Course Repeat Policy - Graduate

Prior to July 1, 2016, the Department of Education allowed unlimited Repeats for Graduate programs. Starting July 1, 2016, graduate Repeats are limited with the same Repeat restrictions as undergraduate programs.  

Setting the "Repeat" Flag - All Courses with the Same Course ID

Regent Award considers all courses sharing the same Course ID, to have the same course content. If two courses have different content (for Title IV purposes), they should use different Course IDs when provided on the SBL.

When an SBL is imported with a course that is marked as repeat=”true” (displayed as a "SIS Repeat" on the /wiki/spaces/REM/pages/7012969) and Regent Award detects that a repeated course exists, Regent Award marks the original course with the internally calculated "Repeat" flag to True. All the remaining/subsequent courses with the same Course ID are also marked with the internally calculated Repeat flag. Regent Award evaluates all the flagged courses (starting with the first one) when counting potential Disqualified Repeats.

The "Repeat" flag depends on two other flags:

• SIS Repeat:  Set whenever SBL course data has repeat="true"
• Repeat Override: Set when Financial Aid staff edit a course in Regent Award and set the Repeat Override flag to True

If either "SIS Repeat" or "Repeat Override" is True on any course, Regent Award will go through the student's course data to find all courses with that same Course ID. Then Regent Award marks all of those courses as repeat=true so they can be counted for the Repeat logic. Regent Award then analyzes which courses are eligible for Title IV funding.

• For example, a student takes a course, then repeats it. The SBL might import course data for the first course without any repeat flag, and then the second course with the SBL data "repeat=true." The second course would show in Regent Award as a "SIS Repeat." Regent Award's analysis would mark that repeated course with the Calculated Repeat flag, and also, mark the student's previous course with the Calculated Repeat flag. Other instances of that course would also be marked as a Calculated Repeat.

Regent Award sorts all of the student's repeat courses sharing the same Course ID. Regent Award puts them in order by program start date, program creation in Regent Award, course end date, completed (counting true first), start date, SIS internal transfer (counting true first), and course creation in Regent Award. The order determines which courses can be funded, and which are disqualified. 

Counting Courses for Repeat Limits

There are instances when courses do not count toward the Title IV Repeat limits. Those instances include:

• External Transfer courses
• Withdrawn courses (having a withdrawal date) Note, if a Withdrawn course would already have been Disqualified, it will still be marked as a Disqualified Repeat. 
• Courses with zero Quality Points, taken before the student passes the course 
• Courses in Graduate programs, with course start dates prior to July 1, 2016, were unlimited and not Disqualified. Graduate courses with a start date after July 1, 2016, are counted just like undergraduate courses and have the same Repeat limits.
• Courses prior to FAY 2011-2012 were only limited by school policy. 

When the student passes the course and earns Quality Points, Regent Award starts counting the number of qualified repeats.

• The earliest passed course, with non-zero Quality Points, is counted as the first successfully completed course.
• After the first passed course, Title IV repeat limits apply:
  
  • Term-based programs: Only one allowed Repeat, regardless of whether the course is passed the second time. Withdrawals are not counted toward the repeat limit.
  • Non-Term programs: No allowed Repeat courses. All repeats are disqualified.

Any additional repeats after the limits are met are Disqualified Repeat courses including all future attempts of the course, regardless of any withdrawal or completion status. Disqualified Repeat courses cannot receive Title IV funding.

Internal Transfer Repeats and External Course ID

Internal Transfer courses are counted toward the Qualified Repeat limits. Regent Award looks for a shared Course ID and the Repeat flag, like non-Transfer courses. However, for Internal Transfer courses imported on the SBL, Regent Award also uses the External Course ID to identify any duplicate courses. For example, a student might have multiple program changes. The same course might appear several times, as an Internal Transfer course in each program. Each unique External Course ID would be counted only once. 

Program Changes

Regent Award counts repeated courses regardless of a student's program. For example, a student might take ECON101, have a program change, and repeat ECON101 (with the same Course ID) again in the new program. When any ECON101 (with the same Course ID) course is flagged as a SIS Repeat (or Repeat Override), Regent Award will mark both ECON101 courses as a Regent Award-Calculated Repeat. Both courses would count toward the allowed Repeat limits.  

If an Internal Transfer course appears in two different programs, the Program with the earliest Start Date takes precedence. Sometimes, an Internal Transfer course is not associated with any active Program. For example, Internal Transfers might be loaded for a program change from years ago, before a school started using Regent Award. When the Internal Transfer courses do not have any associated program, Regent Award uses the earliest program's start date.  

Data Assumptions

There are numerous data assumptions needed for repeat and remedial logic in Regent Award.

1. The Course Level Repeat flag is to be set by the SIS in the SBL file - Regent Award will not set this flag
2. Regent Award assumptions regarding the receipt of data from the SIS:
   • Course data will contain a course where repeat = false (the assumption here is that the first time the student takes a course, the SIS would not know that the course will later be repeated)
   • The SIS will mark any later occurrences of the course as Repeat = true
   • When a course is flagged as a repeat, Regent will use the CourseID+ProgramID+Student to locate and match other instances of the course to determine how many times the course has been repeated. The number of times that a student may repeat a course does not reset when the student changes programs.
3. When repeat = true on the CourseData level:
   • Regent Award will determine all the repeat instances of the same Course Id that exist

   • Regent Award will ignore all withdrawn courses

   • Regent Award will ignore External Transfer courses
   • Regent Award will ignore courses with 0 units

Remedial courses are courses that prepare a student for a program of study. A student solely enrolled in remedial coursework is not eligible for Title IV aid, however, if a student is enrolled in an eligible program which contains some remedial coursework, he/she can be considered a regular student and potentially eligible for Title IV aid, even if he/she is taking all remedial courses before taking any regular courses.

Regent Award assumes that remedial courses are not program applicable. A course that is flagged as both remedial = true and program applicable = true is to be treated as a "normal" program applicable course (i.e. this course does not count towards the Remedial Qualified Units/Weeks). 

If a course is transfer = true, remedial = true, and program applicable = false then it will be summed up at the program level and added to the total remedial qualified units to determine if the student has reached their Program AY unit limit of remedial qualified units. 

Counting Qualified Remedial Unit Totals

Term Specific Remedial Counts

If a course was withdrawn AFTER the census date, it counts toward the census remedial total (for term-based programs only). Only remedial units that were withdrawn BEFORE or ON the census date are disregarded (not included in any remedial counts).

If a course is a disqualified repeat, it is not counted in the remedial course unit summation (If a course is repeatDisqualifed=true then that is considered the same as remedialDisqualified = true). It will NOT count toward ANY remedial qualified or program applicable total and is treated the same as a non-program applicable course.  On the CourseData record for Term programs:

• If the Enrolled Date is <= the Census Date, then the units DO count in the remedial total count
• If the Enrolled Date it NOT <= the Census Date, then they do NOT count in the remedial qualified count.

If the student enrolls in a course prior to the census date, Regent Award counts the remedial units in determining totalQualifiedRemedial units;  If the student enrolls after the census date, Regent Award does not count the course toward the totalQualifiedRemedial units because the student will not receive Title IV awarding for the course due to enrolling after the census date. 

Remedial Limits

Remedial courses that are "Calculated Internal Transfers" are considered toward the remedial unit limit and unit totals. Remedial external transfer and SIS specified internal transfer remedial courses are not considered for any unit totals.

Students are allowed to take a total Remedial unit count up to the related Program AY Unit total based on the Academic Unit Type:

Nonterm Specific Remedial Counts

• Withdrawn nonterm remedial courses are not counted towards the remedial unit limit.
• Withdrawn courses (regardless of dates) are not counted in the totalRemedialQualifiedUnits unit sum.

Partial Remedials

Partial remedials are not being awarded/handled in an automated way in Regent Award.

• Only the remedial courses that relate to the qualified total are considered.
• Any course over the limit will be marked as 'remedialDisqualified = true' and those units/weeks will not be counted toward any CE total.
• Units for a course must count as a total
  • Example: if there are 6 remaining remedial units and two 4 unit remedial courses are imported, only one course will count toward the student’s qualified remedial total, and there will then be 2 remaining remedial units left
• If another course can be used for the remaining units then it will be used otherwise all future remedial courses will be marked as 'remedialDisqualified = true' and their units/weeks will not be included in the CE totals (the totalRemedialUnits/Weeks & totalRemedialProgAppUnits/Weeks).