These days, it is important to know if you have a Pell Grant — $10,000 in loan forgiveness *might* be riding on it. If Biden’s 10/20K student loan forgiveness plan stands up to the court challenges, then you will want to know if you have a Pell Grant, because if you do, you receive an extra $10K in forgiveness.

So, without a Pell Grant, you can expect up to $10K, with a Pell grant, you can expect up $20K. The question becomes then, how do you know if you have ever had a Pell grant. After all, some of us are old, and we just don’t remember. Well, it’s easier than you might think, and in the interest of clickbait, I am here to show you how.

First though, you must have an account on the Department of Education’s website for all-things student loan related: https://studentaid.gov/. If you do not already have an account created, you will need to create an account, then they confirm it, you get an e-mail, and then you are able to go through this process of finding out if you have a Pell Grant.

So, first things first, you need to to https://studentaid.gov/ and Log in. That button is in the upper, right hand corner of the website, next to the button that you saw and hopefully clicked when you were creating your account. After you have provided your login credentials, there is page that pops up that you need to accept. It will be there every time you access the web site. They are reminding you that it is government web site and not to do anything sketchy.

After you have logged in, and accepted the little page of rules, the very next page you see is called your Dashboard.









The most prominent feature on the dashboard is your aid. On the left are your “federally backed” loans. On the right are your grants. In the image above, this person has one grant, and you can see that it is even identified as a Pell Grant at the bottom.

If you wanted to know even more about your grants, then you would need to click on View Details. Then click Grants Or you can use this direct link: https://studentaid.gov/aid-summary/grants

This page would be useful if you had different types of grants.

That is it, that is all you have to do to find out if you have a Pell Grant. Good luck!