The relationship between student persistence and types of financial aid at a Jesuit comprehensive university was studied. Three freshmen cohorts (134 for 1989, 171 for 1990, and 131 for 1991) of 436 students were tracked through fall 1994. Attention was focused on nine financial aid variables, five additional noncategorical and six categorical variables and their relationship to yearly persistence to graduation. Nine models were derived using logistic regression. Although loans were a significant discriminator between persisters and nonpersisters for white males and females during their freshmen year, academic ability of students may have influenced the results since the institutional financial aid award policy establishes an inverse relationship between the amount of loans that make up a student's financial aid package and their academic ability. As students progressed toward graduation, the amount of financial aid award and unmet need became more important discriminators than types of financial aid. College grade point average was found to be the strongest discriminator of all 20 variables in predicting persistence during the first 3 years. Ethnicity, gender, and year in school appeared to be important variables in studying different types of financial aid and other variables on persistence. (Contains 12 references.) (Author/SW)