Contact
Financial Aid Office
Location
Hours
Monday – Friday 8:00 to 4:30
To avoid deadline penalties, you must complete all of these tasks within two weeks of your Award Notification date.
Please opt-in to our new financial aid text service to receive important reminders about aid deadlines and missing application items.
You can opt-out at any time by replying STOP to any message. We can't receive text messages, and we will continue to send most aid notices to your TU email address.
Your Award Guide explains your aid offers, how they were calculated and the conditions of your awards. You are required to read this because it explains your aid responsibilities and the terms of your awards.
Federal law prohibits TU from discussing your financial aid with your parents or others without your authorization. To grant authorization, please complete our Release of Financial Information Form, which is available from Forms & Online Services.
Attention Maryland residents — If the Maryland Higher Education Commission (MHEC) offers you any of these state aid programs, they will notify you directly. To review and accept MHEC aid offers, you must visit their MDCAPS web site.
Your Award Notification lists the maximum amounts you can borrow from the Federal Direct Subsidized and Unsubsidized Loan programs.
Parents of dependent students can also borrow PLUS Loans. The maximum PLUS loan amount = your Cost of Attendance Budget minus all your other financial aid.
You can borrow loans to cover both your TU charges and your other living and personal expenses. To calculate how much you need to borrow for this academic year (Fall & Spring), compare your total grants/scholarships to your estimated costs. To estimate your costs, review our estimated Cost of Attendance Budgets or review our current rates for tuition, room, and board.
Direct subsidized loans have the lowest interest rates and do not accrue interest while you are enrolled at least half-time. Direct unsubsidized loans have the next lowest rates, and Parent PLUS Loans have the highest interest rates. Private loan interest rates vary based on lender and credit scores.
The following loan origination fees will be deducted from federal loans with first disbursements between 10/1/2020 and 9/30/2023.
Every year, you must accept/decline your loan offers and choose your loan amounts at Towson Online Services.
If this is the first time you are borrowing a direct loan at TU do the following:
If you need to change your loan amount after you accept it, submit a TU Loan Change Form from Forms & Online Services.
If your parent wants to borrow a PLUS Loan, please follow our PLUS loan instructions. For information on maximum PLUS loan amounts, see step 4 above.
If your Award Notification offered you a Federal Work-study (FWS) award, then please review the Federal Work-Study Program information. If you think you may be interested in pursuing a FWS job, then accept the award in step 3 above and follow the job search instructions on the FWS program page.
If your Award Notification did not offer you any FWS funds, then you can’t earn FWS funds, but you can still pursue many other part-time jobs on and off-campus. Visit the Career Center’s Student Employment page.
It is extremely important that you regularly check your TU student email. We only send most aid notices to your email account. You (the student) must read all aid emails and complete all aid tasks. You must notify your parents of any requests for parent data.
If you already have a non-TU email account that you check regularly, we strongly encourage you to forward all your TU email to that account. Follow these Gmail forwarding instructions.
New items may be added each week as we process your file. Please submit or request all To Dos items within two weeks of our first request.
If your To-Dos list requests verification documents, promptly submit the worksheet and IRS tax documentation. Please act promptly! It can take over six weeks after you request tax data to receive the required documentation from the IRS.
Late documents can lead to canceled aid offers, a $150 late payment fine and can delay financial aid refunds.
On your FAFSA, what housing status did you list for TU?
If your TU housing status changes at any time, you must notify TU and MHEC.
To notify TU, you must submit a Housing Verification Form from Forms & Online Services.
If you have any state aid from MHEC, you must also update your housing status in their MDCAPS system.
If yes, you must submit a Notice of Additional Resources Form from Forms & Online Services. Examples of aid include private scholarships, and tuition waivers.
See Special Financial Conditions.
The Student & University Billing Office will bill you for one term at a time. Your online eBill will include tuition, fees, and other miscellaneous charges for each term. If you will live on campus, it will also include room and meal plan charges.
To grant your parent(s) or others access to your bill data, please visit eBill & Online Payment for instructions on How to Set Up an Authorized User and How To add an Alternative Email for eBill Notifications.
For more information about billing and payments, please visit the Student & University Billing Office.
When we disburse your aid, we will automatically use it to pay all of your TU charges for this term unless you choose to restrict which charges we can pay with your aid funds by submitting the optional TU Use of Funds form. See Forms & Online Services.