Financial Aid Assessment
Are you are wondering whether you are getting the most impact from your awarding system in recruiting and retaining students? This Assessment helps your learn whether:
- Your aid is awarded in a way that your dollars are used strategically to
- maximize net revenue and
- recruit and retain the profile of students you wish
- The process is efficient and customer/student centered
How It Works
- During a conversation about your campus and issues related to aid, we customize a list of materials for you to send TFA to help prepare for an effective on-site consultation. We also discuss your situation and what meetings will be most helpful in understanding the current and desired state of retention and develop an itinerary;
- An experienced, successful consultant conducts an day of on-site meetings with staff, administrators, and students;
- On the second morning on campus, your consultant leads a discussion through a campus-customized PowerPoint exit presentation that includes Five Top Priority Recommendations for Action
- Your consultant spends 15 minutes talking about how your campus and TFA might work together to use financial aid to help achieve your enrollment and revenue goals;
- You receive the slide presentation to begin work on the recommendations immediately; and
- TFA sends you–within ten business days–a written executive summary and proposal for a customized partnership, with specific services that are right for your campus.
Next Step
Schedule a live phone conversation via e-mail with Teresa Farnum to start the steps above!
Fee
$3,500 plus travel expenses
Financial Aid Assessment Draft Itinerary
The following itinerary is designed as a starting point and will vary, depending on availability of participants and the circumstances that are unique to the campus.
| Time | Meeting |
| Day One | |
| 8:00 a.m. | Campus Contact/ Director of Financial Aid |
| 9:00 a.m. | President |
| 9:30 a.m. | Vice President for Enrollment Management |
| 10:30 a.m. | Vice President for Finance |
| 11:30 a.m. | Lunch meeting with student leaders |
| 12:30 a.m. | Director of Data Management |
| 1:00 p.m. | Financial Aid Staff |
| 2:30 p.m. | Director of Admissions |
| 3:30 p.m. | Admissions Staff |
| 4:30 p.m. | Billing Process: Business Office, Registrar, Director of Financial Aid |
| 5:00 p.m. | Campus contact |
| Day Two | |
| 10:00 a.m. | Presentation and discussion of the findings and recommendations Suggested campus attendees are president, cabinet, financial aid and admissions staff and other leaders as appropriate |
| 11:30 a.m. | Fifteen-minute presentation of a possible customized partnership with TFA to assist in increasing retention and graduation rates |
| 11:45 a.m. | Debrief with contact |
| Noon | Depart campus |
Materials and Institutional Data
The following institutional information, when available, will be reviewed prior to the campus visit to assist in understanding the campus culture, strengths, and challenges. Don’t worry—no campus ever submits all the requested materials, but we want to make the consultation as effective for you as possible, so the more information that we have before we start the meetings, the more productive those conversations will be.
For the past three years
Entering Class
- Financial aid packaging guidelines and strategies both for merit and need
- Institutional recruiting goals
- Projected net tuition revenue
- Class size
- Composition
- Geographic
- Quality
- Gender balance
- Diversity
- Other
- Undergraduate discount rate for:
- Overall
- First-time, full-time (FTFT)
- Transfers (TR)
- By institutional goals, including net tuition revenue actualized
- Funded Scholarships/Grants
- Total available
- Total spent
- Total unspent
- Unfunded Scholarships/Grants
- Total Budgeted amount (dollar and/or percentage)
- Budgeted amounts for selected recruiting targets (dollar and/or percentage)
- Total Awarded
- Total awarded to FTFT and TR
- Total awarded to each recruiting goal
- Average amount awarded
- Average awarded to FTFT and TR
- Average awarded to each recruiting goal
- Total Spent
- Total spent on FTFT and TR
- Total spent on each recruiting goal
- Average amount awarded
- Average amount awarded to FTFT and TR
- Average amount awarded to each recruiting goal
- Number and total dollar amount of private or third party scholarships
- Cost relative to top five competitors (institutionally defined)
- Target Markets
- Dollars and/or percent of unfunded scholarships/grants budgeted to specific categories
- Amount and percentage awarded to specific categories
- Amount and percentage spent on enrolled students in these categories
Continuing Students
- Financial aid packaging guidelines and strategies
- Undergraduate retention goals
- Projected net tuition revenue
- Projected discount rate
- Class size
- Discount rate
- By class
- Funded Scholarships/Grants
- Total available
- Total spent
- Total unspent
- Overall unfunded scholarships/grants
- Total Budgeted amount (dollar and/or percentage)
- Total Awarded
- Average amount awarded
- Total Spent
- Average amount awarded
- Number and total dollar amount of private or third party scholarships
