Federal regulations treat some diploma and certificate programs differently when determining enrollment status and financial aid awards.

Wake Tech and other colleges are required to convert hours for these programs based on a federally regulated formula that usually results in lower Pell Grant payments per term. The formula is used because these programs have one or more courses that cannot be used toward a two-year associate degree.

Enrollment status determination for the affected diploma programs involves taking the "clock hours," or contact hours, a student takes in each course during a semester and dividing it by 30. These converted credits are used to determine the enrollment status, and financial aid awards are based on the converted hours, not the actual credit hours.

Example: A student is enrolled in a 3-credit-hour course that has 64 clock hours. Dividing the 64 clock hours by 30 under the regulations produces 2.13 converted hours. So, the student would be eligible for only 2 financial aid credit hours. (The number of converted hours cannot be rounded up.)

The following diploma programs at Wake Tech are affected by these regulations:

• Dental Assisting
• Magnetic Resonance Imaging
• Plumbing
• Practical Nursing

The following certificate programs at Wake Tech are affected by these regulations:

• Computed Tomography
• Esthetics Technology