Updates for Financial Aid Status

As a student worker at the Financial Aid Office, I've come across several things that could be, well... better, or maybe handled a bit differently. Working there we receive various documents from our students on financial aid and most of the time, especially around the time that their financial aid refunds are expected to pay out and it doesn't, our office is bombarded with complaints.

The most common reason for why their aid hasn't paid out?

They didn't SATISFY the requirements by turning in required documents. *le gasp*

Reasons we get from our students include:

• They did not receive an email requesting those documents
• They don't check their pipeline accounts ever
• Their situations have changed so therefore, new updated info is needed and/or additional forms need to be completed
• They're confused and don't know what other requirements are needed
• They've seen the emails and notifications and decide to turn everything in last-minute expecting it all to be processed within a week (the most common reason)

So, basically...

NO DOCUMENTS = UNMET REQUIREMENTS = NO REFUND CHECK/TUITION PAYMENTS

What I was thinking as a sort of remedy to this, was maybe creating some sort of polling/questionnaire thing (all multiple choice, of course) that would receive basic information from the students and based on that, return a list of the documents needed to the students so that they know what it is they need to complete and submit. Maybe it could even include the status of the documents that were submitted. It would be extremely helpful to many of our students and most especially the Financial Aid Office. 

As far as I know, we have something similar to this on our pipeline accounts that I think not that many of our students know about or utilize. If you check the Quick Links, click on Financial Aid Status. 

A window should pop up (as shown below); click on Financial Aid Status again.

The window will load up the overall status for the aid year you selected and at the bottom of the page, click on Student Requirements.

It should show you the list of documents that you have already submitted as part of the requirements and whether or not they have been satisfied.