Introduction

This Business Process Analysis (BPA) and System Configuration document describes the functionality and configuration settings related to the awarding structure in Regent Award. 

This document defines the following associated with the awarding:

• Packaging Awards

• Award Status

• Title IV Awarding

• Non-Title IV Awarding

• Overawards

• Specifications for the school's specific configuration of:

  • Data requirements

  • Communication

  • User Roles

  • Documents

  • Tasks

  • Additional Configuration

Process Overview

This section describes the default behavior of the Regent Award processes associated with awarding. Regent Award’s awarding workflow and configurations facilitate the student’s Academic Plan and packaging. The awarding structure is comprised of Title IV and non-Title IV funds.  

Packaging Awards

Regent Award will determine a student’s eligibility and create a financial aid package to fill unmet need and unmet cost, awarding need-based and non-need-based aid per the configured Packaging Philosophy and Federal Award Eules (refer to the Funds and Packaging Philosophy BPA.) Regent Award takes many factors into consideration when calculating a student’s eligibility using information provided in the Student Batch Load (SBL), the student’s ISIR, Enrollment Level, Grade Level, Program Type, Remaining Program Units, Cost of Attendance, and Calculated Need. 

Regent Award provides several methods when packaging a student:

• Auto-packaging through the Batch Packaging process

• Manual/Individual student packaging through the Modify Academic Plan (MAP) Wizard

• Manually adding an award through the Add Award Wizard

• Manually adjusting or canceling an award through the Modify Award Wizard (MAW)

• Importing an existing configured fund through the Import Award and Disbursements integration process

Students who have a blocking Document or open Task may not be awarded via the Batch Packaging process or MAP until the restricted Document or Task is resolved.

NSLDS

Regent Award accepts both Financial Aid History (FAH) and Transfer Student Monitoring (TSM) files from the National Student Loan Data System (NSLDS). NSLDS FAH files should be requested and imported so that Regent Award has the most current information to use as the basis for awarding Title IV. The NSLDS/FAH process will be scheduled in the Runbook. User with the appropriate permissions may elect to manually run the process again just prior to disbursements.

Regent Award uses information from NSLDS history for aggregate and LEU limits. Although Regent Award can initially award a student from ISIR loan history data alone, ISIR data may not provide the most up-to-date information for awarding and cannot be overridden. It is therefore recommended that NSLDS FAH files be imported into Regent Award on a regular basis. 

When FAH files are requested for a student from NSLDS, NSLDS provides the results in a file that can be imported into Regent Award. During import, students in the FAH file are matched to student records in Regent Award with matching logic using student SSN, DOB, Last Name, First Name, and School OPEID. If a match is found between a student in the FAH file and a Regent student record, the FAH information from NSLDS appears in the student History tab, and that imported information is used to package or repackage the student.

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Regent Award allows users with appropriate permissions to override student aggregate information through the History tab if it is determined that the information from the Federal data sources do not accurately represent the student’s aggregate amounts or recent changes. Caution should be used in overriding NSLDS information.  It should only be used in rare instances where the ISIR and NSLDS information are unable to be updated accurately. Once the aggregate values have been overridden, the ‘Always Use Manual’ checkbox should be checked to avoid being overwritten by future NSLDS data imports. This allows Regent Award to repackage the student using the manual values entered.

Auto-Packaged Awards

Regent Award automatically packages students for financial aid awards configured to auto-package. An ISIR must be on file for a student for Regent Award to create Federal awards. Federal awards are packaged in ‘Offered’ or ‘Accepted’ status if a current Federal Award Year ISIR is on file. If only a previous FAY ISIR is on file, Federal awards may be configured to package in an ‘Estimated’ status. When the current FAY ISIR is not on file, Regent Award considers the student’s Expected Family Contribution (EFC) from the most recent active ISIR as a basis for estimating eligibility in future Award Periods. 

Batch Packaging

Batch packaging is a method used by Regent Award to award students. This process packages all students for all funds configured to be auto-packaged, in accordance with eligibility rules. Batch Packaging provides a rapid turnaround time from receipt of ISIR to an offered award package. The Batch Packaging process is a scheduled process that runs daily per the Runbook. Users with appropriate permissions may also manually execute the Batch Packaging process.

Manual Packaging - Modify Academic Plan (MAP) Wizard

Regent Award provides users the ability to manually package a single student, using the Modify Academic Plan (MAP) Wizard, with the same rules that apply to students that are batch packaged. This process packages a single student for all funds configured to be auto-packaged, in accordance with Regent Award predetermined school-specific eligibility rules.  

The basic packaging option allows the user to accept the Payment Period dates and crossover FAYs determined by Regent Award and presents the user with the student’s package to review prior to finalizing it. The Advanced Packaging option allows the user to modify the student’s Payment Period dates and the FAY with which a crossover Payment Period is associated. The selected crossover FAY is persistent and is used for awarding changes.

Awarding and Mismatched ISIR Program Levels

Regent Award considers an ISIR to be a Graduate-level ISIR when a student answers "Yes" to the FAFSA question 48, ISIR field "Working on a Master's or Doctorate Program?" If a student answers "No" or leaves that question blank, Regent Award considers the ISIR to be an Undergraduate-level ISIR.

For proper awarding to occur in Regent Award, the Active ISIR program level must match to the Regent Award program type. For example, if a student has an Active Graduate ISIR, but enrolls in an Undergraduate program, Regent Award will not use the Graduate ISIR for packaging the student's Undergraduate awards.

The same behavior will occur if a student has an Active Undergraduate ISIR and enrolls in a Graduate program. Regent Award cancels any previous awards created with the mismatched Graduate ISIR and will not package new Graduate awards with the Active Undergraduate ISIR. If a school is configured to award based on an "Estimated" EFC, Regent Award will still attempt to create estimated awards for the program based on the Active ISIR's EFC. Regent Award also notes the ISIR-program mismatch as a warning in the packaging log. When Regent Award users are processing a Program Change and no matching active ISIR is available, the Program Management Wizard (PMW) will display an alert and prompt the user to select an active ISIR.

Regent Award considers “post-Bachelor’s licensure” credentials to be Undergraduate programs, for awarding purposes.

Awarding and High School Diploma or Equivalent

Regent Award uses the ISIR-provided information for high school when awarding a student. Schools have the option to provide their SIS high school information on the SBL, which will override the ISIR data.  However, if the High School Diploma type on the ISIR is ‘None of the Above,’ the SIS high school information must be provided.  If the SBL contains a blank Diploma Type value, Regent Award will either prevent packaging or cancel existing awards, depending on configuration.

Manually Adding Awards

Regent Award provides the Add Award Wizard (AAW) to manually add an award, and Modify Award Wizard (MAW) for editing an award on, a student’s package. AAW and MAW are accessed on the Awards tab. When students are awarded either through the Import Award process or the Manual Award process, the system considers these awards in determining the student’s overall need for other auto-packaged aid. Adding manual awards to the student’s package may reduce other award eligibility, and when funds are configured to adjust paid disbursements, disbursed funds may be reduced or rescinded. Regent Award uses the configured Packaging Philosophy to determine whether a fund added after the initial package can reduce or replace a fund already packaged.

The ‘Review Eligibility Change’ Task can be configured to trigger anytime the student's eligibility or eligible amount changes for a manual award.

Adding an Award- AAW

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When adding a fund through AAW, Regent Award uses the same eligibility and packaging rules as the Modify Academic Plan Wizard and Batch Packaging (i.e. funds can be added through the AAW only if the student is eligible to be packaged for the award.)

When adding an award, the user is asked to select the fund and the Award Period to which the award applies. The user is then required to enter the Initial Status of the fund, the Award Amount, and a comment in the Notes section. If the award’s Initial Status is ‘Accepted’, both the Offered Amount and Accepted Amount are required. For funds that do not have an auto-package ruleset, Regent Award defaults the eligible amount based on the Fund and Packaging Philosophy configurations. Refer to the Funds and Packaging Philosophy BPA.

A manual award is indicated with the green ‘M’ beside the award on the Academic Plan tab and the Awards tab.  Manual awards are not managed by Regent Award. 

Modifying an Award- MAW

Regent Award provides the ability to modify an existing award through the MAW. Access to an existing award for modification is under the Award Detail on the Awards tab. When modifying an award, MAW pre-populates the screens with the current Award Information and allows the User to make changes to the Award Status, Award Amounts, Disbursement Amounts, Disbursement Dates, and Disbursement Status. If the award has been sent to COD, Regent Award queues the award to be resent to COD for update once these changes are finalized.

If a manual award has already been paid or partially paid, Regent Award does not allow the Award Status to be increased or set back to ‘Offered.'  In cases where the Award Amount needs to be increased on a paid or partially paid manual award, the manual award should not be updated. The user must create a new award in an ‘Offered’ status to allow students to accept the Additional Amount via the Student Portal.

Canceling an Award

An award or its disbursements may be manually canceled via MAW at any time. If the award has been sent to COD, Regent Award queues the award to be resent to COD for update once these changes are finalized.

Award Status

Funds are configured to be awarded in an Initial Status (e.g. ‘Accepted’, ‘Offered’, ‘Estimated’.) However, the status of an award may change due to various business processes. Regent Award provides the following statuses for awards:

• Accepted – Award has been accepted by the student.

• Offered – Award has been offered to a student and is awaiting the student’s acceptance.

• Estimated – Award eligibility is predetermined for future FAYs based on the current or most recent active FAY ISIR.

• Canceled – Award has been canceled due to changes in eligibility or at the student’s request.

• Declined – Award has been declined through the Student Portal or on behalf of the student by the User via MAW.

• Unfunded – Award is a budgeted fund, but no remaining funds are available in the budget.

Accepting Awards

Funds that are configured in an ‘Offered’ status must be accepted. If Direct loans are configured in an ‘Offered’ status, they must be ‘Accepted’ before they can be sent to COD for origination. There are two ways in which the award can be accepted: 1) by the student via the Student Portal or 2) by a user with appropriate permissions on the student’s behalf via MAW.

Accepting Awards via the Student Portal

The Student Portal allows the student to accept awards configured to be initially awarded in ‘Offered’ status. 

Students may initially accept an award with an amount less than the Maximum Eligible Amount and increase the Accepted Amount at a later time, up to the maximum eligibility. When a student has been offered both Direct Subsidized and Unsubsidized Loans, the student must first accept the Maximum Amount of the Direct Subsidized Loan before Regent Award allows the student to accept any amount of the Direct Unsubsidized Loan.

All award-related activity performed by the student via the Student Portal is recorded on the Activity Log in the Regent Award UI. In addition, the Regent Award ‘Awarding Report’ can be utilized to identify student-specific award statuses.

Acceptance on the Behalf of the Student

If a student is unable to accept Offered awards through the Student Portal, the User may accept the award on the student’s behalf. In this case, the User with appropriate permissions must utilize MAW on the student’s Awards tab to change the status of the award from ‘Offered’ to ‘Accepted’. If the student is requesting to accept a different amount than the Award Amount being offered, Regent Award does not mark the award as ‘Manual’. The User must add a note in MAW and should indicate that the award is being accepted on the student’s behalf.

Declining and Cancelling Awards

The Student Portal allows the student to decline awards configured to be initially awarded in ‘Offered’ status. If the Student Portal is configured to allow students to accept a lower award, an Accepted award can later be declined or reduced via the Student Portal.

If the Student Portal is not configured to allow students to accept a lower award, an Accepted award cannot later be declined via the Student Portal (refer to the Student Portal BPA for configuration options.) If a student accepts an Offered award and later decides to decline it, the student must contact the school and request the award be canceled. In this case, the User must utilize MAW on the student’s Awards tab to change the status of the award from ‘Accepted’ to ‘Cancelled’. The award will be considered a Manual award.  The User may cancel the entire award or individual disbursements, in which case the Award Amount must be reduced. When an award or disbursement is reduced or canceled, Regent Award queues the change for COD reporting and it will be included in the next COD export. Any canceled or reduced paid disbursements will result in a negative transaction with the next Export Student Transaction (EST) completed process.

Title IV Awarding

Federal Pell

For Regent Award to award Pell to a student, the student must have the Pell Eligibility Indicator flag on the FAY ISIR set to ‘Yes’ and must not have exceeded Pell LEU limits, including any disbursements received from the current FAY at another Institution. If the current FAY ISIR is not present, the award is Estimated on the previous year’s ISIR eligibility. Regent Award also verifies that the student record is associated to an Undergraduate program in Regent Award. 

Regent Award uses ISIR, NSLDS, or COD data to verify Pell LEU amounts and packages Pell up to the 600% limit. For each Pell awarded to the student, Regent Award checks the total LEU reported (via NSLDS, ISIR, or COD) plus the percent of Pell awarded at the current Institution before awarding for the current FAY. The amount a student receives in a FAY may be restricted by the remaining Pell LEU. 

Regent Award uses the Scheduled Award amounts for Pell Grants specified on the Payment Schedules released by the Department of Education prior to each FAY when awarding Pell to eligible students. 

Year Round Pell (YRP) for 150 Percent Awarding

Regent Award’s awarding functionality supports Year Round Pell (YRP), which allows a student to receive Pell Grant funds for up to 150% of the student’s Pell Grant Scheduled Award (PGSA) for a FAY.  Regent Award tracks disbursements from the first 100% of the PGSA, separate from disbursements of the 50% Additional Pell Grant Award (APGA) granted by the YRP rule.

Regent Award will package all students who meet the general Pell eligibility requirements and award up to 100% of the PGSA.  Once the PGSA is awarded, Regent Award will then award the 50% APGA. The PGSA and APGA amounts are combined and submitted as one amount for COD reporting purposes.  However, Regent Award displays the APGA as a separate disbursement line item in the student’s disbursement detail screen and identifies the disbursement with a YRP icon.

The total Pell award will not exceed 150% for the FAY, unless awarded manually due to the user having confirmed that there has been a Pell restoration for the student. This can be accomplished by utilizing MAW in Regent Award.  If Regent Award determines there is a reduction in the student’s Pell Grant eligibility for the FAY, it will cancel or refund the APGSA prior to reducing the PGSA.

Pell Cost of Attendance

Regent Award allows Campus-level Configuration for Pell COA. Schools can configure the Full-time and Less-than-half-time Pell COA for On-campus, With Parents, and Off-campus housing statuses for each FAY for associated programs. Regent Award will use this value for packaging Pell and will properly report the Pell COA value to COD. Schools will also can override the Pell COA at the Payment Period or Federal Award Year level for an individual student.

Note that each year, schools will need to configure a new Pell COA setup prior to awarding Pell for the new FAY. In order for Regent Award to estimate Pell awards for future FAYs, a school must configure the estimated Pell COA for those future FAYs.

Iraq and Afghanistan Service Grant (IASG)

Regent Award does not automatically award IASG to eligible students. The ‘Review Potential IASG’ task has been configured to trigger when an ISIR with IASG eligibility is received. The User working this task reviews the student to determine if the student is eligible and, if so, awards the student according the eligible Pell EFC and non-eligible Pell EFC rules.

Federal Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grant (FSEOG)

For Regent Award to auto-package FSEOG, a custom ruleset may need to be developed, to award within each school’s FSEOG policy and procedures.

FSEOG is configured with a crossover date of July 1^st. FSEOG budgets may be configured as monthly allocations or by term or payment period to ensure all students have equal opportunity to receive FSEOG. FSEOG recipients must meet the criteria of the custom ruleset developed and would be awarded funding as available based on the date of initial packaging. 

When the configured budget is exhausted, any student who may otherwise be eligible to receive FSEOG is shown with FSEOG Awarded but ‘Unfunded.’ This status is displayed in the Regent Award UI only and not seen by the student on the Student Portal. If a student who has received FSEOG funds becomes ineligible and the award amount returned to the original budget, a student who is awarded FSEOG in ‘Unfunded’ status may receive the awarded amount when repackaged. If this occurs, the ‘Unfunded’ award is updated to the status configured for initial awarding. Refer to the Fund Budgets section of the Funds and Packaging Philosophy BPA for more information.

Direct Subsidized and Unsubsidized Loans

Regent Award Direct Subsidized and Unsubsidized Loans are auto-packaged for eligible students enrolled with a status of at least half-time. Subsidized loans are awarded prior to Unsubsidized loans in the Packaging Philosophy and are awarded up to the student’s calculated remaining unmet need or the annual Federal loan limit, whichever is less. Unsubsidized loans may be awarded up to the student’s remaining unmet Cost of Attendance or the annual Federal loan limit, whichever is less. Unsubsidized loans are configured to replace the student’s EFC. Both Direct Subsidized and Unsubsidized Loans are awarded up to the Federal annual loan limits for the student’s grade level. Refer to the Funds and Packaging Philosophy BPA for “Package To Amounts.”

Grade Level Progression

For Term-based programs, Regent Award provides the ability to automatically award additional eligibility when a student progresses to the next grade level in the middle of an Academic Year. When this option is configured, Regent Award will first package the default loan period, up to the “Package To Amount”, prior to reviewing and awarding a new single term loan with the additional eligibility.  Refer to the Funds and Packaging Philosophy BPA for “Package To Amounts.”

Under an “Active Acceptance Policy” (fund source configured with initial status of ‘Offered’), the student must then accept the new loan amount via the Student Portal. Under a “Passive Acceptance Policy”, the new award will have an initial status of ‘Accepted.’

Subsidized Usage Limit Applies (SULA)

Term-based Only. Regent Award automatically limits packaging of Direct Subsidized loans for students when the Subsidized Usage Limit Applies (SULA) and SULA has been enabled for the student's program. The system calculates and tracks a student's Subsidized Usage Period (SUP). When configured, the system stops packaging Subsidized loans if the loans would exceed the student's SUP limits. Term-based loans have special calculation adjustments for non-full-time Enrollment Levels.

Program Characteristics

Subsidized Loan awarding is based on 150% of the length of the student's current active program. Regent's logic checks the student's total cumulative SUP against the MEP for the Program in each enrollment (i.e., each term, or each nonterm Academic Year).  Schools may configure programs to not apply the SULA calculations for awarding purposes. 

SULA Student-Level Calculations

Regent calculates and tracks the student's total Subsidized Usage Period (SUP) during packaging. 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, as reported by the official ED data source. 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 values for all students with the SULA flag = Y in the official ED 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 continue to calculate student-level SULA for students with a 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.'

Loan-Level SULA Calculations

If SULA=Y, Regent calculates the SUP for each individual Subsidized loan. First, Regent adjusts the loan's amount, eligibility, loan period length, etc. as for normal awarding. Next, Regent calculates the individual loan's SUP. Regent adds the loan to the student's cumulative SUP.  The system calculates the Remaining Eligibility Period (REP), the difference between the program's MEP, and the student's total cumulative SUP.  For term-based students, if an individual loan's SUP is more than the student's MEP, the system first tries to shorten the loan and/or change the amount to achieve a lower SUP. For nonterm students with a full AY, the system cannot award the loan for less than 1.0 of an AY, so the system cannot award the Subsidized loan

Refer to Customer Zone Knowledge Base for additional logic and considerations regarding SULA.

Additional Unsubsidized Loan - Special Circumstances Flag

The ‘Review Dependent Record Unsub Only’ task has been configured to trigger when a dependent student receive the Special Circumstances Flag with a value of ‘4’ on a rejected ISIR. A user with appropriate permissions must manually award the Direct Unsubsidized Loan in the eligible amount of Direct Subsidized Loan for the student’s grade level plus an additional $2000 by selecting the ‘Override Eligibility Rules’ checkbox. Regent Award does not allow awarding of any Title IV fund, including Direct Unsubsidized Loan to rejected ISIRs without the value of 4 being set on the ISIR.

Loan Periods with Ineligible Terms

For Term-based programs, Regent Award automatically adjusts Loan Periods for periods of ineligibility within the original Loan Period (e.g. withdrawing from or failing to attend one or more terms in an Academic Year.)

When a student has a period of ineligibility, Regent Award truncates the Loan Period to the last day of the most recent eligible term, but the student’s Academic Year does not change. Subsequent loans are awarded using the Start Date of the term into which the student registers after a break in enrollment. Regent Award updates COD with the Loan Periods to be consistent with these enrollment patterns.

When any Payment Period within the Loan Period (other than the first Payment Period) becomes ineligible for Direct Loans for any reason, the Loan Period is truncated to include only the eligible period(s). Once the Loan Period has been truncated to end in the past, that Loan Period is considered closed and increases to the loan cannot be originated for that period. The eligibility in subsequent Payment Periods cannot be shifted to the closed Loan Period once the subsequent Payment Period becomes ineligible.  

Remaining Period of Study Proration

Regent Award determines the number of units a student needs to complete his or her program in accordance with the student’s Program configuration (refer to the Academic Structure BPA.) When an Undergraduate student is nearing completion of his or her program such that the remaining units in the Program (as determined by the units configured for the program in Regent Award minus the completed Program Applicable Units) are less than a full Academic Year in units, Regent Award determines whether proration is needed per the Federal rules for proration. PLUS Loans and Graduate Unsubsidized loan limits are not subject to proration.

The logic for determining the remaining period depends on whether the student’s remaining period of study is “anticipated”, meaning no registration or actual course registration for this period has been received from the SBL. Regent Award anticipates the remaining period of study from calculated remaining units. Once actual enrollment is received from the SBL, Regent Award adjusts the remaining period of study to accommodate the course data. 

When a student’s remaining period of study is shorter than an Academic Year, Regent Award prorates the student’s award amount by: 

If the final portion of the program is less than an Academic Year, each Payment Period is equal to half of the remaining units in the Program. For example, if the Academic Year definition is 24 units, but the student has only 18 units remaining, Regent Award anticipates that the final Academic Year has 2 Payment Periods, each with 9 units.

If the total remaining credits in the Program are less than or equal to half of the Academic Year definition, the student’s Loan Period is the remainder of the program and contains a single Payment Period. For example, if the AY definition is 24 units, and the student only has 9 total remaining units, Regent Award anticipates the final academic year has 1 Payment Period.

Direct PLUS Loans

If a school elects to auto-package PLUS Loans, the PLUS loan will be automatically created after the Subsidized and Unsubsidized loans are awarded in the Packaging Philosophy (refer to the Funds and Packaging Philosophy BPA.) The Parent PLUS loan will be packaged for dependent students and the Graduate PLUS will be packaged for Graduate students. A student wishing to receive a Parent PLUS loan must have his or her parent apply for the PLUS loan through the Federal Student Aid website (the student or school is responsible for notifying parent borrowers.) 

Credit Approved

When a COD credit decision file containing a credit approval is imported, Regent Award updates or populates the office use only PLUS Credit Check Approval document in ‘Satisfied’ status. The Loan tab of the student record is updated with the PLUS borrower information. 

If the borrower has completed the MPN and PLUS Entrance Counseling (Graduate) or Credit Counseling (Parent) online, this information is provided in the COD response file and Regent Award automatically populates these documents in ‘Satisfied’ status. Otherwise the applicable documents are populated in ‘Needed’ status when the award is created in Regent Award and are updated to ‘Satisfied’ once a COD response file is imported that indicates completion.

Credit Denied

If the COD credit decision file contains a credit denial, Regent Award triggers the ‘Review PLUS Loan Denial’ task. The User determines whether the borrower will seek an appeal or endorser. In this case, if a subsequent file is received with an approved appeal or endorser, Regent Award populates the PLUS Credit Check Approval document in ‘Satisfied’ status. If a school has elected to manually package the PLUS, a task is created in the Review PLUS Credit Approval task queue for the FA Processor to review the student for a PLUS loan award. The User manually awards the PLUS loan following the Credit Approved process outlined above. 

In the case of a Parent PLUS denial, the student may request the additional Direct Unsubsidized Loan. If the student makes this request, the User must manually set the “Additional Eligibility Indicator” flag for the existing Direct Unsubsidized Loan to ‘Yes’.

Federal Work Study

Federal Work Study (FWS) awards are typically awarded manually by Financial Aid staff due to limited hours and funds available to eligible students.  If configured to auto-package, Regent Award will award FWS to students who indicate “interested in work study” on the ISIR and who have remaining need.  The school’s configured Packaging Philosophy will be respected by Regent Award when auto-packaging the FWS award.  Refer to the Funds and Packaging Philosophy BPA for details.

The Federal Work Study fund is non-disbursable. As the students earns wages, they are paid by the school and disbursements can be added into the student’s Work Study record of earnings. The Import Awards Process is an available option to schools to automatically award FWS to students that elected to participate in FWS.

Regent Award provides the ability to report Federal Work Study earnings via the Work Study tab (if Work Study record of earnings are updated). A Work Study integration file (containing earnings), can be loaded into Regent Award each pay period and will use Payment Period dates to align student earnings.  

A student’s FWS pay periods and award Payment Periods may not align. If the pay period end date falls within the Payment Period, the amount reported and entered by the User should be summed into that Payment Period. If the pay period falls between Payment Periods, the amount should be included in the sum for the next Payment Period. The Work Study - Exceptions report in Regent Award can be utilized to identify earnings that have not aligned with a Payment Period. 

When a Payment Period crosses the FAY, the User must manually adjust the amount for the crossover earnings record (for FISAP purposes). To do this, the disbursement for the student’s pay period must be split at the crossover date, with the earnings appropriately attributed to each FAY. 

COD Originations

Regent Award provides import and export functionality for COD reporting to include Pell, TEACH, and Direct Loan awards. IASG can be manually awarded in Regent Award but must be reported directly on COD. The Runbook includes a detailed list of COD files that need to be exported and imported daily (e.g. Originations and Disbursements, MPN, Plus Credit Decisions and Entrance Counseling.)

Updating a COD Award’s ISIR Transaction Number

Regent Award ensures that appropriate updates are made to a COD award's ISIR (CPS) Transaction Number when required. The ISIR Transaction Number is listed in the COD export file as “CPS Transaction Number.” This affects all COD reported awards.

The ISIR Transaction Number on the Academic Plan for each award reflects the ISIR Transaction Number that Regent Award reported to COD.

Non-Title IV Awarding

Funds Configured to Auto-Package

If a school elects to automatically package Non-Title IV, the fund will be awarded using the fund and packaging philosophy configuration to determine the order in which to award the fund, the award amounts and limits, and managing of award adjustments. Refer to the Funds and Packaging Philosophy BPA.  Any award requirements that are unable to be managed using the standard configuration may be managed on an exception basis or may require a custom ruleset (see Custom Ruleset below.)

Custom Ruleset

Any Non-Title IV award that is unable to be automatically awarded using the existing Fund and Packaging Philosophy configuration will require a custom ruleset in order to auto-package to rules not available via the Fund configuration. All custom rulesets require development for each fund source in order to award outside of the current configuration.

Awarding with ‘Satisfied’ Documents

Eligibility for an award can be determined by the existence of a student Document Requirement (e.g. some scholarships require that a "thank you" letter be sent to the scholarship's sponsor to become eligible to receive the scholarship in a subsequent year.) Regent Award allows users to configure a fund to package only if the student has a Document Requirement in a ‘Satisfied’ status, thus limiting awarding of the fund to a population controlled by the school.  The ‘Satisfied’ Document Requirement will determine eligibility for the fund, along with the other configurable options on Fund Setup. Therefore, if the student has the configured Document Requirement assigned to them with a ‘Satisfied’ status, the student is eligible for the related fund, Regent Award will auto-package the fund. Refer to the Funds and Packaging Philosophy BPA.

This functionality only applies to documents that have a “Student”, “Academic Year” or “Federal Award Year” scope configured in Regent Award. Also, documents configured as “Enforce Scope Uniqueness” are not supported by this feature. The document may be added to a student manually or assigned via a User Defined Field (UDF) that is pre-determined by the school. Refer to Customer Zone Knowledge Base for specific information on full functionality.

Funds Configured Not to Auto-Package

Any Non-Title IV fund that is configured to not auto-package may be manually awarded in Regent Award via AAW. If the fund and packaging philosophy configuration accommodates the calculation requirements for the award, Regent Award can manage the award recalculation throughout the academic year. If the Fund and Packaging Philosophy configuration does not accommodate the calculation requirements of the award, the Award Amount will be required to be updated and therefore considered a ‘manual’ award, requiring the school to manage eligibility changes. Regent Award will trigger the ‘Review Eligibility’ task so that users can quickly identifying manual awards requiring updates.

The Import Awards Process is also an available option to schools to award Non-Title IV awards not configured to auto-package. This process is often used for funds that are managed interdepartmentally within a school’s Student Information System (SIS) or Accounts Receivable (AR) system.

State Grants

Regent Award supports roster fund-based awarding for the following state grants:

• Wisconsin- WG-PNP

• Ohio- OCOG

• Georgia- GTEG

• Illinois State Grant

• Maryland- MHEC

The awarding process is based on a variety of Fund configurations, Document requirements, and Import and Export Processes. Schools wishing to configure these funds for awarding will need to work closely with the Regent team to determine specific configuration options.

Overaward

Regent Award calculates student eligibility and need on an Academic Year Loan Period basis. A student may appear to be overawarded in one Payment Period and under-awarded in another Payment Period, but Regent Award assesses the total for the entire Academic Year to determine the overaward. Regent Award detects an overaward situation (e.g. unmet need or unmet cost is negative, and the EFC is less than COA), and attempts to adjust non-manual awards starting in reverse packaging order as configured in the Packaging Philosophy. The adjustment could come from a future term in the student’s Academic Year.  

Regent Award cannot adjust manually packaged awards. If a student’s eligibility is reduced and the student’s package consists of manual awards, Regent Award may not be able to resolve the overaward. Regent Award provides the ‘Awarding – Overawards’ report to assist in identifying students whose overawards need to be manually resolved (see Manually Packaged Awards above). The ‘Review Overaward with Unpaid Disbursements’ task in the ‘Review Awards’ Task queue will also trigger for review when there is an unpaid disbursement in the Loan Period, the student’s unmet need is negative, and the EFC is less than COA or if the student’s unmet cost is negative.  Note: This Task will not trigger when the student’s unmet need is negative, and the EFC is greater than the COA and the COA is greater than zero.

Award Related Tasks

Refer to the school’s Task Template for all awarding-related tasks.

Configuration

Configuration Template

There is no awarding template required for configuration.

Data Requirements

There are no standard Data Requirements related to the Awarding BPA.

Communications Template

Refer to the school’s Communications_Setup_Template for configuration details for the Awarding BPA.

Users & Roles Template

Refer to the school’s UserRoles_Setup_Template for configuration details for the Awarding BPA.

Documents Template

Refer to the school’s Document_Setup_Template for configuration details for the Awarding BPA.

Tasks Template

Refer to the school’s Task_Setup_Template for configuration details for the Awarding BPA.

SAIG Template

Refer to the school’s SAIG Setup Template for configuration details for the following standard SAIG message classes for NSLDS.

Additional Configuration

Each Institution set up in Regent Award is configured with default settings appropriate for awarding of the Primary Program Type (most frequent) offered by the Institution.  These settings govern how Regent Award creates and manages the student’s Title IV awards. Refer to the Enterprise_Setup_Template for default settings selected by the school.