Financial Assistance & Aid Limits
Q: Are we expected to report financial aid that we awarded to student-athletes during the 2020-2021 academic year, even though fall, winter, and some spring sport athletes were not charged a season of competition? (Updated October 2021)
A: Yes. Even though the student-athletes have been granted an exception that waives the season of competition, financial aid policies require institutions to report aid for students who participate. While the COVID-19 pandemic hindered students from competing and thus warranted an exception regarding seasons of competition, it does not substantially impact a school’s ability to submit financial aid reporting.
A: It will be important that NAIA members have access to financial aid data, so we’ll have to make due the best we can in this scenario. The solution, for those sports that did not actually begin to compete, is to submit financial aid data reporting on the student-athletes the coaching staff anticipated would have been varsity participants. Obviously this is not an exact science, and there will be a significant degree of trust extended to athletics directors in submitting this information. The purpose here is to ensure all NAIA members have the benefit of thorough financial aid data across all sports as viewed through the ROA Insights platform.
Please keep in mind that the definition of a countable varsity student has changed. Any student-athlete who participates in more than 20% of the maximum allowable number of varsity contests in a particular sport is considered countable.
A: Dual-sport student-athletes will still have their aid split evenly between all sports for which they competed as a varsity student-athlete in more than 20% of the contest limit in each sport. Even if the fall team was not able to begin competitions, the student’s aid can still be split with the fall/spring sport(s) in keeping with what was previously anticipated.
