External Scholarships

External Scholarships are monetary funds provided by third-party organizations to assist with educational expenses. These scholarships do not require invoicing. If your external scholarship requires invoicing please use the Third-Party Contract Billing Process.

External Scholarship Submission

Students or scholarship providers may submit external scholarships electronically through the UChicago BackPack Portal >

Important Points:

All external scholarships submitted to the Office of the University Bursar will be included in your anticipated aid calculation.

Scholarships are reported to your Financial Aid Office for review before being disbursed directly to your student account. To ensure timely processing and that your scholarship is applied before your Bill Due Date, submit your external scholarship by the corresponding priority deadline listed below. Scholarships received after the priority deadline may be delayed, which may affect your student account balance.

term	Deadline
Autumn	September 5
Winter	December 5
Spring	March 6
Summer	June 5

External Scholarship Financial Aid Award Review and Disbursement

Once your external scholarship funds are received, your Financial Aid Office is notified. The Financial Aid Office will review your scholarship and take one of the following actions:

Prepare your external scholarship for processing (standard processing time is 2–3 weeks), or

Reject the scholarship and request that the funds be returned to the external scholarship organization.

Viewing and Processing Timeline

Once your scholarship is prepared for processing, you may view it in your Financial Aid information on your My.UChicago portal.

External scholarships are scheduled for processing throughout the academic year and are normally processed 10 days before the beginning of a quarter, provided they are received by the priority deadline.

Enrollment Changes

If you do not attend, withdraw, or reduce your enrollment, your external scholarship will be refunded directly to you.

You will be responsible for returning these funds to your external scholarship organization. For questions about how to submit your external scholarship funds, please contact the Office of the University Bursar.

For questions about your scholarships and the impact of external scholarships on your financial aid award, contact your Financial Aid Office.