Associate Articles
USA Funds provides professional-judgment tips
While the method for determining a student's need for federal aid is defined by law, the law also gives financial-aid administrators the flexibility to make individual adjustments based on the administrator's professional judgment.
During USA Funds®' Student-Loan Workshops, the Education Resource Center (ERC) provided guidance regarding professional judgment, including the following general information and tips:
Students or their families should request consideration of the circumstances that they believe warrant a review of their financial need. It is not the responsibility of the aid administrator to generate a request on behalf of students or parents.
Aid administrators must substantiate in the student's file all professional-judgment decisions, with appropriate supporting documentation.
For transfer students, bear in mind that professional judgments differ from school to school. So, a decision made by a financial-aid administrator at one school may not be the same decision made by an aid administrator at another school.
To ensure consistency, a school's policy-and-procedures manual should contain detailed guidelines on the professional-judgment process.
Special circumstances are conditions that differentiate an individual student from a class of students, rather than conditions that exist across a class of students.
An aid administrator has the authority to request and consider supplementary information from the student or family member when making a professional-judgment decision.
Aid administrators may not use professional judgment to make an otherwise-ineligible student eligible. For example, a financial-aid administrator may not use professional judgment to waive general student-eligibility criteria for an ineligible non-citizen.
The U.S. Department of Education does not permit the consideration of expenses related to post-enrollment activities as part of a student's cost of attendance. For example, professional-licensing-examination fees are not costs to include in a professional-judgment decision.
The ERC works in support of the USA Funds education-loan guarantee to present free seminars, training sessions and conferences throughout the country to help Federal Family Education Loan Program (FFELP) participants improve the financial-aid process. Watch the USA Funds Web site - www.usafunds.org - for information and to register for the spring 2002 Student-Loan Workshop series. The series begins in April.
Submitted by:
Kathy Bixby and Larry Viterna,
USA Funds Services,
866-497-USAF (866-497-8723), option 2.
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