Executive Summary
Regent Education is pleased to announce Regent 5.4, the latest release of the Regent Enterprise Financial Aid Management System.
This release addresses product defects as listed in the “Bugs” section below, and also enhancements which include:
- Subsidized Usage Limit Applies (SULA) Calculations for Regular, Term-based Programs
- New Document Configuration Options: Document configuration has been enhanced to include options for the additional Active ISIR fields
- Regent Smart Form Enhancements
- New 'Disclosure' page in Regent Plan and additional Student Indebtedness Tokens for use on the new page
- 'Inclusion of Student Communications in the Messages component of Student Experience
New Configuration Options
The following new configuration options were added in Release 5.4: Will be updated at certification
Admin and User Guide Updates
As part of Release 5.4, the following Admin and User Guide pages were added/updated: Will be updated at certification
Enhancements
The following enhancements are included in this release:
Key | Product Selection | Functional Area | Release Note |
---|---|---|---|
RS-21012 | Regent Award | User Interface | Title: Term Setup: Updated SAP Fields Tickets: RS-20710; RS-21012; RS-21013; Description: The Term Setup screen has been updated in Regent Award. The old ‘SAP’ column has been removed and the Help Text has been updated on the new fields, ‘SAP Evaluation Start Date’ and ‘SAP Evaluation End Date.’ |
RS-20972 | Regent Plan | Student Experience | Title: Allow User to Accept an Amount of $0 during the My Borrowing Plan Acceptance in Student Experience Tickets: RS-20972; RS-20994; RS-20995; Description: My Borrowing in Student Experience has been updated to allow users to accept an amount of $0 for Subsidized, Unsubsidized, and Graduate PLUS awards when accepting a borrowing plan. A student must still accept the full Direct Subsidized Loan eligibility prior to accepting any amount of Direct Unsubsidized Loan, and any loan amount greater than $0 entered must be a minimum of $1 per term (e.g. A 3-Term Loan Period would require a minimum of $3 to be entered). |
RS-20902 | Student Experience | Student Portal (SNAP) | Title: Update Validation Logic of Completed Smart Form Pages in Student Experience Ticket: RS-20902; Description: Updates have been made within Student Experience to ensure that if the user makes any change to a previously saved Smart Form page, then attempts to navigate away from the page using the page arrows, section link in the menu, or Student Experience navigation menu rather than the Next page button, a message will display for the user to confirm and save the changes. |
RS-20832 | Regent Award | Student Experience | Title: Make Regent Plan Site/Program-level Configs Independent of Institution-level Config Setting Tickets: RS-20832; RS-20849; Description: When Regent Plan is configured for an Enterprise with multiple institutions, the Plan configuration takes place only in one ‘master institution’ and the other institutions use that configuration. In 5.3.1, functionality was introduced to allow schools to display/not display Regent Plan in Student Experience based on site and program-level configurations. Testers determined that if ‘Regent Plan’ was enabled and then disabled, all underlying programs and sites had the ‘Enable Additional Regent Plan Components’ option disabled as well and there was no way to re-enable the functionality. The following changes were made in Regent 5.4.0:
|
RS-20793 | Student Experience | Student Experience | Title: VWS: Text Update- Child Support Clarification Tickets: RS-20793; RS-20907; Description: Text has been updated in the ‘Children and Other Dependents Information' section of the Verification Worksheet. The following sentence has been added to the existing text: “Do not include children for whom you pay child support if the amount you pay does not provide more than half of the overall support for those children.” |
RS-20778 | Student Experience | Student Experience | Title: VWS: Text Update to 'IRS Tax Transcript/Tax Return' Field Tickets: RS-20778; RS-20884; Description: The top section of informational text for the ‘IRS Tax Transcript/Tax Return' field of the Verification Worksheet has been revised to advise that signed copies of a prior year’s tax returns are acceptable for verification. Example Text: “In order to complete the verification process, you will need to provide a copy of your completed and signed 2019 1040 form or a 2019 Tax Transcript for both you and your spouse from the Internal Revenue Service for the Financial Aid Office to review. A 2019 IRS Tax Return Transcript may be obtained using any of the following options:” |
RS-20647 | Regent Award | Awarding | Title: New Document Setup Configuration: ‘EFC’, ‘State of Residency,' and ‘First Bachelor’s Degree by MM/DD/YYYY' Tickets: RS-20647; RS-20713; RS-20711; Description: New configuration options have been implemented in Document Setup<ISIR Assignment in Regent Award to allow schools to assign documents based on the ‘State of Residency’, ‘EFC’, and ‘First Bachelor's Degree by MM/DD/YYYY’ data from the ISIR. |
RS-20621 | Regent Award | Documents | Title: Change to Time Stamp Logic/Format on SmartForm PDFs Tickets: RS-20621; RS-20886; RS-20893; Description: When the user electronically signs a form in Student Experience, the e-signature time stamp displayed on the document output (.pdf) has been updated to reflect the student’s local time, based on the student’s web browser, at the time the e-signature was actually completed. The time stamp for document receipt within Regent Award will match the document. The time stamp format now includes the student’s time zone abbreviation. Example: 1/20/2021 4:58 AM CST |
RS-20567 | Regent Review | ISIR Processing/Verification | Title: ISIR Reprocess Process: Match Future-Year FAYs Tickets: RS-20567; Description: The ‘ISIR Reprocess’ process has been updated to include ISIRs for the current FAY and all future-year FAYs. For example, if the current year is FAY 2019-2020, the system will reprocess available ISIRs for 2019-2020, 2020-2021, 2021-2022, and later. |
RS-20535 | Regent Award | Awarding | Title: Regent Plan: Subsidized Loan Usage Tickets: RS-20535; RS-20735; RS-20657; RS-20658; Description: Regent Plan has been enhanced to optionally display a student’s Subsidized Loan Usage. Schools may enable the new feature in Institution Setup>Regent Plan>General Sub-Tab>Display Subsidized Loan Usage. The new feature applies to students who have Subsidized Usage Limits Apply (SULA) restrictions. If a student’s SULA flag has a value of 'Y' (Yes), the student’s My Plan displays a bar graph showing the student’s current Subsidized Loan Usage percentage for their program, relative to the 150% maximum. The SULA information is displayed just below the Lifetime Aggregate Borrowing Limits. If the student’s SULA flag is ‘N,’ or the system is configured with Display Subsidized Loan Usage disabled, then the system will not display the new SULA graph. |
RS-20504 | Regent Award | Packaging | Title: Package Term-Based Subsidized Loans with Subsidized Usage Limit Applies (SULA) Restrictions Tickets: RS-20504; RS-20495; RS-20507; RS-20508; RS-20509; RS-20511; RS-20513; RS-20514; RS-20515; RS-20521; RS-20522; RS-20524; RS-20530; RS-20533; RS-20534; RS-20543; RS-20551; RS-20519; Description: Regent Award has improved auto-packaging of Subsidized loans for term-based students when the Subsidized Usage Limit Applies (SULA). The system calculates the students' SULA usage and, when configured, the system will prevent packaging of current and future Subsidized loans that would exceed the students' Subsidized Usage Period (SUP) limits. Regent uses the most recent SULA information from COD, NSLDS FAH, or ISIR data. First, Regent starts with the student’s Total Actual SUP value, in years. Next, Regent subtracts any COD-calculated loan actual SUP values for current and future award periods. Then, Regent repackages and re-awards the Subsidized loans for current and future years. During packaging, Regent automatically tracks each loan’s SUP, as adjusted for term enrollment levels or maximum eligibility. Regent adds the loan’s SUP to the student’s total cumulative SUP calculated by Regent. When a student’s program is configured to apply SULA calculations to awarding, the system will stop awarding Subsidized loans when the student’s total SUP reaches 150% of the Published Program Length in years. The system also marks the final subsidized loan as being the last eligible Subsidized loan due to SULA restrictions. Regent Award calculates SULA data for all students with the SULA flag = Y in the official data source. Schools can configure whether the SULA calculations will affect Subsidized loan awarding. The configuration setting is ‘Apply SULA Calculations' in Institution Setup, inheritable to Campus Setup and Program Setup. Regent will still always do the student-level SULA calculations for students with SULA=Y, even when the program is ineligible for Subsidized loans (such as Graduate programs) or the program is configured with ‘Apply SULA Calculations’ set to 'No.' |
RS-20490 | Regent Award | Packaging | Title: Student History Tab, SULA Sub-tab: Student Subsidized Usage, Subsidized Loan Usage, and Loan Subsidized Usage by Payment Period Tickets: RS-20645; RS-20761; RS-20760; RS-20762; RS-20763; RS-16793; RS-20764; RS-20502; RS-20765; RS-20749; RS-20488; RS-20498; RS-20500; RS-20499; RS-20489; RS-20492; RS-20766; Description: |
RS-20444 | Regent Award | Packaging | Title: MHEC Drug Free Pledge Form Tickets: RS-20368; RS-20601; RS-20608; RS-20603; RS-20604; Description: A new Smart Form, MHEC Pledge to Remain Drug Free Form, has been created that will streamline the applicant experience and increase the level of applicant self-service in the completion of MHEC processing. Regent provides the ability to track the completion of the MHEC Pledge to Remain Drug Free Form for both Centralized and Decentralized Awards. Student demographic information is pre-populated and the student is able to electronically sign the form. |
RS-20442 | Regent Award | Packaging | Title: MHEC - Centralized Awards Tickets: RS-20807; RS-20808; RS-20815; RS-20810; RS-20811; RS-20809; RS-20816; RS-20822; RS-20825; RS-20826; RS-20827; RS-20828; RS-20852; RS-20853; RS-20854; RS-20845; RS-20851; RS-20855; RS-20856; RS-20857; RS-20858; RS-20859; RS-20881; RS-20874; RS-20875; RS-20876; Description: New functionality was added to support the MHEC Centralized awarding process. This functionality includes MHEC export files that will provide updated data pertinent to determining eligibility for an award through a series of MHEC Roster imports. It also includes the consumption of the MHEC Award Roster, which will insert MHEC award amounts onto the student’s Academic Plan and cancel existing ineligible awards according to configuration settings. |
RS-20307 | Regent Award | Documents | Title: Increase Field Lengths for ‘Document Reasons’ in Regent Award Tickets: RS-20307; RS-20392; RS-20451; RS-20452; RS-20453; RS-20783; Description: The following field lengths have been increased to allow up to 1000 characters in Regent Award and Regent Review:
|
RS-20281 | Regent Award | Communications | Title: New Parent PLUS Borrower Communication Fields Tickets: RS-18884; RS-20281; RS-20297; RS-20298; RS-20312; RS-20311; RS-20357; RS-20358; Description: |
RS-20253 | Regent Award | User Interface | Title: New Disability Status Field in the Demographic Information Section on the Student Details Tab in Regent Award Tickets: RS-20253; RS-20695; RS-20956; Description: A new Disability Status field will display in Regent Award on the Student Details Tab within the Demographic Information Section. When the disabilityStatus attribute is provided in the SBL, the value will be displayed in the new Disability Status field in Regent Award. |
RS-20170 | Regent Award | Funds (SEOG / Work Study / State) | Title: Update Rounding Logic for Wisconsin State Grant Ticket: RS-20170; RS-20904; Description: The Wisconsin State Grant rules for calculating award amounts in the first term of the FAY when the first term award amount results in a disbursement that is not a whole dollar amount, have been updated in the ruleset. |
RS-20169 | Regent Award | SAP | Title: Use Prior Program SAP Status When Program Level is Changed Tickets: RS-20169; RS-20172; RS-20173; RS-20174; RS-20175; RS-20176; RS-20177; RS-20178; RS-20179; RS-20203; RS-20205; RS-20206; RS-20208; RS-20209; RS-20210; RS-20211; Description: If the new setting has a value of Yes, then by default, the system will apply the previous program's SAP status for program changes across Undergraduate/Graduate program levels. If the new setting is No, and the new program is at a different Graduate/Undergraduate level than the previous program, the first SAP review period will default to a status of "Not Calculated" for the new program. Users may still choose to Use Prior Program SAP Status while processing a Program Change through the Program Management Wizard (PMW). |
RS-19545 | Student Experience | Student Experience | Title: New Regent Plan Disclosure Information Screen in Student Experience Tickets: RS-20768; RS-20769; RS-20770; RS-20771; RS-20772; RS-20773; RS-20774; RS-20775; RS-20776; Description: A new Disclosure Information screen is available in Student Experience. The Disclosure Information screen is a sub-page of Regent Plan and is available to schools with a Regent Plan license. The Disclosure Information screen is accessible via a Page Link Token that can be added to configurable text areas within Student Experience (e.g. Footer configuration). The information displayed on the Disclosure Information sub-page is configurable via a text box in the Loan Disclosure Settings section of the Regent Plan Configuration/General tab in Institution Setup, in Regent. Tokens can be inserted into configurable messaging areas on the Disclosure Page within Student Experience to direct a user to specific Student Experience pages or to surface calculated amounts (e.g. Total Subsidized Loan Amount) within configurable text. |
RS-19544 | Student Experience | Student Experience | Title: Updates to Student Experience Communications Tickets: RS-20794; RS-20795; RS-20796; RS-20797; RS-20798; RS-20799; RS-20800; RS-21078; RS-21083; Description: The Student Experience ‘Messages’ component name has been updated to ‘Communications’. The component has been separated into two tabs. The Messages tab will continue to display portal messages if configured. A new Notifications tab is now available and displays emails and letters that have been generated and are configured to display in Regent. The Communications component, with both the Messages and Notification tabs, only displays when the component is configured to display. |
RS-19467 | Regent Award | Student Experience | Title: VWS: Remove default for 'Confirm Your Current Marital Status' Tickets: RS-19467; RS-20883; Description: ‘Confirm Your Current Marital Status' field on the Verification Worksheet has been updated to not have a default value of 'No’. Student will be required to select the appropriate value. Help text has been moved above the radio button options. |
Bugs
The following bugs are resolved in this release:
Key | Product Selection | Functional Area | Release Note |
---|---|---|---|
RS-19991 | Regent Award | Packaging | Problem: Cause: Fix: Testing: |
RS-21032 | Regent Review | Documents | Problem: After a school upgraded to 5.3.2.0, the school’s Export Student Documents output could not be consumed by the school’s external system. Cause: An enhancement inadvertently made a minor change to the Export Student Documents schema. The new XML output capitalized the word ‘Student’ and ‘Students’ in the XML output file. Fix: The XML output process was corrected to use lowercase values of ‘students’ and ‘student.’ Testing: Update a Document Requirement on a student. In Processes, run the Export Student Documents process. Download and view the output file (decrypting the file if needed). Confirm the file contents have the nodes for ‘students’ and ‘student’ in all lowercase letters. |
RS-20137 | Student Experience | Student Experience | Problem: An error was received when trying to generate a parent portal invite when SSO was configured. Cause: An issue existed in the validation that ensures a user does not supply a parent's email that is the same as their registered username/email. Fix: The validation logic was updated to ignore the registered username/email when SSO is configured for Student Experience. Testing: Identify an affected student. Invite a parent to sign the application. Ensure that no error message is received during the process and that the parent receives the email and is successfully able to electronically sign the application. |
RS-21067 | Regent Award | SBL | Problem: Several Student Batch Load (SBL) files could not load. The processes had technical errors such as “Violation of Primary Key.” Cause: The SBL files contained incorrect, duplicated data. The data tried to update an existing student record and create a new, different student record for the same physical person in the same data file. Fix: Regent added a new validation check to identify duplicated student records, which catches the problem and prevents the full SBL process from failing. Testing: Load a problematic SBL data file into a test environment, adjusting timestamps if needed. Confirm the file loads successfully. Confirm the system displays a validation error for the affected records. |
RS-20892 | Regent Award | Not Applicable | Problem: The date value in the Student History tab, General sub-tab, displayed an incorrect date in the NSLDS column. Cause: The screen displayed the file’s import date instead of the NSLDS Alert or FAH Date from the data file. Fix: The screen was updated to display the NSLDS Alert or FAH Date value from the NSLDS data file. Testing: Edit an NSLDS Financial Award History (FAH) data file. Set the Alert or FAH Date in the NSLDS Header data to be after the date that is currently shown. Load the file into Regent. Navigate to the student. View the student’s History tab, General sub-tab. Refresh. Confirm the ‘Date Updated’ value in the NSLDS column matches the value from the NSLDS FAH data file Header, not the date when the import was made. |
RS-20868 | Regent Award | User Interface | Problem: The new section header titled, ‘FERPA Authorization Settings' under Institution Setup>Portal Smart Form is missing. Cause: The addition of the section header was missed during the implementation of the new ‘FERPA Authorization Settings’. Fix: The new section header titled, ‘FERPA Authorization Settings' under Institution Setup>Portal Smart Form was added. Testing: Navigate to the Institution Setup>Portal Smart Form tab in Regent Award. Scroll to the ‘FERPA Authorization Settings’. Confirm the section title displays above the new FERPA configurations. |
RS-21002 | Regent Award | SBL | Problem: The Student Batch Load (SBL) process failed with an error, Cannot insert the value NULL….column does not allow nulls. INSERT fails. Cause: A rare sequence of changes to course data values led to the system trying to write an empty (null) data value within a student’s Activity Log Entry (ALE). The system was expecting a non-blank value for the field. Fix: As a short-term fix, the problematic data was removed and the file was reloaded. For a more permanent fix, the SBL process was updated to handle null (empty) data values when writing to student Activity Log Entries. Any null values will be replaced with the word ‘BLANK’ in the ALE text. Testing: In a test environment with the affected student, load an SBL file with the malformed data. Confirm the SBL process loads successfully. View the affected student’s activity log. Confirm the message text displays the word ‘BLANK.’ |
RS-20046 | Regent Award | Funds (SEOG / Work Study / State) | Problem: Cause: Fix: Testing: |
RS-20640 | Regent Award | Student Experience | Problem: Cause: Fix: Testing: |
RS-19298 | Regent Award | Packaging | Problem: Cause: Fix: Testing: |
RS-18698 | Regent Award | R2T4 | Problem: Cause: Fix: Testing: |
RS-19632 | Regent Award | Program Change | Problem: Cause: Fix: Testing: |
RS-20898 | Regent Award | Packaging | Problem: Cause: Fix: Testing: |
RS-21031 | Student Experience | Documents | Problem: Students could not download some documents from the Student Experience Portal. Cause: The documents had file names that contained special characters, such as dashes and curly apostrophes. A bug in the My Documents page prevented the documents from downloading when the filenames contained those special characters. Fix: The My Documents page successfully processes files that have special characters in the filenames. In addition, a script was developed as a workaround. The script substitutes hyphens for dashes, and quote marks for apostrophes. Testing: In Windows, edit a file name so it has a long dash and a curly apostrophe, e.g. 2021-2022 Bachelor's Degree Certification.pdf. In Document Setup configuration, create or edit a Document with Attachments Allowed = Yes. For the Attachment, select the file and click Upload. Save the Document Setup. Refresh and confirm the Attachment name displays the name with the special characters. Navigate to a student and add the new Document in Needed status. Create a test account for the Student Experience Portal for the student. Log into the Student Portal. Navigate to the My Documents section. Download the file. Confirm the file is successfully downloaded. |
RS-17319 | Regent Award | Packaging | Problem: Cause: Fix: Testing: |
RS-19617 | Regent Award | EST/Disbursements | Problem: Cause: Fix: Testing: |
RS-20841 | Regent Award | Packaging | Problem: Cause: Fix: Testing: |
Scripts
Terminology for understanding Script Release Notes:
- Build Script: These scripts are automatically run when an environment is upgraded to a new release; no special request is needed and all customers receive the scripted change.
- Data Cleanup Script: These scripts modify specific data, and may or may not be included with a new release; the release note provided below will specify. If they are not included with the release, they need to be requested by the customer.
- Custom Script: These scripts may perform a variety of functions, which will be specified in the release note and must be requested by the customer as needed.
The following Scripts relate to this release:
Key | Release Note |
---|---|
RS-20935 | Purpose of Script: Update effective date of new COD Import Schema to 3/21/21 due to scheduling change by COD. Data Changed by the Script: effectiveStartDate' value in CODschema table How to Access the Script: Included in Regent Award 5.3.3.1, 5.3.4.1, and 5.4.0.0. How to Test the Script: After upgrading to 5.3.3.1, 5.3.4.1, or 5.4.0.0, run the following SQL query: SELECT * FROM dbo.CODSchema WITH (NOLOCK) WHERE code = '4.0e'. Confirm that the effectiveStartDate value in dbo.CODSchema is 03/21/21. |
RS-20900 | Purpose of Script: Data Changed by the Script: How to Access the Script: How to Test the Script: |
RS-20899 | Purpose of Script: Data Changed by the Script: How to Access the Script: How to Test the Script: |
RS-20698 | Purpose of Script: This build script ensures Regent Award is using updated course data for all students upon upgrade. In some cases, resource conflicts at the database level might have caused deadlocks and stopped the Course Enrollment Rollup (CE Rollup) process from completing. Some students might have had pending data changes, such as new course information from the Student Batch Load (SBL) process. For the affected students, the system could not update information such as total unit values. Data Changed by the Script: The script identifies any students that have course data changes or other SIS-provided data that was loaded but was not yet fully processed. The script then runs the Course Enrollment Rollup (CE Rollup) process for those students. The CE Rollup process updates the unit totals and other information. How to Access the Script: The script is included in the deployment of the 5.4.0.0 release. Each customer will receive this script update automatically when they upgrade to the 5.4.0.0 release. How to Test the Script: Before upgrading, find an affected student who had SBL data loaded in a failed CE Rollup process, where the student’s current course data do not match the unit totals on the Academic Plan screen. Package the student using the Modify Academic Plan wizard (MAP). Perform the upgrade. Refresh the Process Log. Confirm the Process CE Rollup process is Complete. View the affected student. Repackage the student using MAP. Refresh the Academic Plan screen. Confirm the total units match the course data. |
RS-20506 | Purpose of Script: Data Changed by the Script: How to Access the Script: How to Test the Script: |
Data Views
The following Data Views relate to this release:
Key | Release Note |
---|---|
RS-21047 | Title: Expanded Data Extract Data Views for Institution, Campus/Location, and Site Information Tickets: RS-21047; Description: 215 Data Extract Data Views have been updated or created. The updated Data Views have been augmented with additional details for Institution, Campus/Location, and Site external IDs. The added fields allow improved filtering for those entities. The Regent Award Data View Data Dictionary has been updated to reflect the new and updated data views. |
RS-20720 | Title: New Data Views for ISIR, Course Enrollment, and Communications Tickets: RS-20720; Description: New data views have been created for the following tables:
The Regent Award Data View Data Dictionary has been updated to reflect the added views. |
RS-20696 | Title: New Student Detail Data View Version Ticket(s): RS-20696; Description: A new data view, dataExtract_StudentDetail_View_v003 has been created. The difference between the v002 and v003 versions of the view is as follows: Added disabilityStatus column. The Regent Award Data View Data Dictionary has been updated to reflect the new view version. |