Conroy & Cryor Scholarships

Maryland's Conroy and Cryor Scholarship programs provide aid based on military or public safety service and to victims of 9/11 or school violence.

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Maryland's Conroy and Cryor Scholarships support students who meet the military service, 9/11, public safety employee or school employee violence victim criteria below.  

The Maryland Higher Education Commission (MHEC) establishes the award criteria, and the TU Financial Aid Office processes applications based on their guidelines.

Categories that Require MD Residency

  • A student veteran who is a current MD resident who suffered a disability of 25% or greater as a result of U.S. military service and has exhausted or is no longer eligible for federal veterans’ educational benefits.
  • A student veteran who was a Maryland resident when declared a U.S. POW/MIA of the Vietnam conflict or their children or stepchildren who were born before or while they were a POW/MIA.
  • Children, stepchildren or the surviving spouse (who has not remarried) of a person from any of the three categories below. 

For the three categories below, the student applicant must be a current MD resident, or your family member must have been a MD resident when the qualifying event occurred.

  • a U. S. Armed Forces service member who died or suffered a 100% permanent disability as a result of his/her service
  • a Maryland public or private school employee who as a result of an act of violence died or was rendered 100% disabled in the line of duty
  • a Maryland resident who was killed as a result of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center, the Pentagon or the crash of United Airlines Flight 93

Categories that Don’t Require Maryland Residency

  • a state or local public safety employee* or volunteer who was 100% disabled in the line of duty
  • children, stepchildren or the surviving spouse (who has not remarried) of a state or local public safety employee or volunteer in Maryland who died or was 100% disabled in the line of duty

*Public safety employees include persons employed or serving as volunteers in Maryland fire departments, ambulance or rescue company or squads; law enforcement or correctional officers; and members of the Maryland National Guard who were Maryland residents at time of death or disability.

Other Requirements

  • Recipients must enroll at least half-time to receive an award for that term (6 units for undergrads and most graduate students and 3 units for doctoral students).
  • You must be pursuing a bachelor’s, master’s, or doctoral degree; or a graduate certificate program.
  • All recipients must be at least 16 years old.
  • Recipient awards may be renewed for up to 5 years of full-time enrollment or 8 years of part-time enrollment or a combination of both. 

Application Process and Deadlines

  • First-time TU applicants should immediately submit a complete application and all required documents. Funding is very limited, and MHEC requires us to select recipients based on the order we receive complete applications.
  • If funds aren’t exhausted earlier, the final application deadline will be July 15  of each year. We can never accept applications after that date.
  • If you are a previous Conroy/Cryor recipient at TU and received a Spring 2026 Conroy/Cryor payment at TU, you do not need to reapply. If you didn't receive a spring payment at TU, you should immediately reapply because funding is very limited.

Application Submission Options

  • Upload all documents using the Financial Aid Document Submission Form or fax them to 410-704-2584.
  • Combine all documents into a single PDF document.
  • Don’t email your application. Our email system will reject it because of the SSN in Section B.

Recipient Selection

After we receive your application, we will notify you if it is complete, but we won’t start awarding any recipients until we receive 26-27 recipient selection guidance from MHEC.

Scholarship Amount Limits

In recent years, because of statewide increases in Conroy/Cryor recipients, the annual Conroy/Cryor payments drastically exceeded the annual state Conroy/Cryor budget. In prior years, the extra spending was paid from supplemental state funding. Because state law was recently revised to limit annual spending based on the state’s annual Conroy/Cryor budget allocation, MHEC has implemented new spending limits. Because these new spending limits are more than 50% lower than last year, Conroy Scholarship amounts decreased. 

New Recipient Amounts — After Spring 2026

For TU students who receive their first Conroy/Cryor Scholarship award after Spring 2026, the maximum annual TU Conroy/Cryor scholarship amount for new recipients will be $3,000 per year ($1,500 per semester).

These limits will apply to these new recipients for 26-27 and future award years, but future award amounts could change because MHEC scholarships are subject to state and MHEC budget restrictions.

Legacy Recipient Amounts — Before Fall 2026

Students who received their first Conroy/Cryor scholarship payments at TU before Fall 2026 will receive the slightly higher award amounts below because their previous awards were higher. The 2026-27 limit below are based on MHEC’s budget allocation to TU and our total projected 2026-27 Conroy/Cryor scholarship payments. During the fall semester, we will reevaluate our total projected Conroy/Cryor payments for fall 2026 and spring 2027. If those projected payments are significantly higher or lower than MHEC’s budget allocation to TU, we will change the spring 2027 award amounts. Future award amounts could change because MHEC scholarships are subject to state and MHEC budget restrictions.

Enrollment level Semester LIMIT ANNUAL LIMIT
Full-time $2,600 $5,200
3/4 time $1,950 $3,900
1/2 time $1,500 $3,000

Additional Limits

Conroy/Cryor Scholarship amounts also can’t exceed all these additional MHEC limits:

  • They can’t exceed total tuition and mandatory academic fees.
  • They can’t cover tuition or fees from audited courses.
  • They can’t cover any other costs, such as campus housing or meal plan charges.
  • For 2026-27, your total combined financial aid from all sources can't exceed your TU Cost of Attendance Budget, or $32,200, whichever is less.
  • For September 11 attack victims, your combined Conroy scholarship and all other 9/11 scholarships you receive from any other sources can’t exceed the limits in the bullet above.
  • Statewide, there’s a 15 student per year cap for student veterans with a 25% or greater disability.

Questions

For questions contact the TU Financial Aid Office, Scholarship Unit at 410-704-4634 or .