Academic Programs - Academic Common Market

Academic Common Market (ACM) What It Is: The Academic Common Market (ACM) is a Southern Regional Education Board (SREB) program that allows legal residents of the 16 SREB member states to receive reduced tuition for select degree programs not offered in their home state. Visit the SREB Academic Common Market website for more information on the degree programs allowed by each participating state, links to ACM applications, and State Coordinator contact information.

Students New to ACM: Students must first be accepted into the University of South Carolina-Columbia and declare or be enrolled in an ACM-approved degree program before applying for Academic Common Market privileges.

ACM privileges are applicable only for the degree, program, and concentration specified in your ACM Certification of Residency form.

It is the student's responsibility to monitor the progress of their application for the ACM Certification of Residency. Students are urged to follow up with their home state ACM Coordinator to make sure that they have received all necessary materials, and that the ACM Certification document has been forwarded to USC. You can visit the SREB Academic Common Market website to contact your participating state's ACM Coordinator.

If you are an incoming freshman or transfer student, you cannot be fully approved for ACM until you go through orientation and register for classes. Please contact the USC ACM Advisor for your program if you have questions about when this will occur.

The USC-ACM office will process your paperwork as soon as it is received from the ACM State Coordinator’s Office, provided you are fully registered for classes, in the semester, major, and concentration for which your state issued you the ACM Certification of Residency. You will know your status as an ACM student at USC is official and complete when the University Bursar’s office has posted an in-state tuition bill to your VIP account.

The Bursar’s Office posts tuition bills to student VIP accounts according to the following calendar:

Fall Semester: Mid-July
Spring Semester: Mid-November
May Session, Summer I: Third Week of March
Summer II: Second week of June

You, as an ACM student, are the only person who has access to this information. No ACM Advisor or University administrator can retrieve it for you.

Deadlines: Please note, our deadlines have changed.

The deadline for Spring 2013 was January 7, 2013.
The deadline for Maymester 2013 is May 6, 2013.
The deadline for Summer I 2013 is May 27, 2013.
The deadline for Summer II 2013 is June 28, 2013.
The deadline for Fall 2013 is August 12, 2013.

ACM Certification forms for semesters underway or already completed will not be approved by USC.

Students Already in ACM:If you change majors out of your ACM-approved major or concentration for any reason, your ACM benefits will be terminated and you will be billed for the out-of-state tuition differential for the semester the change was made.

A change of major or concentration to a different ACM program approved by your state requires you to reapply to your state for certification in the new major/concentration. Contact the USC ACM office for assistance before changing your major.

If you are a USC student but not yet in ACM, the best time to apply for Academic Common Market is at a time when you are not enrolled in classes, ideally during May or early Summer. Students are strongly advised not to initiate an Academic Common Market application during the three weeks immediately preceding the Spring semester; there is not enough time to complete the process due to the university closure for the winter holiday.

In order to qualify for Academic Common Market tuition benefits, students must remain enrolled full-time. For undergraduate students in the Fall and Spring semesters, full-time enrollment is a minimum of 12 credit hours or more per semester. For graduate students, full-time enrollment in the Fall and Spring semesters is a minimum of 9 credit hours per semester. There is no minimum credit hour limit for being considered a full-time ACM student during May Session, Summer I or Summer II, provided you were a full-time enrolled ACM student in the Spring semester immediately preceding. You will continue to be billed at the ACM (in-state) tuition rate for your summer classes*, and you will not have to reapply for ACM in the Fall.

*NOTE: The University’s in-state tuition rate in a Summer I or Summer II semester is higher per hour if you enroll in less than 6 hours.

IT IS THE STUDENT'S RESPONSIBILITY TO REMAIN INFORMED ABOUT AND ABIDE BY THE ACM POLICIES OF THEIR HOME STATE, AND OF THE UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH CAROLINA. Scholarships and ACM: If you have been awarded a scholarship that includes a tuition reduction, and have also been approved for Academic Common Market by USC, you will receive the award amount from the scholarship, but only one or the other tuition reduction. The University will always give the student the better of the two tuition rates; this is almost always the Academic Common Market tuition reduction.