The curriculum has been developed for five distinct audiences:
Admissions Officers
College Coaches
College Counselors
Parents
Financial Aid Administrators
Professional Advisors
The Institute brings together individuals currently (or newly) working in post-secondary admissions and enrollment management positions. Also attending will be secondary school college counselors and individuals working in associated agencies or foundations, such as TRIO.
in addition, parents of college-bound students have a unique opportunity to gain a more comprehensive understanding of the financial aid process over a full day.
The Institute also welcomes new financial aid administrators seeking professional content learning, college coaches, as well as professionals in business and industry who provide advice and counsel to clients in areas of college saving, investing, taxation and application completion.
Each track includes individual group sessions, exercises and plenary sessions with other attendees.
Specific Track Descriptions
Admissions Officer Track
College admissions officers are often asked about financial aid policy and practice. The Summer Institute is designed to give admissions officers a broad understanding of traditional financial aid theory and computation, so you are better prepared to assist your applying public.
Once you gain this basic knowledge, you will learn that financial aid is practiced differently at different schools, depending in large part on the size of the student body, the size of the financial aid endowment, and the policies and practices within your institution’s competitive admissions peer group.
Attendees will be exposed to financial aid application basics, including forms and application cycles, eligibility criteria for the various state and federal grant and loan programs, federal and institutional need analysis models, and financial aid packaging practices among colleges.
Admissions officers will be exposed to student and parent loan programs and gain an appreciation of the importance of borrowing - and the danger of borrowing too much – to afford a college degree.
Attendees will be invited to draft a merit scholarship proposal for fictional Trustees and to debate the percentage of grant money that should be allocated to merit scholarships and away from need-based aid.
Attendees will learn how money influences enrollment and what role campus employment plays in student retention.
The admissions office track will co-mingle members of the guidance community and college admissions staff to discuss topics of mutual importance, such as how and why financial aid wait lists are created, need-aware admissions practices, treatment of local merit awards, and the best ways to negotiate changes in financial aid awards.
Some of these conversations will be supplemented by experienced
College Coach Track
College coaches spend many hours on the phone and in the homes of prospective players and their families. The Institute is designed to give college coaches a deeper understanding of traditional financial aid theory and practice, so coaches are better prepared to assist their recruits and field questions about awards from competing insitutions.
Once you gain this basic knowledge, you will understand that financial aid is practiced differently at different schools, depending in large part on the size of the student body, the size of the endowment, trustee philosophy toward need-based aid, and the general practices of peer institutions.
Attendees are exposed to application basics, including forms and application cycles. eligibility criteria for state and federal grant and loan programs, federal and institutional need analysis models, and financial aid packaging policies among colleges.
Coaches will develop a better appreciation for the role student and parent borrrowing plays in enrollment decisions and persistence to graduation.
Faculty will discuss the NCAA rules that prohibit early financial aid "reads" for recruited Division III athletes. They will also reveal the shortcomings associated with on-line financial aid calculators, including the Department of Education's new Net Price Calculator (NPC) coming to all college web sites in 2011.
Faculty will discuss the degree to which financial aid awards influence enrollment decisions and the role campus employment plays in student retention.
Faculty will discuss various admission policies and practices regarding merit and need-based financial aid awards, the integration of outside merit scholarships in existing awards, and the best ways to appeal financial aid decisions.
Please join us for the next class!
College Counselor Track
The MASFAA Summer Institute serves the
The importance of early financial aid information and planning will be emphasized with reference to popular web site tools, including the new MASFAA Audio Files.
Starting with application forms and procedures (with particular emphasis on the FAFSA), faculty will familiarize attendees with key filing instructions, filing pitfalls and trouble spots, and the process for submitting on-line FAFSA corrections. Early decision application myths will be addressed along with NCAA requirements banning pre-admission award letters.
Faculty will explain the relationship between EFC and state and federal program eligibility, including the Maine State Grant program, basic Pell and Pell ACG, Supplemental Grant (SEOG), Perkins loan and Federal Work Study.
An entire hour will be devoted to understanding how the federal methodology works and why certain income and asset values are excluded from the federal system. The use of professional judgment will be explained to illustrate how methodologies can respond to special circumstances. Distinctions between federal methodology (FM) and institutional methodology (IM) will be highlighted.
Counselors will learn how financial aid packages are constructed and why they differ from college to college. Faculty will explain the treatment of local merit scholarships in award packages and how the federal over-award regulations govern substitution practices.
Counselors will learn why some students receive federal Perkins loan money and others receive
The final hour will provide time for school counselors to share common concerns and direct specific questions to the faculty.
Parent Track
The curriculum for parents assumes that attendees will be applying for federal and institutional financial aid in the future and have a limited understanding of how to successfully accomplish this task. The track also assumes that parents seek a more comprehensive overview of how the financial aid system works and why college aid administrators make the award decisions they make.
The core curriculum is comprised of five lesson blocks beginning with a summary of the forms used to apply for federal, state and institutional aid and the general requirements for successful completion of most aid applications. The focus will be on application for “need based” aid. Select sections of the federal FAFSA, CSS Profile and Noncustodial Profile will be examined. The importance of data accuracy will be emphasized. Common processing problems will be reviewed.
Faculty will explain the federal eligibility criteria associated with federal grant and loan programs, so that attendees understand some of the reasons for variations in award packaging and access to certain Title IV programs. For example, why is it that some students qualify for lower interest Perkins loans and others do not? Why isn’t the federal Treasury paying interest on my child’s student loan while she is in school?
Faculty will also talk about local practice variations among colleges in the distribution of their own funds and the reasons why some college trustees allocate endowment funds on the basis of merit as opposed to calculated need. Why is it that colleges using the same need analysis methodology often arrive at different calculated family contributions and different awards?
Attendees will be exposed to the basics of federal methodology (FM) and institutional methodology (IM) and understand how one system differs from the other and why schools elect to utilize one need analysis system rather than another. Parents will better understand the shortcomings of web-based calculators and why they can sometimes lead families to conclude they will or will not receive financial aid.
Faculty will highlight important instructional web sites that parents can use to learn more about financial aid. Attendees will understand which economic factors influence the determination of a family’s “need” and what kind of circumstances have little or no effect on need analysis. Understanding what need analysis does not do can be an important insight into the award process.
The packaging of financial aid awards often follows a standard job-loan-grant model. As grant funds fail to keep pace with rising college costs, packaging standards begin to change. Colleges make their packaging decisions based on many factors, some of which will surprise you! Attendees will learn how to evaluate award letters and determine net payment to the college.
The different student loan programs will be examined, as well as the inclusion of basic Pell grant and Pell AC grant. Attendees will also learn about the federal Work Study program and why campus employment is important to successful completion of the degree.
We will talk about ways to appeal award decisions and the reasons why some appeals are successful and others are not.
It should be noted that most of the material presented by the Institute is available to inquiring students and parents free of charge. Many of the answers to basic questions can be heard on the MASFAA Audio Files web site found at http://www.masfaa.bowdoin.edu/.
At the same time, while financial aid administrators are happy to answer any question at any time, parents may not know all of the consumer-oriented questions to ask and may never have an opportunity to benefit from six hours of personal access to
We believe the Institute will prepare you to manage a complicated application process with greater ease and less anxiety and we believe you will find the experience to be well worth the price.
Financial Aid Officer Track
For many new financial aid officers (and senior support staff), day-long exposure to the fundamentals of the financial aid process, taught in a group setting, is the best way to begin an interesting student service career.
Taught by some of
Understanding state and federal program eligibility criteria is another complicated area, made more interesting recently by recent expansion of Pell grants and anticipated changes to the federal student loan programs.
Aid administrators must develop a working knowledge of the federal methodology (FM) need analysis system. Attendees working in higher cost private colleges with larger endowments must also have a firm grasp of institutional methodology (IM) theory and computation.
Federal income tax returns play an important verification role in need analysis, as do other checks and balances that aid professionals employ to verify data and finalize awards.
The exercise of professional judgment is carefully prescribed in federal methodology, less so in institutional methodology. Understanding what a calculated family contribution represents and how to distinguish between willingness to pay and ability to pay is an important professional proficiency.
There are sound reasons why award packages come in various shapes and sizes. Some of these reasons may surprise you! Faculty will explain packaging approaches and strategies and also talk about the growing national problem of unmet need.
The final hour will be devoted to a plenary Question and Answer period with other professional advisors. A faculty panel will respond to questions for the benefit of everyone.
Professional Advisor Track
The Professional Advisor track follows a general four-part core curriculum throughout the day. Beginning with basic financial aid applications, the track moves through program eligibility, need analysis and award decisions, but it does so with the understanding that professional advisors often bring individual levels of expertise to some areas that will enrich the group conversation and require more detail at certain points in the delivery of the content material.
Institute faculty understand that advisors provide professional consultation services to higher net worth clients, services that include estate and tax planning, investment, insurance and retirement planning. The Institute believes that, to be of value to your clients and your profession, advisors need a clear grasp of how the financial aid process works and how financial aid decisions are made at varying school types. It is our belief that value added is much more than maximizing "need.”
Toward that end, faculty will explain variations in federal and institutional need analysis methodologies, as well as the instances when financial aid practitioners may exercise professional judgment to change family contributions before or during an award period.
Such changes often occur through a process called “verification,” using federal income tax returns and Form W-2.
In addition, many private institutions go beyond basic verification to analyze specific tax schedules, as well as business and trust tax returns in their entirety. Advisors will gain an understanding of how private school aid administrators may view certain tax data to improve upon the definition of income as a starting point for need analysis and the distribution of private endowment funds.
Faculty will discuss asset valuation methods for homes, trusts and business, as well as processing differences among college savings plans, retirement savings, and student-owned assets.
Faculty will discuss packaging variations among colleges that can lead to award “gaps” and significant differences in award offers.
While most advisors have a general understanding of the federal FAFSA and the federal methodology, many have less appreciation for the CSS Profile and the underlying institutional methodology used by many higher cost private schools. An understanding of such differences gives advisors an important counseling edge.
Limitations to on-line financial aid calculators will be discussed, as will the importance of data accuracy and issues of interpretative license in the completion of forms on behalf of clients.
Parent and student loans will be compared, including legislative initiatives that will change the borrowing landscape in the near future.
Advisors will have a chance to talk personally with new and veteran financial aid administrators at the plenary Question and Answer session at the end of the day.