Apply For West Virginia (WV) Promise Scholarship 2024/2025

Apply For “West Virginia (WV) Promise Scholarship 2024/2025“.

West Virginia Scholarship: The WV Promise Scholarships is a merit-based financial aid programme awarded by College Foundation of West Virginia for the residents of West Virginia.

The award amount is $4,750 which covers both the cost of tuition and mandatory fees at public or private institutions in West Virginia.

Awards are always contingent upon annual funding of the programme by the West Virginia Star Legislature.

Requirements For WV Scholarship

The academic requirements for the Promise Scholarship are:

1. Applicant must complete a high school graduation requirement at a West Virginia private or public high school.
2. Applicant must complete at least one half of the credit required for a high school graduation.

• Limited exceptions for West Virginia Students who commute on daily basis to an out of state private or public high school and qualifies as a military dependent under Section 6 of the Promise Scholarship Program Rule.

3. Applicants must achieve an average cumulative grade point of 3.0 on a 4.0 scale or whatever that is considered a “B average, based on county board grading policies in both overall coursework required for graduation by West Virginia Department of Education and core courses.

• Applicants attending private high schools must submit a grade report form to be eligible. Private high school officials ensure and verify if grades were maintained through the final semester. Unlike private high schools, public high-schools students do not submit the grade report forms unless otherwise requested.

• Applicants may qualify with sixth or seventh-semester grades but must try to maintain the grade point average requirement through the eighth semester or the scholarship will be revoked.

• The core grade point average is always determined based on the grades in all core courses a student completes on the core class listing, not just the ones required for graduation.

• Grade point average calculations must be determined by a school official or high school counsellor.

• Students who use final grades to meet their eligibility are responsible for having their grade report sent to form an official transcript sent to the office of the West Virginia Higher Education Grants by their school for consideration.

• If a student does not have a qualifying sixth or seventh-semester grade point average, they must apply and have a completed FAFSA submitted by the March 1 deadline to be considered.

• Weighted grades may be used based on county board grading policy.

Dual Credit and other College Courses

A student can take an unlimited amount of dual credit coursework before college enrollment and still stand eligible for the award.

Credit hours earned before the first fall semester of enrollment will not be counted toward the credit hour requirement especially in determining eligibility for award renewal.

Homeschool applicants must provide documentation of their home school status from their county school board office. The documentation Webpagepdf.com should be able to show that the applicant was homeschooled during the 11th and 12th grades.

Host Nationality

Promise Scholarship is a merit-based financial aid programme awarded by College Foundation of West Virginia for the residents of West Virginia.

Eligible Nationalities

Promise Scholarship requires that the student must have resided in West Virginia for twelve consecutive months continuously preceding the PROMISE Scholarship deadline unless a member of armed services or a military dependent under Section 6 of the PROMISE Scholarship Program Rule.

Scholarship Worth

The Promise Scholarship pays $4,650 per year or the cost of mandatory fees and tuition, according to the one that is less at any eligible institution. The award payment is made directly to the West Virginia University or College of the student’s choice.

The funds can be used in eligible four-year and two-year institutions in the State of West Virginia. The institution’s funds can only be used to pay for undergraduate coursework that applies to the student’s academic program.

A bachelor’s degree-seeking student is eligible to receive this Promise Scholarship for no more than 8 semesters of a four-year degree program.

A student who is seeking an associate degree is eligible to receive a Promise Scholarship of not more than 4 semesters of a two-year degree program.

Students who wish to transition from a two-year degree program to a four-year degree program must be able to achieve the renewal requirements after their second year to continue scholarship eligibility.

Eligibility

An applicant will need to satisfy the following requirement to stand eligible for the Promise Award:

Minimum Test Score Requirements

Must meet standardized test score criteria on ACT or SAT national test by the July test date for ACT and June test date for the SAT of the application year.

• ACT Score requirement: 22 composite scores with a minimum of 20 in English, Mathematics, Science, and Reading.

• SAT Score requirement:

  • Total score 1100.
  • Math 520.
  • Evidence-Based Reading and Writing 530.
  • The SAT writing portion is not included in the calculation of the composite score.
• Scores must be from a single testing date and cannot be combined from multiple test administrations.
• Students must submit an application and FAFSA by the deadline, even if they have not met the required testing scores by the March 1 deadline.

Homeschooled Applicants

With regards to the Class of 2019, homeschooled applicants must achieve a cumulative grade point average of at least a 3.0 on a 4.0 scale or whatever is considered a “B” average in both core courses AND overall coursework required for graduation.

• Homeschooled applicants must submit a homeschooled grade report form and a transcript to qualify.
• The Core grade point average is determined based on the grades in all core courses a student completes on the core class listing, not just those required for graduation.
• Applicants who missed the deadline may be eligible for a late award to begin the following Spring term of the application year, dependent though on the availability of funding.
• A student can only apply for the scholarship award within their 2 years if graduation from high school. However, a student who joined the United States armed services is lifted from this term pursuant to Section 5 of the Promise Scholarship Program Rule.
• Only full-time first-year students can receive the initial award.

The student must complete the minimum core class requirement.

The core course requirements include:

• English- 4 credits
• Mathematics- 4 credits
• Social sciences- 4 credits
• Natural sciences- 3 credits.

Homeschool applicants must provide documentation of home-schooled status from your county school board office. Documentation must show that you were homeschooled during the 11th and 12th grades.

Eligible Commuter Applicants Only

Eligible commuter applicants must submit their grade report form and transcript to qualify. The grade report forms must be submitted by a high school counselor or school official and can be found under forms.

The eligible commuters must also provide documentation from a high school counselor or school counselor that they commuted on daily basis to an out of state high school.

If you are taking the ACT/SAT in a state other than West Virginia, an official score must be sent to our office.

• ACT code: 4539
• SAT code: 3456

Military Dependents/ Armed Services Members Only

Provide documentation of military status.

Military dependent applicants must submit a grade report form, an official transcript to qualify.

Grade Report Forms can be found at https://secure.cfwv.com/Financial_Aid_Planning/Scholarships/Promise/Forms.aspx and must be submitted by a high school counselor or school official.

Military dependent/ Armed Services Member applicants must submit verification of maintaining legal residence in West Virginia while serving in the United States armed forces while the student attended high school.

If you are taking the ACT/SAT in a state other than West Virginia, an official score must be sent to our office.

• ACT code: 4539
• SAT code: 3456

The West Virginia Promise Scholarship Renewal Requirement and Procedures:

It is very important that one understands the requirement for renewal because once the scholarship is lost, one cannot regain it at a later time.

For a student to have the WV Promise Scholarship renewed or retained each year, the student must maintain an average cumulative grade point of 2.75 on a 4.0 scale the first year and then an average cumulative grade point of 3.0 in the subsequent years.

A student who received a two-semester award in an academic year must complete and earn a minimum of 30 credit hours in every 12 months.

But if a student receives a single semester award, the student only gets to complete and earn a minimum of 15 credit hours in the academic year. Scholars are not required to be full time or meet renewal during their last two semesters of scholarship eligibility.

However, Scholars may use the subsequent summer sessions to meet the requirements for renewal, but at their own expense.

Eligibility for renewal is also determined by the student’s institution, and according to the institutional grading policy at the end of an academic calendar. It usually takes a 12 month period to start calculating renewal.

The 12 month period begins with the fall semester and ends with the summer semester.

How to Apply

To apply for the West Virginia Scholarship, you must first create a West Virginia Student Aid Management (WVSAM) Account online to submit your application.
An applicant submits a completed by March 1, 2019, to be eligible for the 2019/2020 awards.

An applicant’s FASFA must meet the required conditions for processing by March 1 deadline.

Students have only 6 years from the date awarded to utilize the Promise award unless of course, they are enrolled in the military and then the time is extended.

Applicants for West Virginia Promise Scholarship awards are strongly urged to perform at least 20 hours of unpaid community service while in high school and college. The community service may include, but is not limited to, participating with non-profit, governmental, institutional or community-based organizations designed to improve the quality of life for community residents, meet the needs of community residents or foster civic responsibility.

You can click on PROMISE Scholarship website at cfwv.com for an in-depth review of this great opportunity and current scholarship criteria.

PROMISE Scholarship Program Contact Information

West Virginia Higher Education Policy Commission
Division of Financial Aid
1018 Kanawha Blvd. East, Suite 700
Charleston, WV 25301

Phone: (304) 558-4618 or 1 (877) 987-7664
Email: [email protected]
Fax: (855) 292-1415