article 2.04. One: demonstrate financial need. Two: be enrolled in an undergraduate or graduate programme, and the Act stresses “without exclusion of programmes, campuses and professional schools of the University of Puerto Rico.” Three: have completed the FAFSA at the time of applying; if the federal Department of Education selected your application for verification, that verification must be completed at the time of the award. Four: demonstrate satisfactory academic progress, again without exclusion of programmes, campuses or professional schools. Five: be a United States citizen domiciled in Puerto Rico, or have obtained Permanent Resident status from the federal Government and be duly domiciled in Puerto Rico. On financial need, the Article 1.03 definition adds a concrete threshold: the annual adjusted gross income — yours if you are an independent student, or your family group’s if you are a dependent — must be below one hundred thousand dollars ($100,000) a year. The Act expressly includes graduate students: master’s, doctorate, postdoctorate, medicine, interns and residents, and law (Juris Doctor, Master of Laws and Doctor of Laws), among other similar professional degrees.

• Demonstrate financial need, with annual adjusted gross income — yours if independent, or your family group’s if dependent — below the one hundred thousand dollar ($100,000) annual threshold.Verified against the official source
• Be enrolled in an undergraduate or graduate programme, without exclusion of programmes, campuses or professional schools of the University of Puerto Rico.Verified against the official source
• Have completed the FAFSA at the time of applying; if it was selected for verification by the federal Department of Education, have it completed at the time of the award.Verified against the official source
• Demonstrate satisfactory academic progress under the University of Puerto Rico’s policies.Verified against the official source
• Be a United States citizen domiciled in Puerto Rico, or have obtained Permanent Resident status from the federal Government and be duly domiciled in Puerto Rico.Verified against the official source

Information pending verification.

1. 1

   Step 1: Start with the FAFSA, because without it there is nothing

   It is the third of the five requirements and the only one that depends entirely on you and a federal calendar: “Have completed the FAFSA at the time of applying for the scholarship.” The Act adds a detail that costs scholarships every year: “Any application selected for verification by the federal Department of Education must be completed at the time the scholarship is awarded.” If you were selected for verification and left it half done, having filed is not enough. The FAFSA, by its own name — Free Application for Federal Student Aid — costs nothing.

2. 2

   Step 2: Look at the hundred thousand dollar threshold

   The Article 1.03 definition of “financial need” has two parts. The first is the federal Department of Education’s congressional formula, which calculates what you need to cover your study costs based on your annual gross income and particular needs. The second is a hard number worth knowing before you rule yourself out: “the annual adjusted gross income, if classified as an independent student, or the annual adjusted gross income of the family group, if classified as a dependent student, must be below the one hundred thousand dollar ($100,000) annual threshold.” Who is dependent and who is not is determined by the federal Department of Education’s Title IV requirements, not by the UPR.

3. 3

   Step 3: Having Pell does not disqualify you

   This is the point most people miss, and the Act says it unambiguously in Article 2.04(d): “No eligible student may be disqualified from receiving any scholarship under the Scholarship Programme to Offset the Fiscal Plan Tuition Increase by reason of receiving a Pell Grant, Certificación 4, student loans or any other type of financial assistance; provided that such aid does not completely cover the eligible student’s financial need.” The condition is in the last line: what knocks you out is not having other aid, it is that aid covering your entire need. That is the whole logic of the programme, which was born precisely from the gap between tuition cost and what Pell gives.

4. 4

   Step 4: If you are a graduate student, this is yours too

   The Act reserves a quarter of the money for you. Article 2.04(c)(1) requires that available funds “must be distributed between graduate and undergraduate students, at seventy-five per cent (75%) for undergraduate students and twenty-five per cent (25%) for graduate students in programmes that have experienced increases in tuition, laboratory, fee or other related costs.” And the definition of “graduate student” is broad: master’s, doctorate, postdoctorate, medicine, interns and residents, law — Juris Doctor, Master of Laws and Doctor of Laws — “among other similar professional degrees.”

5. 5

   Step 5: How they decide who gets it: need first, grades second

   Article 2.04(b)(1) calls this a “general bivariate criterion” and orders it in two steps. First: “The eligible student’s financial need shall be used as the primary selection criterion.” Second: “Once the universe of students with financial need is identified, scholarships shall be awarded according to the academic achievement of participating students.” That is, grades do not put you in the queue; they order you within the queue once financial need has put you there.

6. 6

   Step 6: Check your institutional email every September 30

   This is the transparency piece the Act puts in your hands, not an official’s. Article 2.05(b) requires the Internal Committee to deliver, on or before September 30 each year, a report to the Legislative Assembly and to the budget Working Group, “and circulated to the entire student body of the University of Puerto Rico via UPR institutional email.” The report must carry five data points: distribution of benefits by socioeconomic profile, by financial-need profile and by academic-achievement profile of students; the financial need not covered by available aid; and total funds disbursed with undisbursed balances, identifying which account they come from. That last one is what lets you see whether money was left over.

7. 7

   Step 7: Where the money comes from, and why it matters

   It is not an annual budget line that can vanish from one year to the next. Article 2.01 orders the UPR to deposit into the Endowment Fund Trust account a minimum of one hundred twenty-five (125) million dollars, plus any other amount assigned for Fiscal Years 2021-2022 and 2022-2023 and thereafter, and the Programme is financed from the yield on that deposit. Article 2.02 creates a restricted Matching Endowment Account whose sole purpose is to supplement the scholarships “when the Trust’s yields for a given year do not reach the sum of ten (10) million dollars,” and which will cover that shortfall until the allocated funds run out. We tell you this because it explains why the scholarship can vary year to year without disappearing: it depends on the trust’s performance, with a cushion in between.

At the University of Puerto Rico. Article 2.01 orders the UPR to set the qualifying requirements and Article 2.04 refers to “the regulations, rules, circular letters [or] similar mechanisms adopted by the Governing Board,” so the concrete procedure lives there and at your campus’s financial aid office. The Internal Supervision, Management and Disbursement Committee is “the body in charge of the operation, administration and disbursement of the scholarships.” The Act publishes no form, portal, address, telephone or student deadline, and we do not invent them.

• Ruling yourself out for having a Pell Grant: the Act expressly forbids disqualifying on that basis, unless the aid completely covers your financial need.
• Believing it is only for undergraduates: twenty-five per cent of the funds go to graduate students, including medicine, residencies and law.
• Filing the FAFSA and forgetting verification: if you were selected, it must be completed at the time of the award.
• Thinking good grades put you in the queue: financial need is the primary criterion; achievement orders you within that group.
• Assuming your campus or professional school is excluded: the Act says twice “without exclusion of programmes, campuses and professional schools.”
• Ruling yourself out without checking the threshold: the annual adjusted gross income cutoff is below one hundred thousand dollars.
• Ignoring the September 30 institutional email: that is where the annual report arrives with how much was disbursed and how much need went uncovered.

These are the government pages this guide is based on.

• Portal de Servicios del Gobierno de Puerto Rico (PR.gov)

  PR.gov

  bvirtualogp.pr.gov