Skip Navigation
Register
Search Box Form
After Navigation
Home » Financial Terms Glossary

Financial Terms Glossary

Finance & Financial aid terms can be an alphabet soup of acronyms like FAFSA, SAR, SAP and EFC and technical terminology. It is almost like speaking a foreign language. This glossary defines the terms and acronyms that are most frequently used in basic finance or student financial aid.

Edvisors® allows the use of its glossary content by any college, university, non-profit, or other educational access agency, if the content is linked from the Edvisors® page. At any time Edvisors® may limit use per its Terms of Use policy.

S&P 500

A widely followed stock market index that follows the performance of the 500 largest companies listed on US stock exchanges.

Safety School

A safety school is a college or university where the student’s academic performance falls above the range of academic performance of the school’s typical freshman class. A student is likely to be admitted to a safety school.

SAFRA

Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act

Salutatorian

The salutatorian gives the introductory speech at a graduation ceremony. The salutatorian is usually the second-highest ranked student in a class of students.

SAP

Satisfactory Academic Progress

SAR

Student Aid Report

SAR Acknowledgement

If you filed your FAFSA online but did not provide a valid email address, you will receive a paper SAR Acknowledgement by mail after your FAFSA is processed. Like the SAR (Student Aid Report), the SAR Acknowledgement includes a summary of the information you submitted on your FAFSA as well as your expected family contribution (EFC). To make corrections to your SAR Acknowledgement, log in to FAFSA on the Web at FAFSA.ed.gov.

SAT

Previously called the Scholastic Assessment Test and Scholastic Aptitude Test, this college admissions test is now known as just the SAT.

Satisfactory Academic Progress

Satisfactory academic progress, or SAP, is a measure your school uses to determine your eligibility for financial aid. Yor school will monitor both your quantitative and qualitative progress. Essentially, they are looking for you to maintain a certain GPA and that you are making progress toward your degree. While the U.S. Department of Education has set minimum requirements, it allows your school to have a stricter policy. If your school’s policy is stricter than the U.S. Department of Education, your school rules would be the requirements you need to achieve.

At a minimum, your school must ensure you maintain at least a C average (2.0 GPA on a 4.0 scale) and for you to be making progress toward a degree or certificate that is consistent with graduation within 150 percent of the normal timeframe for completion.

If you fail to maintain SAP, you could lose financial aid eligibility. If you find yourself failing SAP you will need to work through your school’s procedures to appeal the decision to reinstate your eligibility. If you successfully appeal, you will need to stick with your school’s requirements to return to good standing.

 

Satisfactory Repayment Arrangement

A satisfactory repayment arrangement is an agreement between a borrower and a lender to repay a defaulted or delinquent debt, such as making a certain number of consecutive, on-time, voluntary, full, reasonable and affordable monthly payments.
Read Related Content:

Saving

Income not spent on current consumption or taxes Savings account – an interest-bearing deposit account at a banking establishment that is not typically used for transactions and has no maturity date Scarcity – the condition that arises whenever limited resources are insufficient to provide for peoples' basically unlimited wants Short-term goal – a goal that a person or organization plans to achieve in less than one year Smart card – a plastic card, usually about the size of a credit card, which has been embedded with a microchip that manages and processes information. Because of the chip, the card can handle multiple applications such as personal identification, banking, and use in pay phones. The cards make it easy to carry data. They provide high data security and offer great convenience to users. 

SAY

Scheduled Academic Year

SC

Student Contribution

SCA

Student Contribution from Assets

Scholarship

A scholarship is a form of gift aid, money that does not need to be repaid. Scholarships are usually awarded by private organizations (e.g., foundations, corporations, associations, individual philanthropists and nonprofit organizations) based on some form of merit, such as academic, artistic or athletic talent, or activities, such as community service. Also called Private Scholarships or Outside Scholarships.
Read Related Content:

Scholarship Matching Service

A scholarship matching service matches a student’s background profile against a database of scholarships to identify the scholarships for which the student is eligible.

Scholarship Search Service

A scholarship search service matches a student’s background profile against a database of scholarships to identify the scholarships for which the student is eligible.

School Code

The Federal School Code is a six-digit number assigned by the U.S. Department of Education to a college or university that is eligible for Title IV federal student aid. If an applicant lists a federal school code on the FAFSA, the college or university will receive a copy of the student’s financial aid application data in the form of an Institutional Student Information Record (ISIR).

SE9W

Substantially Equal 9 Week

Second Chance Banking

Financial institutions will not review a person's banking history and offer temporary banking services, so that a person still has access to financial tools.  

Secondary Market

A secondary market is a financial institution that purchases loans from lenders to enable the lenders to obtain the liquidity (capital) needed to make new loans.

Secondary School

A secondary school teaches children in grades 9-12.

Secured Credit Card

A credit card with a line of credit backed by and equivalent to a security deposit paid when the card was opened.

Secured Loan

A secured loan is a loan where the borrower pledges an asset as collateral to ensure payment of the debt. Examples include home mortgages and auto loans.

Selective Service

Male U.S. citizens and immigrants age 18-25 are required to register with the Selective Service System. Male students who fail to register may be ineligible for federal, state and, frequently, institutional student financial aid for college.

Selectivity

A college’s selectivity is the percentage of applications that receive offers of admission. Selectivity measures the difficulty of getting in to the college.

Self-Help Aid

Self-help aid includes financial aid in the form of student employment and student loans.

SEOG

[Federal] Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grant

SEP

Simplified Employee Pension Plan

Separation

A legal separation is a court-ordered agreement in which husband and wife remain married but live apart. An informal separation is not court-ordered. An informal separation is sometimes called a trial separation.

Separation Date

The separation date is the date a student borrower graduates or drops below half-time enrollment. The separation date may also refer to the date the student or parent got separated or divorced from his or her spouse.

Serious Delinquency

A delinquency that is 90 or more days past due.

Servicer

A loan servicer is a company that manages sending out statements and coupon books and collecting payments on a loan, as well as other customer service functions. Some lenders service their own loans, while others outsource it to a third party company that specializes in servicing loans.

Servicing

Servicing a loan involves sending statements and coupon books, collecting payments and responding to customer service inquiries from borrowers.

Settlement

A student loan settlement is a lump sum payment on a defaulted student loan that is accepted by the lender as payment in full. The settlement amount may be less than the loan’s payoff amount.

SFA

Student Financial Assistance

Sharpe Ratio

A measure of an investment asset's average returns relative to the potential risks of holding it.

Shrinkflation

The act of downsizing the size or quality of a good while holding its sticker price constant, such as reducing the size of candy bars or the number of sheets in a roll of toilet paper.

Sibling

A sibling is a brother or sister.

SIC

Dependent Student’s Income Contribution

SID

Student Identifier (for COD)

Signature Page

The signature page is a document that can be printed and signed instead of using a PIN to sign the FAFSA electronically. Signing the FAFSA with a PIN is faster.

SIMPLE

Savings Incentive Match PLan for Employees

Simple Daily Interest

Simple daily interest multiplies the outstanding principal loan balance by the product of the interest rate with the number of days since the last payment divided by the number of days in the year.

Simple Interest

Simple interest is interest that is not compounded because it is not added to the principal loan balance.

Simplified Needs Test (SNT)

The simplified needs test ignores assets from the calculation of a student’s EFC for low- and moderate-income students who are eligible to file an IRS Form 1040A or 1040EZ or who are eligible for certain means-tested federal benefit programs

Skip Tracing

Skip tracing is the process of locating a borrower’s current contact information.

SLS

Supplemental Loan for Students

SNAP

The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), previously known as food stamps, provides nutrition assistance to low-income individuals and families.

SNT

Simplified Needs Test

Social Security

A program run by the federal government and funded by payroll taxes that provides benefits to retirees, their survivors, and workers who become disabled.

Social Security Number

A Social Security number (SSN) is a 9-digit identification number issued by the Social Security Administration. An individual’s citizenship status is usually associated with his or her Social Security number.

Special Allowance Payments

Special allowance payments (SAP) are payments from the U.S. Department of Education to a lender to compensate the lender for a below-market rate of return on a federal education loan.

Special Circumstances

Special circumstances include significant changes in a family’s financial circumstances from one year to the next or circumstances that differentiate the family from the typical family. Examples include job loss, salary reduction, death of a wage-earner, high unreimbursed medical and dental expenses, high dependent care costs and private elementary and secondary school tuition for a sibling.

Special Circumstances Review

A special circumstances review is the process by which a college financial aid administrator reviews, on a case-by-case basis, documented special circumstances affecting a student’s ability to pay for college. During the review, the financial aid administrator may decide to make an adjustment to the cost of attendance or to the data elements on the FAFSA that are used to calculate the student’s expected family contribution (EFC). Some colleges call a special circumstances review professional judgement or financial aid appeal.

Spending

Using income for current consumption.

SSA

Social Security Administration

SSDI

Social Security Disability Insurance

SSI

Supplemental Security Income

SSIG

State Student Incentive Grant

SSN

Social Security number

SSS

Selective Service System

Stafford Loan

The Stafford Loan is the largest federal student loan program. Stafford loans may be subsidized, where the government pays the interest that accrues during periods of authorized deferment, or unsubsidized, where the borrower is responsible for the interest that accrues.

Standard Deviation

A statistic that measures how dispersed a dataset is relative to its mean. Within the context of investing, standard deviation is used to measure the total risk of an asset or portfolio.

Standard Repayment

Standard repayment is a repayment plan involving level amortization with a 10-year repayment term. The loan will be repaid in full after 120 equal monthly payments (10 years).

Standardized Test

A standardized test, like the SAT or ACT, requires all students taking the test to answer the same questions or a statistically equivalent set of questions. The standardized nature of the test allows test scores from different students to be compared on the same scale.

State Aid

State aid is student financial aid provided by a state.

Statement of Educational Purpose

The statement of educational purpose is an agreement by the student to use federal student financial aid funds for educational expenses only.

Stepparent

A stepparent is a stepfather or stepmother. A stepparent is a parent by marriage, not birth. A stepfather is the husband of a child’s natural mother after the death or divorce of the child’s natural father. A stepmother is the wife of a child’s natural father after the death or divorce of the child’s natural mother.

Sticker Price

A college’s sticker price is the college’s cost of attendance, including tuition, fees, room, board, books, supplies, equipment, transportation, loan fees, dependent-care costs, disability-related costs and miscellaneous/personal expenses.
Read Related Content:

Sticker Shock

Sticker shock refers to the anxiety and dismay students and parents feel when they learn about the total cost of attendance of the student’s dream college or university.
Read Related Content:

Stock

An equity security that represents partial ownership of a company.

Stock Buyback

When a company repurchases shares of its own stock from public investors, which reduces the number of shares freely trading and usually boosts their value.

Stock Split

When a company makes its stock more affordable by dividing its existing shares into additional, less expensive shares.

Stocks

Shares of ownership in a corporation.

Student Aid

Student aid is financial aid funding provided to a student to enable him or her to pay for a college education. 

Student Aid Index

The student aid index (SAI) is the number calculated based on the information provided in the student’s FAFSA. The SAI is a financial aid eligibility index number used by the school’s financial aid office to determine their financial aid eligibility. 

Student Aid Report

The Student Aid Report (SAR) summarizes the information you submitted on your FAFSA and includes your expected family contribution (EFC). You'll receive your SAR soon after your FAFSA is processed. You should review the SAR to ensure that the information is accurate and correct it, if necessary.

Student Budget

The student budget is the college’s cost of attendance. Usually there will be three student budgets, one for students who live on campus in college housing, one for students who live off campus with their parents and one for students who live off campus on their own.

Student Contribution

The student contribution is an estimate of the student’s ability to contribute to his or her cost of attendance. Among the key components comprising the student contribution are base year taxable and untaxed income, net value of assets as of the date of FAFSA submission, family size, and, possibly, any other documented extenuating or special family circumstances the college is willing to consider. The student aid index is determined by factoring the information provided by all contributors on the student’s FAFSA.

Student Employment

Student employment is a program that allows students to take a part-time job, on- or off-campus, as part of their financial aid package.
Read Related Content:

Student Financial Aid

Student financial aid is funding provided to a student to enable him or her to pay for a college education. 

STX

State and Other Tax Allowance

Subprime

A subprime loan is made to a borrower with bad credit, typically a borrower with a credit score of 620 or less. Subprime loans often have high interest rates and fees to compensate for the high risk of default.

Subsidized

A student loan is subsidized if the federal government pays the interest on the loan during periods of authorized deferment, such as during the in-school deferment and the economic hardship deferment.
Read Related Content:

Subsidized Interest

The U.S. Department of Education pays the interest on subsidized federal student loans, such as the Federal Perkins Loan and the subsidized Federal Stafford Loan, while the student is in periods of authorized deferment, such as the in-school deferment and the economic hardship deferment.

Substantial Gainful Activity

Substantial gainful activity is work for pay involving significant physical and/or mental activities.

Summer Melt

Summer melt occurs when a student accepts a college’s offer of admission and pays the deposit but does not enroll at the college in the fall following high school graduation.

Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grant

The Federal Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grant (FSEOG) is a grant to low-income undergraduate students who demonstrate exceptional financial need. Exceptional financial need is defined as the students with the lowest expected family contribution (EFC) at the school, with a preference for Federal Pell Grant recipients. Part of the FSEOG funding is provided by the school and part by the federal government. The FSEOG program is a form of campus-based aid.

Better Business Bureau logo

Edvisors provides expert advice on planning and paying for college. On Edvisors.com easily compare student loan lenders, learn how to apply for financial aid, and discover scholarships. Learn about federal and private student loans for students and parents, how and when to apply to college, and more!

Edvisors (“Edvisors Network, Inc.”) provides independent advertising-supported platforms for consumers to search compare and apply for private student loans. Loan offers from participating lenders that appear on our websites are not affiliated with any college and/or universities, and there are no colleges and/or universities which endorse Edvisors’ products or services. Lender search results do not constitute an official college preferred lender list. Edvisors receives compensation from lenders that appear on this site. This compensation may impact the placement of where lenders appear on this site, for example, the order in which the lenders appear when included in a list. Not all lenders participate in our sites and lenders that do participate may not offer loans to every school.

Edvisors is not a lender and makes no representations or warranties about your eligibility for a particular loan or financial aid. Lenders are solely responsible for any and all credit decisions, loan approval and rates, terms and other costs of the loan offered and may vary based upon the lender you select. Please check with your school or lender directly for information related to your personal eligibility.

Edvisors has endeavored to provide accurate information. However, the results provided by lenders are for illustrative purposes only and accuracy is not guaranteed, as such, Edvisors assumes no responsibility for errors or omission in the information provided.

Copyright © 1998-2025 by Edvisors Network, Inc. All rights reserved.

All other trademarks and service marks displayed on Edvisors Network, Inc. websites are the property of their respective owners.

Edvisors Network, Inc. 350 S. Rampart Blvd, Suite 200, Las Vegas, NV 89145

Copyright © 2025 by Edvisors.com. All rights reserved.