Student Financial Aid Resources

If you anticipate having unneeded funds for a future disbursement (not applied to your tuition bill yet), contact your Student Financial Aid Coordinator to cancel or reduce the upcoming disbursement at least fifteen days before your semester begins.

Within the first 120 days of when the loan was disbursed to your tuition account, a school may return unneeded Federal Direct Loans back to the government on a student's behalf. Funds returned within this timeframe will have interest accrual and loan fees eliminated. However, it may take up to two weeks for a return request to be fully processed and returned, so MUSC's practice is to ask students who wish for MUSC to return excess loans on their behalf to submit the form linked below within 106 days of disbursement.

Students may, of course, return funds on their own at any time but loans returned directly by students to their loan servicer are not reflected in a student's updated award letter, and any loans returned after 120 days will still incur interest and fees.

1. Complete the Request to Return Loan Funds Form and send to your Financial Aid Coordinator.
2. Your loans will be returned to the lender.
3. Plan ahead. Please do not wait until the last minute to submit your Return of Funds Form. Allow up to two weeks for processing the Return of Loan Funds through the school.

If you are returning a borrowed amount more than 106 days after disbursement you will need to make that payment directly to your loan servicer. Your loan servicer is assigned to you by the US Department of Education. Loan Servicer information can be found at Federal Student Aid under the My Loan Services section on the main account dashboard.

Borrowers of private loans should contact their Lender directly on their specific procedure of returning unneeded loan funds to them.

IRS Tax Benefits for Education: Information Center

The federal government offers tax incentives when you or your parents pay for college through tax credits (direct reduction of tax liability) and tax deductions (reduction of the amount of income on which you pay taxes), if you meet certain conditions. While MUSC cannot provide you with tax advice, we urge you to contact the IRS or your personal tax adviser to determine if you are qualified to claim these tax credits and deduction.

Federal Tax Credits

• American Opportunity Tax Credit
• Lifetime Learning Credit

South Carolina Tax Credits

SC Tuition Tax Credit

Tax Deductions

• Tuition and Fees or Student Loan Interest deduction
• 1098-T Statements

Schools send the 1098-T form to any student who paid “qualified educational expenses” in the preceding tax year. Students may download the information from Heartland ECSI annually or contact the Bursar’s office for assistance in obtaining the form.

• IRS Publication 970 (Tax Benefits for Education)
• Tax Benefits for Higher Education