To be eligible for a COMPLETE Grants, a student must: (1) be eligible for a federal Pell Grant, as determined by their Student Aid Index on the 2025–2026 FAFSA; (2) be eligible for TN Promise; (3) be enrolled full-time; (4) submit a completed COMPLETE Grant form with all required documentation for their chosen category; and (5) be connected with a tnAchieves COMPLETE Coach, who helps verify eligibility and process the request. Eligibility criteria and required documentation by category are maintained at tnachieves.org/complete and through the Tennessee Board of Regents.
This page is part of the 2026 report titled From Stopgap to Safety Net: Designing State Emergency Aid That Works. You can find the main body of the report here.
The COMPLETE Grants Program assists Pell Grant-eligible students enrolled in TN Promise—the state’s last-dollar “free community college” program—to alleviate their financial barriers, including college-related technology, textbooks, gas & transportation, groceries, and housing, that impact college success. According to tnAchieves’ 2025 Annual Report, tnAchieves has produced 53,168 college graduates through its programming. The three-year graduation rate has also increased in recent years, which is attributed specifically to the COMPLETE program’s model pairing 1:1 coaching with emergency aid grants, which together have driven continuous improvement in degree completion rates across the state.
The history of what would eventually lead to the COMPLETE Grants program began in 2014, when Tennessee Governor Bill Haslam signed HB 2491/SB2471, otherwise known as the “Tennessee Promise Scholarship Act of 2014,” or simply “Tennessee Promise.” This legislation established a statewide scholarship and mentorship program through which Tennessee high school graduates could attend a community/technical college free of tuition and mandatory fees. The scholarship covers tuition and fees costs that are not covered by Pell grants, the HOPE Scholarship, or TSAA funds, otherwise known as a “last dollar” grant. In 2021, the Tennessee Promise program launched the COMPLETE program, which included mentorship and Grants statewide. The COMPLETE Grants is part of the larger ‘Tennessee Promise’ initiative is administered through an organizational partner known as tnAchieves.
Who administers the program?
The Tennessee Promise Initiative, including the COMPLETE Grants program is largely facilitated, administered, and managed by tnAchieves, which receives applications, provides funding, and submits student data reports.
How much funding does the COMPLETE Grants program receive per year?
The funding varies yearly for the COMPLETE Grants program, and no clear information is available about the exact yearly appropriations for the program. The funding for the COMPLETE program has generally hovered slightly above or below $2 million per year (with $2,035,391 disbursed in AY 2024-25).
How much aid can students receive, and what is the typical emergency aid award?
Qualifying students can be awarded up to $1,000 per academic period (periods reset August 1st, December 1st, and May 1st if funding is available.
In the 2024–2025 academic year, tnAchieves disbursed 16,084 COMPLETE Grants totaling $2,035,391, an average of roughly $127 per grant. Since the program’s 2018 launch, more than 53,000 COMPLETE Grants totaling over $6.7 million have been disbursed. For comparison, in the prior 2023–2024 academic year, 17,863 grants were awarded to 3,289 unique recipients across 55 institutions, totaling $2,086,552.59.
What are the reasons that students can apply for and receive emergency grants?
The COMPLETE Grants program covers a defined set of categories: transportation to school (provided as a gas gift card, Uber credit, or bus pass); groceries (provided as a grocery gift card); a computer (shipped directly to the student); supplies and tools required for coursework; rent and utility payments; textbooks; and class-specific fees.
According to the 2025 tnAchieves Annual Report, groceries (36.3% of dollars disbursed) and transportation (33.3%) were by far the largest categories of COMPLETE Grant spending in 2024–2025, followed by computers (11.2%), textbooks (5.7%), rent and utilities (5.6%), supplies and tools (5.1%), and class-specific fees (2.4%).
What is the application process like for students to receive emergency aid?
Students must submit requests to apply for a COMPLETE Grants. Each grant request requires a screenshot of the student’s class schedule showing their name and confirming full-time enrollment. Students select a grant category and provide the documentation required for that category; separate requests must be submitted for each category within the same form. A full list of categories and required documentation is maintained at tnachieves.org/complete. Requests are processed by tnAchieves and verified against TBR enrollment and Pell eligibility data before approval.
What are the reporting requirements for the COMPLETE Grants program?
While individual institutions are not dispersing COMPLETE Grants funds themselves, they do still have reporting requirements regarding the COMPLETE Grants program. The Tennessee Board of Regents (TBR) has set up a cloud-based system where all community and technical colleges submit weekly reports regarding Tennessee Promise eligible students and verification of students who are eligible and receiving Pell grants, or other requirements to receive COMPLETE Grants funds.
TnAchieves then uses this information for grant approval and verification and sends all the IHEs a monthly report of all the students at that specific institution who received COMPLETE Grants funds and the amounts. IHEs use this information for their own financial aid reporting requirements.
