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Satisfactory Academic Progress (SAP) is the set of academic standards that all students must be meeting in order to qualify for Title IV financial aid. SAP is required for Title IV aid eligibility regardless of whether the student has previously received Title IV aid.
SAP reviews the student’s entire academic history which includes the following:
- UCF Credit Hours
- Dual Enrollment
- Transfer Credit Hours
- Transient Credit Hours
A student’s SAP status is evaluated every semester to include newly earned grades into their status. If a student is no longer meeting all SAP standards, they will receive notification to their Knights email account regarding the change in status and how the change will impact their aid eligibility for their next term of enrollment.
Satisfactory Academic Progress Standards
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Grade Point Average (GPA) Requirements
Undergraduate: Minimum 2.0 (cumulative GPA)
Graduate: Minimum 3.0 (cumulative GPA) -
Completion Ratio
Students must earn a successful grade in at least 70%* of all attempted credit hours in the student’s entire academic history.
Effective fall 2021, students must have a 67% completion ratio to meet this SAP standard.
What qualifies as a successful grade for financial aid may differ from what the college of the major considers acceptable.
- Successful completion for financial aid is defined as earning a grade of A, B, C, D or S.
- Unsuccessful completion for financial aid is defined as earning a grade of F, W, NC, I, U, X, N, WM, WP, WF, WH or IP.
Repeated coursework and grade forgiveness may both negatively impact your completion ratio. All attempts will be considered towards your ratio calculation, but only one successful completion will be considered.
Transient grades and late grade changes could also impact your completion ratio. We will determine completion ratio once a semester. Any requests to update the ratio due to grades posting after our initial determination must be made via the appeal process.
Access instructions on how to calculate your completion ratio.
Test credits (AP, IB, AICE, etc) are not automatically included in determination of your completion ratio. These credits will show as grades of “S” with the code “TE” on your degree audit, so a student’s calculation of ratio may differ from ours. Test credits can be taken into consideration via the appeal process.
*A rounding methodology is used when calculating the student’s ratio.
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Maximum Time Frame
Students must graduate within 150% of the credit hours required for completion of their degree program.
Students who reach their attempted hours limit will be placed on a cancellation status, effective the next term enrolled.
Students may not receive Title IV financial aid for courses that do not count toward program completion. This includes graduate students who should be enrolled in graduate courses only, unless the undergraduate courses have been required as prerequisites or have been approved by the department.
Graduate students must complete their degree within the attempted UCF hours limit assigned by this policy.
Students are required to graduate within the number of hours allowed by the Satisfactory Academic Progress Policy.
Students are allowed a specific number of attempted hours, based on their classification. This includes all transfer hours plus all UCF hours. See chart below.
Degree Program Maximum Time Frame Undergraduate 180* Attempted Hours Second Undergraduate 70 Attempted hours
(Not including hours attempted towards first undergraduate degree)Graduate Certificate 27 Attempted Hours
(Only including hours taken while classified as seeking grad cert)Masters 70 Attempted Hours
(Including all hours taken while classified as a graduate student)Specialist 100 Attempted Hours
(Including all hours taken while classified as a graduate student)Doctoral 120 Attempted Hours
(Including all hours taken while classified as a graduate student)*180 attempted credit hours is the maximum time frame for degree programs that require 120 credit hours for graduation. Certain degree programs require over 120 credit hours for completion so the Maximum Time Frame for these students is adjusted accordingly.
Maximum Time Frame and Multiple Degrees
Students seeking double majors and/or minors
Attempting a double major and/or a non-required minor does not exempt students from the Maximum Time Frame component of SAP. When considering additional programs students are advised to determine whether they will be able to complete all programs prior to reaching Maximum Time Frame.
Students seeking a second master’s degree
Maximum Time Frame for students seeking a second master’s is 70 total credit hours including all coursework attempted while classified as a graduate student. This includes hours attempted towards the first master’s degree and any other graduate level coursework attempted.
Third or more degrees
Students are ineligible to receive federally funded financial aid for third bachelor’s or master’s degrees regardless of SAP standing.