Kentucky Scholarships & Grants (2027–2028): KEES, CAP Grant & Kentucky Tuition Grant Deadlines

Last updated: August 26, 2026 · Facts verified against the Kentucky Higher Education Assistance Authority (kheaa.com)

Kentucky changed its biggest scholarship rule in the 2026 budget, and the change lands directly on the Class of 2027. At the same time, the state’s two largest need-based grants have no deadline at all, which sounds like relief and is actually the most expensive thing on this page. Start with the rule that just moved.

The one thing to know first

KEES now takes a 2.75 GPA. The money your student already earned at a lower GPA is still theirs.

House Bill 500, the 2026 state budget, raised the minimum GPA for the Kentucky Educational Excellence Scholarship from 2.50 to 2.75 beginning with the 2026–2027 school year. KHEAA has said the new floor applies only to awards earned starting that year, and that funds earned before it, including awards tied to GPAs below 2.75, stay intact and available to use.

Read that twice, because both halves matter. A senior who earned a 2.6 in ninth, tenth, and eleventh grade keeps three years of KEES and earns nothing new for senior year unless the GPA comes up. Senior year grades are now worth real dollars for the first time. And no family should conclude that KEES is gone.

See the three ways KEES is earned and what each rung pays ↓

And the date: October 1, 2026. Kentucky does not have a deadline. It has a starting gun.

The College Access Program grant and the Kentucky Tuition Grant are both awarded first-come, first-served by FAFSA completion date, until the money runs out. KHEAA publishes no statewide cutoff, so nothing tells a family they are late. A household that files in March has broken no published rule and may still receive nothing, because the funds were gone. The 2027–2028 FAFSA is on track to open October 1, 2026. Here is the full calendar.

⏰ Where we are in the cycle (as of August 2026)

  • 2026–2027 aid year (students starting college this fall): ❌ That FAFSA opened in September 2025 and CAP and KTG awarding is long since under way. If you have not filed, file anyway. Federal aid does not run out.
  • Class of 2027, the 2027–2028 FAFSA: ✅ Opens October 1, 2026. This is your race. Everything below points at it.
  • KEES for the Class of 2027: ✅ Senior year is the first year graded against the new 2.75 floor. Ninth through eleventh grade were earned under the old rules and are locked in.
  • Dual Credit Scholarship, 2026–2027: ⚠ Capped at one general education class, not two. Juniors and seniors are scheduling around this right now.
  • Work Ready Kentucky Scholarship, 2026–2027: ✅ Application open in MyKHEAA, awarded first-come by application date.
  • Work Ready Dual Credit, 2026–2027: ✅ Open. Requests due March 1, 2027.

If your student is a rising senior, the two things to do this month are the FSA ID and the MyKHEAA account. Everything Kentucky does runs downstream of those two logins.

📌 What to do right now

  • Create FSA IDs for both parent and student at studentaid.gov/fsa-id. It takes about ten minutes and there is a verification wait, which is an irrelevance in August and a disaster in October. New to all of this? Start with FAFSA 101 for Parents.
  • Create the MyKHEAA account at kheaa.com. This is the state portal, separate from the FAFSA, and it is where Work Ready, the dual credit scholarships, the Teacher Scholarship, and your KEES balance all live.
  • Check the KEES balance now, before senior year is over. If your student has been sitting between 2.50 and 2.74, this is the year that number is worth money. A half-point of effort in the fall semester is worth more than any scholarship essay they will write.
  • Rising senior (Class of 2027)? Put October 1, 2026 on the calendar and treat it like a game day, not a window. Then check the scholarship deadline at every college on the list. In Kentucky those run from December 1 to April 1, and they are all earlier than families expect.
  • Rising junior or sophomore? Ask the counselor which dual credit courses are career and technical education pathway courses. As of the 2026–2027 year those are funded differently, and more generously, than general education dual credit. There is real money in that distinction.
  • File the FAFSA even if you are sure you make too much. Kentucky’s Teacher Scholarship, Teacher Recruitment Loan, Early Childhood Development Scholarship, and Work Ready Kentucky Scholarship all require it, and so does nearly every college’s own need-based aid.

💬 You’re allowed to ask about this one

Before the FAFSA opens to everyone on October 1, the U.S. Department of Education runs a public beta period. Beta testing for the 2027–2028 form began in August 2026, and a second round opens to any student or parent who requests access on StudentAid.gov. Students who file during beta are completing a real 2027–2028 FAFSA, and state agencies begin receiving those records in August and September.

In a state that awards grants in FAFSA completion order, that is potentially a several-week head start. What we cannot tell you is whether KHEAA counts a beta-period completion date in the CAP and KTG queue, because KHEAA has not published a position on it. Ask them directly at 800-928-8926 before you decide. We would rather tell you the question than guess at the answer.

Looking beyond state aid? Browse every college on our College Scholarships hub, compare awards using the CRP Scholarship Search Tool, or see how aid works elsewhere on the State Scholarships & Grants hub.

How Kentucky State Aid Actually Works

Kentucky runs an unusual system: the biggest merit program requires no application at all, and the biggest need-based programs require no application beyond the FAFSA. That sounds simple. The catch is that one of those facts makes families complacent and the other makes them slow, and Kentucky punishes slow.

There are two front doors.

  • The FAFSA (Free Application for Federal Student Aid) is the door to the College Access Program grant, the Kentucky Tuition Grant, Work Ready, the Teacher Scholarship, and every college’s own need-based money. Filed at studentaid.gov, once per aid year.
  • MyKHEAA is the state’s own portal. It is where the Work Ready application lives, where both dual credit scholarships are claimed, where the Teacher Scholarship application lives, and where you can see your KEES balance. It is not a substitute for the FAFSA and the FAFSA is not a substitute for it.

KEES is the exception that confuses everyone: it has no application at all. Kentucky high schools report GPAs to KHEAA automatically. The money accrues in the background across four years of high school and shows up at whichever participating Kentucky college the student enrolls in.

Setting up MyKHEAA so it still works in three years

  • Use a personal email address, not the school district one. District accounts are disabled at graduation, and this account matters through college.
  • Enter the student’s name exactly as it appears on the Social Security card. A nickname here causes a records mismatch later that takes phone calls to fix.
  • Save the username and password somewhere a parent can find them. The single most common Kentucky aid problem is a nineteen-year-old who cannot get into the account that holds their scholarship.

💰 Four Kentucky myths that cost real money

  • “We make too much, so filing the FAFSA is pointless.” CAP is need-tested, not income-capped, and the test is your Student Aid Index, not your salary. Beyond that, filing is a precondition for Work Ready, the Teacher Scholarship, the Teacher Recruitment Loan, the Early Childhood Development Scholarship, and most college-funded aid. Not filing forfeits all of it at once.
  • “KEES is automatic, so there is nothing to manage.” Earning it is automatic. Keeping it is not, and getting it back after you lose it is on the student, not the college. See the renewal cliff.
  • “The AP bonus is for everybody who passes an AP exam.” It is not. The KEES supplemental award for Advanced Placement, International Baccalaureate, and Cambridge exams requires the student to have been eligible for free or reduced-price lunch during some year of high school. Many families never learn this, and a few learn it after budgeting on it.
  • “There is no Kentucky deadline, so there is no rush.” Both halves are true and the conclusion is wrong. There is no deadline because the money simply stops. That is worse than a deadline, not better.

The Three Ways KEES Is Earned

KEES is earned in high school and spent in college. There is no application, and there is no way to earn it later. That single sentence is the most important thing on this page after the two boxes at the top. A student who reaches graduation without the GPA has no second chance, no appeal, and no essay to write.

There are three separate awards, and they stack on each other. All amounts below are the figures KHEAA has most recently published, for the 2026–2027 year. Kentucky re-sets these against available lottery funds, so treat them as the current shape of the ladder rather than a promise about 2027–2028.

Door 1: the yearly GPA award

Earned separately for each year of high school in which the student posts at least a 2.75 GPA at a certified Kentucky high school while meeting the KEES curriculum requirements. Four qualifying years means four base amounts added together, and that total is what pays out each year of college. The student must also be a Kentucky resident and a U.S. citizen, national, or permanent resident.

GPA that year Base award added, per year of college
4.00$500
3.90$475
3.80$450
3.75$437
3.70$425
3.60$400
3.50$375
3.40$350
3.30$325
3.25$312
3.20$300
3.10$275
3.00$250
2.90$225
2.80$200
2.75 (the new floor)$187

Worked example: a student who posts a 3.50 every year of high school earns $375 four times, so $1,500 is added to the college award every year they qualify to receive it.

Door 2: the ACT or SAT bonus

A one-time bonus that then repeats every year of college, based on the highest score achieved before high school graduation. It starts at an ACT composite of 15 or an SAT of 830 on the reading, writing, and math sections. That is a genuinely low bar and far below what most colleges require for merit money. KHEAA also lists a 2.75 GPA in some year of high school as a condition for the bonus.

ACT composite SAT range Bonus, per year of college
28 or above1300–1600$500
271260–1290$464
261230–1250$428
251200–1220$393
241160–1190$357
231130–1150$321
221100–1120$286
211060–1090$250
201030–1050$214
19990–1020$179
18960–980$143
17920–950$107
16880–910$71
15 (the floor)830–870$36

What we do not know yet: KHEAA describes the bonus as based on the highest score achieved before graduation, which reads as a single test sitting rather than a superscore assembled from several. At least one Kentucky university does superscore for its own awards, which means a family could be working from two different numbers without realizing it. We are not going to guess. Confirm with KHEAA at 800-928-8926 before you plan a testing calendar around it.

Door 3: the AP, IB, and Cambridge supplement

This one carries a condition most families never see. To receive it, the student must have been eligible for free or reduced-price lunch during some year of high school, in addition to earning a qualifying exam score and posting a 2.75 GPA in some year. There is no limit on the number of these supplements a student can collect.

Advanced Placement International Baccalaureate Cambridge Advanced International Supplement
Score of 5Score of 7a*, a, or b$300
Score of 4Score of 6c or d$250
Score of 3Score of 5e$200

If your student is homeschooled or earns a GED

Students who graduate from a Kentucky homeschool program or another non-certified Kentucky school, or who earn a GED in Kentucky between ages 18 and 23, can earn KEES solely on their highest ACT or SAT score, using the same ladder above. The GPA door is closed to them because KHEAA does not accept the GPA, which makes the test score the entire award. Legislation to open the base award to homeschool graduates was filed in the 2026 session and did not pass. Do not budget on a proposal.

Where KEES can be spent, and where it cannot

At roughly 49 participating Kentucky colleges and universities, public and private, two-year and four-year, plus several proprietary institutions. The student must be enrolled at least half time, meaning six credit hours, during the fall or spring term to receive it.

Out of state, KEES travels only under a narrow condition: the student’s major must not be offered at any Kentucky public college and must be available through the Academic Common Market, which requires approval from the Kentucky Council on Postsecondary Education. Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois do not participate in the Academic Common Market, so a Kentucky student crossing the Ohio River almost always leaves KEES behind. Families in northern Kentucky should price that in before falling for a Cincinnati campus.

Your move: pull up MyKHEAA tonight and look at the KEES balance. Not the estimate, the balance. If it is lower than you expected, the reason is almost always a single year below the GPA floor, and that is information you want in September rather than in May.

The KEES Renewal Cliff

Only the spring term counts, and summer school cannot fix it. This is the rule that quietly costs Kentucky families the most money, and almost nobody hears about it until the semester it bites.

KEES renewal is judged on the cumulative GPA at the end of each spring term. Not fall. Not the annual average. Not after a summer recovery course. A student who has a rough spring and then aces two summer classes has still lost the award for the following academic year, because grades earned in summer cannot be used to renew KEES when the preceding spring GPA was low.

Checkpoint What keeps the full award What happens below it
End of first year Cumulative GPA of 2.50 or higher Award is lost until requirements are met at the end of the next spring term
End of second, third, or fourth year Cumulative 3.00 or higher, or 2.50 to 2.99 and certified by the college as on track to graduate See the reduction band below
The reduction band 2.50 to 2.99, enrolled full time, but not certified on track to graduate 50 percent of the award, not zero. It can be restored by raising the GPA or meeting the on-track requirement
Below 2.50 cumulative Nothing keeps it Award lost until renewal requirements are met at the end of the next spring term

The part that is genuinely on the student. When a student loses KEES and then earns it back, reinstatement is not automatic. It is the student’s responsibility to make sure the GPA is reported to KHEAA at the end of the next spring term. A student who fixes their grades and assumes the system noticed can go a full year without money they had already re-earned. Questions about losing or regaining an award go to kees@kheaa.com.

Two more limits worth knowing before freshman year, not after. KEES expires at whichever of these comes first: eight semesters of funding used, five years after high school graduation, or the day a bachelor’s degree is earned. A student who takes a gap year, then five years to finish, runs out of KEES before they run out of college. And the award only pays while the student is enrolled at least half time in a fall or spring term.

Your move: in April, not July, ask the registrar or the financial aid office two questions. What will the cumulative GPA be at the end of this spring term, and am I certified as on track to graduate. Those two answers decide the following year’s award, and April is still early enough to change one of them.

Major Kentucky Programs

Six programs carry most of the money for undergraduates. Amounts shown are the figures KHEAA most recently published, for the 2026–2027 year. Kentucky re-sets these annually against lottery revenue, so confirm the 2027–2028 numbers on the official pages before you build them into a budget.

KEES (merit, no application)

  • Award: the sum of every yearly GPA award, plus a test bonus, plus any AP, IB, or Cambridge supplements. Paid each year of college.
  • Who it is for: graduates of certified Kentucky high schools who post at least a 2.75 in a given year. Homeschool and GED graduates qualify on test score alone.
  • Deadline: none. Schools report GPAs automatically.
  • Trap: the renewal cliff, judged only on the spring term. Read that section.

Official KEES page →

College Access Program grant (need-based)

  • Award: up to $2,500 at a two-year institution and up to $5,300 at a four-year institution.
  • Who it is for: Kentucky residents with financial need, enrolled at least half time in a program at least two years long.
  • Deadline: none published. Awarded first-come, first-served by FAFSA completion date.
  • Trap: capped at four full-time terms in a two-year program or eight in a four-year program, and it stops when the money runs out statewide.

Official CAP page →

Kentucky Tuition Grant (need-based, private colleges)

  • Award: maximum $3,300 for the year.
  • Who it is for: Kentucky residents with financial need attending an eligible private Kentucky college, enrolled full time in an associate or bachelor’s program.
  • Deadline: none published. First-come, first-served by FAFSA completion date.
  • Trap: full time, not half time, unlike CAP. And the college makes the final need determination, so other scholarships you win can reduce or erase it.

Official KTG page →

Work Ready Kentucky Scholarship (workforce)

  • Award: last-dollar. It pays tuition and fees remaining after federal and state grants and scholarships are subtracted, capped at the KCTCS in-state rate, with no more than $400 of that going to fees.
  • Who it is for: Kentuckians without an associate degree yet, in an approved certificate, diploma, or Associate of Applied Science program. The 2026–2027 sectors are construction, education, healthcare, manufacturing and logistics, and professional, scientific, and technical services.
  • Deadline: none published. First-come, first-served by Work Ready application date, which is a different clock from the FAFSA.
  • Trap: you need two applications, the FAFSA and the Work Ready form in MyKHEAA. Filing only the FAFSA gets you nothing here. Eligibility ends at 60 funded credit hours or your first associate degree.

Official Work Ready page →

Dual Credit Scholarship (high school)

  • Award: the dual credit tuition charged by the participating college, capped at $99 per credit hour for 2026–2027. Limited to one general education class for that year.
  • Who it is for: Kentucky residents in grades 11 or 12 at a Kentucky public, private, or home school.
  • Deadline: claimed through MyKHEAA once the high school reports enrollment. Home school students apply directly, by October 1 for fall and March 1 for spring.
  • Trap: the one-class cap is new, and a 30-minute college success counseling session is required each year the scholarship is awarded. Details here.

Official Dual Credit page →

Work Ready Dual Credit Scholarship (high school, CTE)

  • Award: the dual credit course amount charged by an eligible college, for up to two approved courses per school year.
  • Who it is for: Kentucky residents in grades 9 through 12, in career and technical education coursework on a pathway the Kentucky Department of Education has approved as leading to an industry-recognized credential.
  • Deadline: requests for 2026–2027 are due March 1, 2027, and funds are awarded in the order preferences are submitted.
  • Trap: it starts in ninth grade, two years before the general education scholarship, and almost no ninth-grade family knows that.

Official Work Ready Dual Credit page →

A conflict worth knowing about. KHEAA’s own CAP page lists financial need, not Pell eligibility, as the requirement. Several Kentucky community colleges publish “be Pell eligible” as a CAP criterion on their own pages. Those are not the same rule, and the stricter version, if a family believes it, talks people out of filing. We are publishing KHEAA’s version, because KHEAA administers the program, and telling you plainly that the college pages disagree. File regardless. The FAFSA is the only thing that answers the question, and there is no cost to being wrong about your own eligibility.

The Dual Credit Change Nobody Announced

For 2026–2027, the Dual Credit Scholarship covers one general education class, not two. That change traces to House Bill 193 of the 2025 session, and it is the kind of thing that shows up as a bill on a family’s account in October rather than as a headline in the spring.

Here is why it matters more than the dollar figure suggests. A junior who plans four general education dual credit courses across the year, on the assumption that the state covers them, will now be paying out of pocket for three. At the $99 per credit hour ceiling, a three-hour course runs about $297, so a full schedule of unfunded dual credit is roughly $900 a family never budgeted.

The workaround that is not a workaround

Career and technical dual credit is funded separately, still covers two courses, and starts in ninth grade.

The Work Ready Dual Credit Scholarship is a different program with a different budget. It pays for up to two approved career and technical education courses per school year, on a pathway the Kentucky Department of Education has approved as leading to an industry-recognized credential, and it is open to students in grades 9 through 12. As of the 2026–2027 year, a student on a CTE pathway can access more funded dual credit than a student on a purely academic one, and can start two years earlier. That is a real reversal from what most Kentucky counselors were telling families three years ago.

Two details that protect you either way. Participating colleges have agreed to charge no more than the dual credit tuition ceiling, which is half the KCTCS hourly rate, to every Kentucky high school and home school student, whether or not that student has a scholarship. They have also agreed to charge no additional fees, including lab fees, special equipment, and application fees. If a college is billing your student more than $99 a credit hour for dual credit, or adding a lab fee, that is worth a phone call.

What we do not know: whether the one-class general education cap continues into 2027–2028 or was a single-year budget decision. KHEAA has not published 2027–2028 dual credit terms. Before a sophomore or junior commits to a four-year dual credit plan, call KHEAA at 800-928-8926, extension 67394, which is the number KHEAA lists for House Bill 193 questions, and ask what the cap will be for the year your student will be a junior.

Your move: ask your counselor one question this month. Which of the dual credit courses on my student’s schedule are on an approved CTE pathway, and which are general education. The answer changes who pays.

Deadlines

Kentucky’s deadlines are unusual because the two biggest need-based programs do not have any. What they have instead is an order of arrival. Screenshot the second table if your student is in the Class of 2027.

The dates that repeat every year

Program When Where it happens
FAFSA opens October 1. For the 2027–2028 aid year that is October 1, 2026. studentaid.gov
CAP grant No deadline. Awarded by FAFSA completion date until funds are gone. FAFSA only
Kentucky Tuition Grant No deadline. Awarded by FAFSA completion date until funds are gone. FAFSA only
Work Ready Kentucky No deadline. Awarded by Work Ready application date until funds are gone. FAFSA plus MyKHEAA
KEES No application. GPAs are reported by the high school after each year. Automatic, viewable in MyKHEAA
Dual Credit, home school students October 1 for fall, March 1 for spring KHEAA application form
Work Ready Dual Credit March 1 for the school year MyKHEAA
Teacher Scholarship Application has opened in January with a May 1 deadline. Confirm the 2027–2028 dates when posted. FAFSA plus MyKHEAA
Teacher Recruitment Loan Application has opened April 1. Confirm the 2027–2028 date when posted. FAFSA plus MyKHEAA
Federal FAFSA closes June 30 at the end of the aid year. Missing this loses federal aid, not just state aid. studentaid.gov

The milestone chain for the Class of 2027

When What has to happen
August and September 2026 FSA IDs for parent and student. MyKHEAA account on a personal email. Check the KEES balance. Watch StudentAid.gov for the FAFSA beta access request.
October 1, 2026 File the 2027–2028 FAFSA. This is the day CAP and KTG start awarding.
December 2026 to April 2027 Kentucky college scholarship deadlines land in this window, and they vary by more than four months across the state. See the college section and confirm each one directly.
Any time it is requested Verification documents. If the college or KHEAA asks for paperwork, the clock on your aid stops until you send it. This is the single most common way a family that filed early ends up treated as a family that filed late.
Spring 2027 Senior year GPA is finalized and reported. This is the first year assessed against the 2.75 floor.
Summer 2027 KEES becomes available at the college the student enrolls in. Confirm it appears on the first bill rather than assuming.
End of spring term 2028 First KEES renewal checkpoint. Cumulative 2.50 or the award pauses.

Confirm current dates at KHEAA before relying on them. Colleges set their own scholarship deadlines, they are separate from anything on this table, and in Kentucky they usually come first.

Free counselor resource

The Kentucky State Aid Cheat Sheet, two printable pages

Everything on this page condensed for a desk or a bulletin board: every program at a glance, the deadline table, the KEES award ladders, the renewal cliff, a month-by-month counselor calendar, and the mistakes that cost Kentucky students money. Built for counselors to copy and hand out, and just as useful on the family fridge. No email, no signup, no data collection. Just the PDF.

Download the Kentucky State Aid Cheat Sheet (PDF) →

2 pages · Free to print, copy, and distribute · Verified against KHEAA, August 2026 · Questions or corrections: leo@collegereadyparent.org

How Kentucky Aid Stacks With College Scholarships

Kentucky aid stacks with federal aid and with college scholarships, and the state does not publish a combined cap across its own programs the way some states do. What does cap everything is the federal Cost of Attendance, or COA, which is the college’s published estimate of tuition, fees, housing, food, books, and transportation for the year. Total gift aid cannot exceed it. When it would, the college reduces something, and the thing it reduces is usually its own award rather than the state’s.

One term worth defining because it changes the math completely. Last-dollar means a program pays what is left after everything else has been applied. Work Ready Kentucky is last-dollar. That means a student with a strong Pell grant and a CAP grant may find Work Ready pays them nothing, and that is the program working correctly rather than failing. The cash did not disappear. It was never going to be additional.

The two examples below are illustrative. They use plausible round numbers to show how the pieces fit, not quotes for any real student or college. Your actual figures depend on your FAFSA, your college, and the year.

Illustrative example 1: four-year public university, living on campus

A Kentucky student earns a 3.40 GPA all four years of high school and scores a 24 on the ACT. Base awards of $350 four times is $1,400, plus a $357 test bonus, so KEES pays about $1,757 a year. Suppose the FAFSA produces a Pell grant of roughly $4,000, and the family files in the first week of October, so a CAP grant of up to $5,300 is still available.

That is roughly $11,000 in grants and scholarships before the college has contributed anything, against a cost of attendance that at a Kentucky regional public runs somewhere in the mid twenty thousands with housing. Tuition and fees are likely covered. Housing is the gap, and the college’s own merit award is what closes it. That is why the college choice, not the state programs, is the variable that decides whether this family can afford the year.

Illustrative example 2: community college, commuting, career program

A student earns a 3.00 all four years and scores a 20 on the ACT, so KEES pays about $1,214 a year. They enroll in an Associate of Applied Science program in an approved Work Ready sector. Suppose Pell comes in around $3,500 and CAP pays up to $2,500 at a two-year institution.

Against community college tuition and fees in the neighborhood of $5,000, those three sources already exceed the bill. So Work Ready pays zero, because it is last-dollar and there is no last dollar left. The student still comes out ahead: tuition is covered and there is grant money left over for books and gas. The lesson is that applying for Work Ready cost nothing and the family had no way to know in advance which side of the line they would land on. File both applications anyway.

One structural point that catches families every year. Being admitted is not being funded. An acceptance letter in March says nothing about whether the CAP grant money was still available when your FAFSA arrived in February. Those are two different queues, run by two different organizations, and Kentucky is one of the states where they can diverge sharply.

Common Ways Kentucky Aid Gets Lost

None of these are failures of effort. Every one is a process problem, which means every one is preventable by someone who knows to look.

Filing the FAFSA in the spring

The most expensive mistake in Kentucky, and the one nobody warns families about, because there is no deadline to miss. By March the CAP and KTG money may simply be committed. Nothing on the form will tell you.

Dropping below the credit hour floor

Three different floors, and students rarely know which one binds them. KEES needs at least half time, meaning six hours. CAP needs at least half time. KTG needs full time. Dropping one class can cost all three or none, depending on where you started.

Fixing the GPA and not reporting it

A student who loses KEES, works hard, and earns it back has to make sure the new GPA reaches KHEAA at the end of the next spring term. Assuming the system noticed costs a full year of money already re-earned.

Verification paperwork in an ignored inbox

Selection for verification is routine and is not an accusation. But an unanswered request freezes the file, and in a first-come state a frozen file behaves exactly like a late one.

Running out the KEES clock

Eight semesters, five years past high school graduation, or a bachelor’s degree, whichever arrives first. A gap year plus a five-year degree path means the last year is unfunded. Plan the fifth year before you start the first.

Transferring across the Ohio River

KEES follows a student out of state only through the Academic Common Market, and only when the major is unavailable at every Kentucky public. Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois do not participate at all. For a northern Kentucky family, a Cincinnati campus can quietly cost four years of KEES.

Who Benefits Most (Reality Check)

Low-income families

The biggest winners, if they file early. Pell plus CAP plus KEES can cover tuition outright at a Kentucky public university, and at a community college it frequently covers tuition with money left over. This group also has exclusive access to the KEES AP, IB, and Cambridge supplement, which requires free or reduced-price lunch eligibility. The entire advantage is conditional on filing in October rather than March.

Middle-income families

CAP and KTG are unlikely, though the FAFSA is still the only way to know, and both programs test your Student Aid Index rather than your salary. For this group KEES is real but modest, and the college’s own automatic merit is what moves the bill. Kentucky has several universities that pay automatic merit on GPA alone, and picking one of those over the flagship is frequently worth more than every state program combined.

High-achieving students

A 4.00 every year plus a 28 or better on the ACT maxes both KEES ladders. That is a meaningful floor, not a solution, and it is only the starting point. The larger money for this group sits in honors college awards, National Merit programs, and competitive institutional scholarships, all of which have separate applications and earlier deadlines than anything the state runs.

Students who test poorly

Kentucky treats you better than most states. The KEES base ladder requires no test score at all. A student with a 4.00 and no ACT still earns the full base award. The bonus ladder then starts at an ACT of 15, which is far below where most college merit programs begin paying. And several Kentucky universities pay automatic merit on GPA alone below their top tiers. If testing is the weak spot, Kentucky is a state where grades can carry the whole thing.

The Kentucky quiet cliff: families stop after KEES and assume that is all the merit money there is. KEES is designed as a floor. The gap between a KEES award and an actual tuition bill is closed by college awards that require separate steps, and those steps have deadlines that run from December to April. The families who lose the most are not the ones who did not qualify. They are the ones who stopped looking.

Adult and returning students

Work Ready Kentucky is built for you, and it does not ask your age. The conditions are that you have not yet earned an associate degree or higher and that you enroll in an approved program in one of the state’s high-demand sectors. Be aware that KEES expires five years after high school graduation, so an adult more than five years out has no KEES to bring. The Early Childhood Development Scholarship is a separate and generous path for anyone already working at least twenty hours a week in a participating childcare or preschool setting.

First-generation families

Identical eligibility, higher exposure to every process failure on this page. The three that matter most in Kentucky are FAFSA timing, verification requests, and the MyKHEAA login. A shared family calendar with October 1 on it, plus a note of where the MyKHEAA password lives, prevents more lost money than any scholarship search will ever find. Our First-Gen Parent Guide and the grade-level checklists are built for exactly this.

Colleges That Stack Best With Kentucky Aid

KEES pays the same amount at every participating Kentucky college, and the CAP grant differs only between two-year and four-year schools. So the state is not the variable. The college is. Below are the Kentucky universities currently verified in the CRP database, grouped by what they actually do for a family rather than by prestige. Every award described as automatic means no essay, no interview, and no committee. Admission and your numbers do the work. Award amounts live on each college’s own page, linked below, so that we audit them in one place rather than two.

The finding most Kentucky families never hear

The flagship has the highest automatic bar in the state for Kentucky residents, and a lower one for everybody else.

The University of Kentucky’s automatic award for a Kentucky resident requires both a 3.30 GPA and a 26 ACT. Its automatic award for a student from another state begins at a 3.00 GPA with no test score required at all, and pays more at every rung. Meanwhile Eastern Kentucky pays automatic merit to a Kentucky resident down to a 2.00 GPA, Murray State pays down to a 2.75 with no test score, and Western Kentucky starts at a 3.00, also with no test score. For a Kentucky student with steady grades and a middling ACT, the flagship is frequently the most expensive public option in the state, not the cheapest.

The lowest academic bar for real money

  • Eastern Kentucky University (Richmond): the lowest automatic floor we have verified in Kentucky. EKU’s resident ladder pays down to a 2.00 GPA, with no test score required at any resident tier below the top one, and steps up at 3.00, 3.40, and 3.80. Renewal runs at 3.00 to 3.20 depending on tier, which is stricter than the entry bar, so read the renewal terms before you commit. EKU does not publish a scholarship deadline on the pages we have verified, which is exactly the kind of gap worth a phone call rather than an assumption.
  • Murray State University (Murray): a seven-step automatic ladder open to residents and nonresidents alike, entering at a 2.75 GPA with no test score and requiring a test only at the top two tiers. Renewal is a friendly 2.75 across the board. The detail that matters most: Murray awards at admission with no separate scholarship deadline, and accepts test scores up to the start of fall semester classes. For a family that got started late, that is the most forgiving timeline in the state.
  • Western Kentucky University (Bowling Green): a five-band GPA ladder starting at 3.00 with no test score, open to residents and nonresidents on the same terms, with a test score only lifting you into the top band. Renewal is 2.50, the gentlest we found. WKU also layers automatic supplements for Governor’s Scholars, Governor’s School for the Arts, Governor’s School for Entrepreneurs, Rogers Scholars, and National Merit semifinalists. The deadline is a hard December 31, which is early and catches families who are still writing applications over winter break.

Automatic full tuition, if you qualify

  • Morehead State University (Morehead): runs an automatic full tuition award for students from its regional service area at a 3.00 GPA with a 21 ACT, which is an unusually low bar for an award of that size. Morehead’s Kentucky resident band starts at a 3.00 with a 20 ACT, and there is a separate award for Rogers Scholars and for Governor’s Scholars, Governor’s School for the Arts, and Governor’s School for Entrepreneurs alumni. Priority March 15, final June 15. Note that full tuition is not a full ride: housing and food are not included, and that distinction is worth several thousand dollars a year.
  • University of Louisville (Louisville): offers automatic full tuition to National Merit finalists and semifinalists from Kentucky and southern Indiana, with a separate award for National Merit students from elsewhere. UofL is also the only school in our Kentucky set that superscores the ACT, which can move a student a full tier. Its regional awards for families just outside Kentucky are among the largest in the state. Deadline April 1, the latest of any Kentucky university we have verified.

Where a test score still gates the money

  • University of Kentucky (Lexington): the flagship, and the only Kentucky public we have verified where a resident cannot reach the automatic grid on GPA alone. Both resident tiers require a 3.30 GPA plus a test score, entering at a 26 ACT and stepping up at 28. Nonresident awards run on a separate and more generous four-tier ladder. Deadline December 1, the earliest in the state, and it is a genuine cutoff rather than a suggestion.
  • Northern Kentucky University (Highland Heights): a compact GPA-only ladder with no test requirement, entering at a 3.00 for Kentucky residents and paying Ohio and Indiana residents on a parallel track, which makes NKU one of the more sensible options for a Cincinnati-area family. Renewal is 2.75. The published deadline is unconfirmed on NKU’s current pages, with a mid-February priority date appearing in older material. Call the NKU financial aid office and get the date in writing before you plan around it.

A different model entirely

  • Bellarmine University (Louisville): the one private in our verified Kentucky set, which also makes it the one where the Kentucky Tuition Grant applies. Bellarmine does not run a public stat grid. Awards are made from the admission application, with a February 1 priority date for institutional scholarships, and there is a named award for Kentucky Governor’s Scholars. Two things to note. Bellarmine runs a price-match style award aimed at families comparing against a public flagship. And one of its awards requires a FAFSA filed by May 1 plus a completed official campus visit before that date, which is a deadline you can only meet by planning the visit months ahead. Transfers are treated generously here, with awards down to a 2.00 GPA.

If you live just across the state line, Kentucky is worth pricing seriously. Morehead State runs an automatic full tuition award for regional students at a 3.00 with a 21 ACT, plus a dedicated Ohio tuition advantage program. Louisville’s border and regional awards are large enough to change which state is cheaper. Northern Kentucky pays Ohio and Indiana residents on a parallel ladder to its own. Eastern Kentucky and the University of Kentucky both run separate, and in UK’s case more generous, nonresident grids. Families in southern Ohio, southern Indiana, southern Illinois, western West Virginia, southwest Virginia, northern Tennessee, and southeast Missouri should run these numbers before assuming home is cheaper. Note that Kentucky’s own state programs are for Kentucky residents, so you would be shopping institutional money only.

Not yet in our database. Kentucky has a large private-college sector and a sixteen-college community and technical system, and we have not verified award data for them yet, so we are not going to publish numbers. This gap matters more in Kentucky than in most states for two reasons: the Kentucky Tuition Grant only works at private Kentucky colleges, and Work Ready Kentucky is effectively a community college program. Publics and systems we have not added: Kentucky State University (HBCU and land-grant, Frankfort) and all sixteen colleges of the Kentucky Community and Technical College System. Privates we have not added: Centre College (Danville), Transylvania University (Lexington), Berea College (Berea), Georgetown College, Asbury University (Wilmore), Campbellsville University, University of the Cumberlands (Williamsburg), Lindsey Wilson College (Columbia), Thomas More University (Crestview Hills), Spalding University (Louisville), Midway University, Union Commonwealth University (Barbourville), Alice Lloyd College (Pippa Passes), Brescia University (Owensboro), Kentucky Wesleyan College (Owensboro), Kentucky Christian University (Grayson), University of Pikeville, Simmons College of Kentucky (HBCU, Louisville), and Sullivan University (Louisville). Two of those run models worth knowing about independently: Berea charges no tuition to admitted students, and Alice Lloyd operates a tuition guarantee for students from its service region. Check each college’s own scholarship page directly. We would rather leave them without numbers than publish a guess.

The two-year and transfer pathway

Here is the math most four-year-bound Kentucky families never run. The CAP grant pays more at a four-year school than at a two-year school, up to $5,300 against up to $2,500. That sounds like an argument against starting at a community college until you notice the second half: the award goes up when you transfer. Start at a KCTCS college, pay community college tuition against a CAP grant plus Pell plus KEES, then move to a four-year school with junior standing and collect the larger CAP grant for the expensive half of the degree.

Three clocks to respect. CAP is capped at the equivalent of four full-time terms in a two-year program and eight in a four-year program, so a slow start burns eligibility. KEES is capped at eight semesters, five years past high school graduation, or a bachelor’s degree, whichever comes first, and those semesters are counted across every institution. And Work Ready Kentucky ends at sixty funded credit hours or your first associate degree, whichever comes first, which means it will not follow you into a bachelor’s program.

One caution specific to Work Ready. It funds certificate, diploma, and Associate of Applied Science programs, and an AAS is generally a career degree rather than a transfer degree. If a bachelor’s is the goal, ask the community college advisor directly which credits transfer to your intended four-year school before you enroll, not after. That question is not rude and you are allowed to ask it.

Smaller Kentucky Programs Worth Checking

Narrower programs, but the money is real and the applicant pools are small. All figures are the most recently published, for the 2026–2027 year.

Program What to know
Early Childhood Development ScholarshipUp to full tuition and fees, not to exceed $7,089 per semester, for people working at least twenty hours a week in a participating early childhood setting. Requires the FAFSA plus a MyKHEAA application, and carries a service commitment. The most generous per-student program on this list.
KHEAA Teacher ScholarshipUp to $3,000 per fall and spring semester, $2,000 for summer, for students admitted to a teacher education program. Needs-tested. Teach one semester in a Kentucky school for each semester received, or repay with interest. Application has opened in January with a May 1 deadline.
Teacher Recruitment Loan ProgramA forgivable loan, up to $5,000 per semester once admitted to a college of education, or $2,500 per semester for a declared major not yet admitted. Teach one year in a Kentucky public school per semester borrowed. Larger than the Teacher Scholarship, with a heavier service obligation.
KEES Workforce Reimbursement PathwayLittle known and genuinely useful. A graduate entering a registered apprenticeship or an approved workforce program can have KEES reimburse approved expenses, including tools, equipment, licensure, and uniforms, instead of sending the money to a college. Requires an opt-in form and itemized receipts.
KEES for CTP programsStudents with intellectual disabilities enrolled in a comprehensive transition and postsecondary program earn $500 a term at six or more credit hours, or $250 below that, for eight terms, in addition to any KEES earned in high school, and without the usual renewal requirements.
Kentucky National Guard Tuition AwardA tuition benefit for Guard members, funded through lottery proceeds alongside the programs above. Administered through the Kentucky National Guard rather than through MyKHEAA, so start with your unit.
Optometry Scholarship$15,000 per recipient, with a December 1 application deadline, usable at four participating schools of optometry including options outside Kentucky.
Veterinary Contract SpacesCovers roughly the gap between in-state and out-of-state tuition at participating veterinary colleges, with 164 seats a year. Students beginning to receive funds in fall 2027 or later must practice one year in Kentucky per year funded, or the support converts to a loan with interest dating back to disbursement.

Kentucky State Aid FAQs

What is the KEES GPA requirement for the Class of 2027?

A 2.75 GPA, raised from 2.50 by House Bill 500, the 2026 state budget. KHEAA has said the higher floor applies only to awards earned starting with the 2026–2027 school year, and that funds earned in earlier years, including awards tied to GPAs below 2.75, remain intact and available to use. For a current senior that means ninth through eleventh grade were earned under the old rules and senior year is the first year judged against the new one.

Does Kentucky require an ACT score for KEES?

No. The KEES base award is earned entirely on high school GPA and requires no test score at all. A test score only adds the separate bonus award, which starts at an ACT composite of 15 or an SAT of 830. Homeschool and GED graduates are the exception: because KHEAA does not accept their GPA, their entire KEES award is calculated from the test score.

How much is the KEES scholarship per year?

It is the sum of everything earned in high school, paid out each year of college. Base awards run from $187 at a 2.75 GPA to $500 at a 4.00, earned separately for each qualifying year. The test bonus adds $36 at an ACT of 15 up to $500 at a 28 or above. Students eligible for free or reduced-price lunch can add $200 to $300 per qualifying AP, IB, or Cambridge exam, with no limit on the number. These are the amounts KHEAA most recently published, for the 2026–2027 year, and Kentucky re-sets them annually against available lottery funds.

Is there a Kentucky FAFSA deadline for the CAP grant?

No, and that is the problem. The College Access Program grant and the Kentucky Tuition Grant are both awarded first-come, first-served by FAFSA completion date, until the funding is exhausted. KHEAA publishes no statewide cutoff date, so nothing warns a family that they are too late. Treat the day the FAFSA opens, October 1, as the real deadline. Individual colleges sometimes publish their own priority dates, and those are worth honoring, but they are not the state’s rule.

Can you lose the KEES scholarship?

Yes, and the rule catches people. Renewal is judged only on the cumulative GPA at the end of each spring term. After the first year you need a 2.50. After the second, third, and fourth you need a 3.00, or a 2.50 to 2.99 plus certification from your college that you are on track to graduate. A full-time student between 2.50 and 2.99 who is not certified on track receives a 50 percent award rather than nothing. Below 2.50 the award pauses until you meet the requirements at the end of the next spring term. Summer grades cannot be used to renew it, and when a student does earn it back it is their responsibility to make sure the new GPA is reported to KHEAA.

Does Kentucky state aid cover housing?

Not directly. KEES, the CAP grant, and the Kentucky Tuition Grant are all disbursed to the college and applied to the student account, where tuition and mandatory fees are charged first. In practice they rarely reach room and board because they rarely exceed the tuition bill. Work Ready Kentucky is explicitly limited to tuition and fees, with no more than $400 of it going to fees. If housing is the gap in your budget, the money that closes it is federal Pell, the college’s own award, or a work arrangement, not the state programs.

Can you get both KEES and the CAP grant?

Yes. They are different programs testing different things, KEES on high school performance and CAP on financial need, and Kentucky does not publish a combined cap across its own programs. What limits the total is the federal Cost of Attendance at your college, which no combination of gift aid can exceed. Note that stacking has one counterintuitive effect: because Work Ready Kentucky is last-dollar, a large KEES and CAP combination can reduce a Work Ready award to zero. That is the program working as designed, and it is still worth applying for.

What Kentucky scholarships can you get with a 3.0 GPA?

More than most families assume. A 3.00 every year of high school earns the KEES base award four times over, plus any test bonus down to an ACT of 15. At the college level a 3.00 clears the automatic merit entry point at Western Kentucky University, Murray State University, Northern Kentucky University, and Morehead State University, and sits comfortably above Eastern Kentucky University’s floor. It does not clear the University of Kentucky’s resident automatic grid, which requires a 3.30 plus a 26 ACT. For a 3.00 student, choosing the right Kentucky campus is worth more than any single scholarship application.

Prefer a printable version? Download the Kentucky State Aid Cheat Sheet (PDF), two pages, free to copy, print, and share.

Sources & verification

Program rules, amounts, and deadlines verified August 26, 2026 against the Kentucky Higher Education Assistance Authority: KEES · College Access Program grant · Kentucky Tuition Grant · Work Ready Kentucky Scholarship · Dual Credit Scholarship · Work Ready Dual Credit Scholarship · Early Childhood Development Scholarship · Teacher Scholarship · Full program list. The KEES GPA change is per House Bill 500 of the 2026 Regular Session, the state budget bill. FAFSA availability per the U.S. Department of Education, which has stated the 2027–2028 form is on track to launch by October 1, 2026.

College scholarship criteria come from the CollegeReadyParent scholarship database and reflect published automatic award terms at the time of verification. Award amounts are published on each college’s own page rather than here, so that they are audited in one place. See our data methodology. Kentucky re-sets its award amounts annually against lottery revenue and changed a core eligibility rule in the 2026 budget, so always confirm current details on the official pages and with the college’s financial aid office before making financial decisions.

Leo Dimilo
Written by Leo Dimilo
I started CollegeReadyParent while working through college costs for my own kid, and quickly figured out that the number a school advertises and the number a family actually pays are two very different things. Since then I’ve gone school by school pulling apart award letters, scholarship pages, and cost sheets to find what families are supposed to just know. This site is the version of that research I wish someone had handed me. More about Leo →

Looking beyond Kentucky? Visit the State Scholarships & Grants hub to explore aid programs in all 50 states, or see how to compare aid offers once the letters start arriving.

If you are reading this and thinking “we’re late,” you’re not. Most families don’t learn any of this until senior year. The win is doing the next right step.

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