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Community-college Pell-grant share in Maryland

Community colleges in Maryland ranked by Pell-grant share — the percentage of undergraduates who received a federal Pell Grant in the most recent reporting year. Pell share is a useful proxy for the share of the student body from lower-income households and for the institution's experience serving students who depend heavily on need-based federal aid.

  1. Baltimore City Community CollegeBaltimore, MD44%
  2. Wor-Wic Community CollegeSalisbury, MD43%
  3. Community College of Baltimore CountyBaltimore, MD34%
  4. Prince George's Community CollegeLargo, MD32%
  5. Allegany College of MarylandCumberland, MD32%
  6. Garrett CollegeMcHenry, MD31%
  7. Montgomery CollegeRockville, MD27%
  8. Cecil CollegeNorth East, MD27%
  9. Howard Community CollegeColumbia, MD27%
  10. College of Southern MarylandLa Plata, MD26%
  11. Chesapeake CollegeWye Mills, MD23%
  12. Hagerstown Community CollegeHagerstown, MD21%
  13. Harford Community CollegeBel Air, MD21%
  14. Anne Arundel Community CollegeArnold, MD21%
  15. Frederick Community CollegeFrederick, MD16%
  16. Carroll Community CollegeWestminster, MD15%

How to interpret Pell share

The federal Pell Grant is the largest need-based grant program in U.S. higher education. Eligibility is determined by the FAFSA and is based primarily on family income and assets relative to the cost of attendance. A community college with a high Pell-grant share is, by construction, an institution whose student body skews toward lower-income households. That is not a quality signal in either direction on its own — many of the strongest community-college transfer pipelines in Maryland run through institutions with high Pell shares — but it does indicate where institutional services such as emergency aid, child-care subsidies, food pantries, and need-based scholarships are most likely to be developed and well-resourced.

If you are eligible for the Pell Grant, the practical implication is that several of the community colleges on this list will be tuition-free for you after the grant is applied, with state aid and institutional aid often covering most of the remaining cost of attendance. File the FAFSA as early as possible in the academic year — it determines eligibility for all major federal need-based programs, and many state aid programs in Maryland use the FAFSA as their qualifying application as well.