Federal and State Grants

The Federal TEACH Grant Program provides financial assistance, through the federal student aid programs, to students while attending college, majoring in an academic program that will allow them to teach in high need subject areas, as highly qualified teachers, at Title I (low income serving) elementary or secondary schools in the United States.

The College Cost Reduction and Access Act of 2007 created the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) Grant Program that provides up to $4,000 per year in grant funds to students who intend to teach full-time in high-need subject areas for at least four years at schools that serve students from low-income families. Graduate students are also eligible for $ 4,000 per year or a total of $8,000. The amount of TEACH Grant that is awarded to students based on enrolled hours.

Since this opportunity is sponsored and administered by the U.S. Department of Education, we strongly encourage you to visit the Federal Teach Site for more detailed information regarding this opportunity.

The TEACH Grant will be available to students who are pursuing a degree leading to teacher certification and who have been admitted to teacher candidacy in the College of Education.

If you fail to complete the four-year teaching obligation, the grant will be converted to a loan and you will have to repay this loan with interest.

Effective Dates
The first TEACH Grants will be awarded to eligible students for the 2009-10 school year.

**NOTICE** All TEACH Grant awards, in which the first disbursement was made after March 1, 2013, will require a reduction, as mandated by the Budget Control Act (BCA) of 2011, passed by Congress on August 2, 2011.

General Program Requirements:
Please CAREFULLY review the “What You Need to Know before You Get a TEACH Grant”. This important fact sheet was developed by the Department of Education and can be found below:

Student Eligibility Requirements
To receive a TEACH Grant at NSU you must:

• Complete the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA), although you do not have to demonstrate financial need.
• Be a U.S. Citizen or eligible non-citizen.
• Complete the NSU TEACH Grant Request Form for each year in which the TEACH Grant is being requested.
• 2022-2023 TEACH GRANT Application
• Have a Cumulative GPA of at least 3.25 on a 4.0 scale for college work AND maintain a cumulative GPA of at least 3.25 throughout your academic program for which you receive a TEACH Grant.
• Be admitted to the College of Education teacher candidacy program.
• Complete TEACH Grant counseling with the Department of Education: https://studentloans.gov/myDirectLoan/index.action
• Sign a TEACH Grant Agreement to Serve and Promise to Pay each year with the U.S. Department of Education. (This will be available electronically on a Department of Education Website): https://studentloans.gov/myDirectLoan/index.action

TEACH Grant Agreement to Serve and Promise to Pay
Each year you receive a TEACH Grant, you must sign a TEACH Grant Agreement to Serve and Promise to Pay (service agreement) that will be available electronically on a Department of Education Web site. The TEACH Grant service agreement specifies the conditions under which the grant will be awarded, the teaching service requirements, and includes an acknowledgment by you that you understand that if you do not meet the teaching service requirements you must repay the grant as a Federal Direct Unsubsidized Loan, with interest accrued from the date the grant funds were first disbursed.

Teach Exit Counseling
TEACH Grant recipients who graduate or cease enrollment from their TEACH Grant program are required by Federal Regulations to complete the TEACH Grant Exit Counseling within 30 days of the last day of attendance. The TEACH Exit Counseling can be found on the Department of Education’s National Student Loan Data System for Students website at https://studentloans.gov/myDirectLoan/teachExitCounseling.action#!/teachExit/launch

Teaching Obligation
To avoid repaying the TEACH Grant as a loan with interest you must be a highly-qualified, full-time teacher in a high-need subject area for at least four years within eight years of finishing the program at a school serving low-income students. Specific definitions of these terms are included below:

Highly-Qualified Teacher
You must perform the teaching service as a highly-qualified teacher. The term highly-qualified teacher is defined in section 9101(23) of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 or in section 602(10) of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act.

“Highly Qualified Teachers” Revised State Plans: http://www.ed.gov/programs/teacherqual/hqtplans/index.html#la

Full-Time Teacher
You must meet the state’s definition of a full-time teacher and spend the majority (at least 51 percent) of your time teaching a one of the high-need subject areas.

High-Need Subject

• Bilingual Education and English Language Acquisition
• Foreign Language
• Mathematics
• Reading Specialist
• Science
• Special Education
• Louisiana and other state teacher shortage areas identified at the time you begin teaching. These are subject areas (not geographic areas) that are listed in the Department of Education’s Annual Teacher Shortage Area Nationwide Listing at: Teacher Shortage Areas

Schools Serving Low-Income Students
Schools serving low-income students include any elementary or secondary school that is listed in the Department of Education’s Annual Directory of Designated Low-Income Schools for Teacher Cancellation Benefits here: Teacher Cancellation Low Income (TCLI) Directory

Documentation
For each TEACH-eligible program for which you received TEACH Grant funds, you must also provide documentation to the Department of Education that you completed your teaching obligation. TEACH Grant recipients must also confirm to the Education Department in writing within 120 days of completing or otherwise ceasing enrollment in the TEACH-eligible program that they are fulfilling (or planning to fulfill) the terms and conditions of the service agreement.

Documentation of the teaching service must be certified by the elementary or secondary school’s chief administrative officer, upon completion of four academic years of teaching service. This documentation must show that you were a full-time, highly-qualified teacher at a school serving low-income students, teaching a high-need subject area for at least four years.

For more information regarding service obligation & certification and to access your TEACH Grant information visit: TEACH Grant

IMPORTANT REMINDER
Failure to complete the teaching obligation or properly document your teaching service will cause the teach grant to be permanently converted to an unsubsidized federal direct stafford loan with interest.

(Interest would accrue from the date of the original disbursement. Note: In the Federal Register (73 fr 15354) published on Friday, March 21, 2008 the Department of Education, in projecting the estimated cost of the program, indicated that data from longitudinal studies were used to estimate the percentage of recipients who graduated from college, were highly qualified, and taught in high poverty schools for four out of the eight years following graduation. Based on this data, the Department assumed 80 percent of recipients will eventually fail to fulfill their service requirements and have their grants converted into Federal Direct Unsubsidized Stafford Loans.)

Students must seriously consider the financial impact that converting these grants into loans will have on their future.