If the purpose of your question to see if he can still be a dependent of your tax return:
According to IRS publication 17, a full-time student is a student who is enrolled for the number of hours or courses that the school considers to be full-time attendance.
To qualify as a student, the person must be, during some part of each of any five calendar months of the year:
- A full-time student at a school that has a regular teaching staff, course of study, and a regularly enrolled student body at the school, or
- A student taking a full-time, on-farm training course given by a school described in (1), or by a state, county, or local government agency.
The five calendar months do not have to be consecutive.
If she does not meet the full time student rule, she cannot be a Qualifying Child dependent*. Then we look to see if she meets the qualifying relative rules. Primarily, her income for the year must be less than $4700.
*There are two types of dependents, "Qualifying Children"(QC) and Other ("Qualifying Relative" in IRS parlance even though they don't have to actually be related). There is no income limit for a QC but there is an age limit, student status, a relationship test and residence test. Only a QC qualifies a taxpayer for the Earned Income Credit and the Child Tax Credit. They are interrelated but the rules are different for each.
The support test is different for each type. The support test, for a QC, is only that the child didn't provide more than half his own support. The support test for a Qualifying Relative is that the taxpayer provided more than half the relative's support.
