Chestnut Hill· Scholarship Stacking

Stacking Outside Scholarships at Chestnut Hill

How Chestnut Hill treats outside scholarships when they arrive on top of institutional merit aid.

Verified Jun 20264 days ago· COWORK

The verdict

Mixed displacement

At Chestnut Hill, an outside scholarship is treated category-by-category, where some aid stacks and some displaces. The strategy follows from that: the answer depends on which aid category the outside award lands against, so get the order in writing.

chc.edu lists First-Year Scholarship Matrix (Presidential / Distinction / Scholars / Achievement / Rise / Promise) as the baseline automatic award that any outside scholarship will sit on top of.

Stacking policy at Chestnut Hill

Outside scholarships plus institutional grant aid can never produce a refundable credit balance — if they would, CHC reduces the student's institutional funding instead. Federal overaward rules cap all aid at cost of attendance. Some named awards (Alumni Legacy, Legacy of Service) are explicitly stackable, but Legacy of Service does not stack with IDHP.

The Financial Aid Policies page states institutional funding is reduced when outside grants/scholarships plus institutional grants would create a credit balance, and that students may never receive refunds from institutional funds. It also restates the federal COA overaward rule. The types-of-aid page labels specific awards 'stackable'.

Source: https://www.chc.edu/admissions-aid/financial-aid/applying-for-aid/financial-aid-policies/

Common stacking mistakes

Assuming an outside (private) scholarship adds on top of all CHC aid.
CHC policy: outside grants/scholarships plus institutional grant funding 'can never result in a credit balance' — if they would, 'the student's institutional funding will be reduced and no refund will be credited.' Outside money can displace CHC aid once your account would go into credit.
Expecting total aid to exceed the cost of attendance.
The Financial Aid Policies page states federal regulations require all financial resources to fit within the student's COA; overawards are resolved by reducing aid, and any resulting balance is the student's responsibility.
Stacking the Legacy of Service ($4,000 Catholic-HS award) on top of the Honors Program award.
The page says Legacy of Service 'is a stackable scholarship with the exception of students in IDHP' — Honors students cannot add it.
Assuming a lost athletic grant will be replaced with other aid.
The page warns: 'If these requirements are not met the athletic grant may be rescinded. Should this happen, the rescinded athletic grants may not be replaced by other grants.'

Rules that bite at Chestnut Hill

The trip wires we'd flag in a custom playbook. Each is derived from Chestnut Hill's own published policy, not generic advice.

displacementDifferent aid types are displaced differently
Chestnut Hill treats loans, work-study, and institutional grant under different rules. The same $5,000 outside award can land against any of them depending on category.

Aid-office script (copy & send)

A binding written answer beats a verbal hallway promise. This script is keyed to Chestnut Hill's published displacement type. Paste it, fill in your name, and send it before you accept an outside award.

Subject: Outside-scholarship treatment question, fall applicant

Dear Chestnut Hill Financial Aid Office,

I'm a fall applicant reviewing how outside scholarships interact with my institutional aid package. I've read the public policy at https://www.chc.edu/admissions-aid/financial-aid/applying-for-aid/financial-aid-policies/.

Which institutional aid types are protected from outside-award displacement, and which can be reduced?

Is the displacement order published anywhere internally, even if not on the public site? Families need this to compare schools.

A written answer (email is fine) is important because the outside-scholarship awarding bodies want confirmation before disbursing. Thank you for the time.

— [Student name], [Application ID if available]

How Chestnut Hill compares across our verified dataset

86 of 751 verified schools in our dataset use mixed displacement.
Chestnut Hill is in the modest minority (86 schools share this category). That framing matters when comparing peer schools that may publish the policy differently or not at all.
669 of 751 verified schools publish at least one four-year renewable merit award.
Chestnut Hill is one of them. The cohort minority (82 schools) only awards one-year scholarships, which means the four-year value families assume on a brochure quote isn't guaranteed at every school.

Sources used on this page

Every claim is checked against Chestnut Hill’s own published materials. Below is the full reference set.