Tuition Assistance

Tuition assistance can be awarded to qualifying families for student tuition, Kindergarten through 12th grade. Preschool tuition is not eligible for assistance.

The award of tuition assistance is subject to the availability of funds.

In addition to K-12 tuition, SAS tuition is considered in the tuition assistance evaluation. Receipt of tuition assistance does not exempt families from the Bellevue Christian Payment & Withdrawal policy.

All families are expected to participate financially in their student’s education. Families who receive tuition assistance will have tuition responsibility ranging from 30% to 99% of annual tuition. Applying for tuition assistance does not guarantee assistance will be awarded.

Tuition assistance is only available to families whose students are citizens of the United States.

Tuition accounts must be current to be considered for assistance.

BCS does not discriminate against economic status and invites families to apply for aid. The tuition assistance process is independent of the admissions process. Tuition assistance applications and documents can be submitted at the same time as admissions applications, but students must be admitted and enrolled (including payment of the non-refundable enrollment fee) before the tuition assistance application will be reviewed.

Feel free to begin your tuition assistance application for the next school year any time after October 1. However, the earliest a completed application could be reviewed would be January of the coming year because Bellevue Christian requires the most recent year’s tax documents as part of the application. Your application will be complete after you have filed your returns and uploaded the required tax documents on the SSS website.

Generally, families who submit completed tuition assistance applications by mid-April will receive notification of award status prior to tuition invoice billing for the coming school year. If more information or documentation is required, the finance office will notify the applicants, but communication of results could be delayed.

Families with overdue tuition accounts will not receive tuition assistance awards until the balance is brought current.

There are several dates to keep in mind:

• If your student is considering application for a need-based scholarship, your tuition assistance application must be received by April 15, 2023. (All scholarship applications are due April 15.)
• Enrolling and applying for assistance after May 1, 2023:  Keep in mind that annual tuition is due May 1, 2023 and that annual tuition paid by installment is due May 1, 2023 to February 1, 2024. Families making application for enrollment and applying for assistance after the start of tuition installment cycle should anticipate paying the full tuition installments for each month of the tuition cycle that has passed regardless of potential assistance that may be granted. Tuition payment would be immediately due and must be made prior to the student’s start of classes.
  >> For example, if a family enrolls mid-August, full tuition installments for May, June, July and August would be due, in addition to the enrollment fee.
  
  When the completed tuition assistance application is reviewed, the family’s tuition responsibility is communicated. Any assistance granted would be from the date of the award decision and would not applied to tuition installments already paid.

Tuition assistance is awarded based on a family’s ability to pay tuition which is determined through a detailed financial report submitted by the family to School & Student Services (SSS), a service of the National Association of Independent Schools (NAIS). (A supplemental application is submitted directly to Bellevue Christian.) SSS serves the tuition assistance departments of hundreds of private schools across the country, including Bellevue Christian. To determine the family’s ability to pay tuition, SSS applies a standardized method of evaluation that considers income, assets, extraordinary expenses, and some forms of indebtedness, along with family size, the number of children attending tuition-charging schools, the regional Consumer Price Index, and other factors. Once the family’s financial report is submitted to SSS, a report identifying the family’s ability to pay tuition is made available to the school. The BCS Financial Aid Committee then confirms the family’s qualification for, and makes an award of, tuition assistance. Families who do not qualify for assistance are notified upon confirmation by the Committee.

BCS endowed scholarships are awarded through the scholarship application process to qualifying student applicants. Most of the scholarships are need-based; some are merit-based. If the student is applying for a need-based BCS scholarship, the student’s parents or guardians must also apply, and qualify, for tuition assistance. Information about each scholarship can be found on the BCS scholarship page.