Improving Student Success Through the Multiple Disbursement of Financial Aid

Bay College Located in the UP of Michigan Campuses in Iron Mountain and Escanaba 5 ½ hours from here Fall 2018 Enrollment : 1,937 Travis

Who Are We? Ruth Carlson Travis Blume Assistant Director of Financial Aid Worked at Bay College for 15 years Travis Blume Vice President of Student Services Previously the Registrar at Bay Has worked at Bay for 4 years us

What Are Multiple Disbursements? Divide student’s federal financial aid into portions as well as the charges on the student’s account – we use four disbursements Goes beyond the financial aid requirement to disburse one semester loans in two disbursements Give students a portion of their financial aid overage with each disbursement. Ruth

Why? Assists students with budgeting their financial aid overage Assists with Retention and Persistence Assists with Return to Title IV (R2T4) process Travis

Who is Involved? Financial Aid Student Accounts IT Registrar Faculty Ruth

Process Financial Aid coordinated the process. Issues needed to be address before we could make multiple disbursements a reality. We needed to give students their financial aid overage throughout the semester and not just hold it until the account was paid in full We needed to know the student was attending their classes to make sure we were no longer funding a student who wasn’t attending We needed to assure student data was reported accurately for each system with the Department of Education We needed IT support and programming to assist in the processes Ruth

Process Con’t Business Office and Financial Aid determined steps to pay students a portion of their financial aid overage at a time. Federal financial aid was set to disburse in four equal portions Created a schedule every year. Federal funds disburse based on that schedule Determined the process required steps outside of our system Through reports from our system (Jenzabar EX) and Excel, we determine the amount of what the student should receive in an overage at each disbursement. That information is imported back into our system to run checks Example: 25% of the student’s tuition is paid with 25% of their financial aid. Students are sent any remaining portion of that calculation at that time. ruth

Process Con’t The Registrar’s Office, along with IT and Financial Aid, determined steps needed to gather attendance throughout the semester A schedule is determined for each semester of what timeframes are monitored for attendance. Faculty report if the student attended, literally went to class or completed a gradable assignment online, for each timeframe throughout the semester Financial Aid monitors those who are reported as not attending and holds the financial aid disbursements if the student is no longer eligible for the funding. Institutional Research and Financial Aid work together to make sure the information reported to NSC and Department of Education are the same. Created a one week major freeze to allow for accurate reporting. Travis end with Ruth

Communication was KEY! Faculty Students Staff Faculty received training during the winter and summer terms leading up to the change Reminded leading up the Fall semester, and during the semester Students Changes in the disbursement process were sent to students in multiple ways through the financial aid award and disbursement cycle Disbursement Notice changes sent with every award letter Information posted online Information emailed to students Notices posted on our digital bulletin boards Staff Information about the new process was discussed at all campus meetings and reminders were sent via e-mail Travis

Change is Hard Faculty Part Time and Full Time Staff Time and effort Students Change in how previous students got their money Us

Results Student’s request for emergency funding late in the semester reduced Return to Title IV (R2T4) decreased by more than $100,000 In 2013-2014 we returned $150,353 In 2017-2018 we returned $48,893 As a result, the college had less write-offs Student began to stay in classes longer during a semester Assisted with graduation rates increased Ruth First, TB last 2

Way Forward Bay College plans to continue this process Improvements planned Move to daily attendance Improved tools for staff to review information

Questions?

Ruth Carlson Ruth. Carlson@baycollege Ruth Carlson Ruth.Carlson@baycollege.edu 906-217-4032 Travis Blume Travis.blume@baycollege.edu 906-217-4116