Establishing Defaults

Financial Aid Defaults

INSTALLATION_FA

Set Up SACR > Install > Financial Aid Installation > Financial Aid Defaults

Define general financial aid processing defaults at the installation level.

Aid Processing Rule Setup

FA_DFLT_RULE_SET

Set Up SACR > Product Related > Financial Aid > Aid Year > Aid Processing Rule Setup

Create aid processing rule sets that you can use to define defaults at the career and program level that differ from the installation default values.

Academic Base Weeks

Enter the number of weeks that define your institution's Academic Award Period (AAP). Several financial aid processes use this value to calculate eligibility and to calculate prorated Expected Family Contribution (EFC)/Student Aid Index (SAI).

Valid values are 0.0 to 99.9.

Non-Standard Base Weeks

Enter the number of weeks that define your institution's Non-Standard Award Period (NSAP). Several financial aid processes use this value to calculate eligibility and to calculate prorated EFCs. Non-standard terms are usually summer terms or inter-sessions.

Valid values are 0.0 to 99.9.

Pell 3 Academic Weeks Only

Select so the Pell Grant calculation uses only Academic Base Weeks as the Academic Program's Weeks of Instruction for Formula 3. If not selected, the Pell Grant calculation sums the Academic Base Weeks and Non-Standard Base Weeks together to determine the Academic Program's Weeks of Instruction.

Option Rule Set

Select an Option Rule Set to define need analysis calculation options for your student population that do not have an academic career specified in the Financial Aid Term record or in the Student Career Term table. You can use a different rule set for any career or program by establishing a relationship between the career and rule set on the Valid Careers for Aid Year page (AID_YEAR_CAREER) or the program and rule set on the Valid Programs for Aid Year and Career page (AID_YEAR_PROGRAM).

The Option Rule Set value provides full flexibility to determine how need analysis is performed. You load the Option Rule Set table into the system by using a data mover script that is delivered to your institution each year in a regulatory release.

Select the Option Rule Set from these values: CSS Rules, Health Pro (health professional), or Ugrd/Grad (undergraduate/graduate).

The Option Rule Sets are delivered as translate values and should not be changed or altered in any way. You can create additional Option Rule Sets for your institution by creating additional translate values.

Pell Calculation Start

Enter the option to use for Pell calculations made before the student's academic term start date. Values are:

Enrollment Current Load (For use only with 2009 and prior Aid Years): Directs the Pell calculation to use the Current Load value from Financial Aid Term to determine which Federal Pell Grant disbursement schedule to use when it is calculating the student's eligibility for a Pell Grant. The Current Load value uses the number of units that the student is currently enrolled in, plus the number of units from already completed sessions in the term to determine the student's load for the term.

Enrollment FA Load (For use only with 2009 and prior Aid Years): Directs the Pell calculation to use the FA Load value from Financial Aid Term to determine which Federal Pell Grant disbursement schedule to use when it is calculating the student's eligibility for a Pell Grant. The FA Load value uses the number of financial aid eligible units that the student is enrolled in for the term to determine the student's load.

Formula 1 — FA Load (For use only with 2010 and future Aid Years): Directs the Pell calculation to divide the Pell Grant award by the Pell Number of Terms and uses the student's actual FA Load for each term.

Formula 1 — Full-time (For use only with 2010 and future Aid Years):Directs the Pell calculation to divide the Pell Grant by the Pell Number of Terms and uses Full-time as the student's FA Load for each term.

Formula 3 — Current Load (For use only with 2010 and future Aid Years): Directs the Pell calculation to sum the Academic Base Weeks and Non-Standard Base Weeks values to determine an Academic Program's Weeks of Instruction. This value serves as the denominator in the percentage calculation for student's number of enrolled weeks in a term. This mode uses the Current Load value from Financial Aid Term to determine which Federal Pell Grant schedule to use when it is calculating the student's eligibility for a Pell Grant. The Current Load value uses the number of units in which a student is currently enrolled ("In Progress" from the Financial Aid Term Session Detail) plus the number of units from completed sessions in the term to determine the student's load for the term.

Formula 3 — FA Load (For use only with 2010 and future Aid Years): Directs the Pell calculation to sum the Academic Base Weeks and Non-Standard Base Weeks values to determine an Academic Program's Weeks of Instruction. This value serves as the denominator in the percentage calculation for a student's number of enrolled weeks in a term. This mode uses the FA Load value from Financial Aid Term to determine which Federal Pell Grant schedule to use when it is calculating the student's eligibility. The FA Load value uses the number of financial aid eligible units in which the student is enrolled for the term to determine the student's load.

Formula 3 — Full-time Load (For use only with 2010 and future Aid Years): Directs the Pell calculation to sum the Academic Base Weeks and Non-Standard Base Weeks values to determine an Academic Program's Weeks of Instruction. This value serves as the denominator in the percentage calculation for a student's number of enrolled weeks in a term. This mode uses Full-time as the FA Load value when it is calculating the student's eligibility.

Full Time (For use only with 2009 and prior Aid Years): Directs the Pell calculation to always use the full time Federal Pell Grant disbursement schedule to determine the student's eligibility for a Pell Grant regardless of the student's enrollment.

Half Time (For use only with 2009 and prior Aid Years): Directs the Pell calculation to always use the half time Federal Pell Grant disbursement schedule to determine the student's eligibility for a Pell Grant, regardless of the student's enrollment.

Pell Calculation Midterm

Enter the load value to use for Pell Grant calculations made on or after the student's academic term start date but before the student's term census date. The available values match those for Pell Calculation Start.

Pell Calculation Census

Enter the load value to use for Pell Grant calculations made on or after the student's term census date. The available values match those for Pell Calculation Start.

Pell Number of Terms

Enter the number of terms that define the Academic Program. Although this value should match the TERM_TYPE on the ACAD_CAR_TBL, there is no cross-check between the two to ensure that these values correlate. Packaging uses this value to distribute a Pell Grant across the student's enrolled terms when making a Pell Grant calculation using the Formula 1 - FA Load, Formula 1 - Full-time, Full Time, or Half Time Pell calculation values. If you select Formula 1 — FA Load or Formula 1 — Full-time, you must populate the Pell Number of Terms field.

Gap Item Type

Select the gap financial aid item type that you created for this instance. Gap is an artificial figure that instructs Packaging to set aside an amount of unmet need to be funded later. It prevents full funding to any student to conserve funds or to provide room to award other types of aid in the future. The gap financial aid item type that you enter here is used when you assign a gap packaging rule in a packaging plan.

See Defining Gap Financial Aid Item Types.

Packaging Data Source

Select which application data to use when packaging a student for financial aid. The system also tells the Equation processor which application data to gather for use in equations.

Fed Only (federal only): This is the default value that instructs Packaging to gather data from the ISIR_** records. When Fed Only is selected, students are packaged only if they have federal application data (ISIR) available. If Fed Only is selected and the student has no ISIR data, the student is not packaged and the following error message is displayed during packaging:

Student has no ISIR data.

Fed, Inst (federal, institutional): Instructs Packaging to gather federal application data (ISIR) if available. Otherwise, Packaging gathers institutional application data (PROFILE). If neither federal nor institutional application data exists for the student, the student is not packaged and the following error message is displayed during packaging:

Student has neither ISIR nor Institutional data.

Inst Only (institutional only): Instructs Packaging to gather data from the INST_** records. When Inst Only is selected, students are packaged only if they have institutional application data (PROFILE or institutional application) available. If Inst Only is selected and the student has no PROFILE data, the student is not packaged and the following error message is displayed during packaging:

Student has no Institutional data.

Inst, Fed (institutional, federal): Instructs Packaging to gather institutional application data (PROFILE, or institutional application) if available. Otherwise, Packaging gathers federal application data (ISIR). If neither institutional nor federal application data exists for the student, the student is not packaged and the following error message is displayed during packaging:

Student has neither ISIR nor Institutional data.

Aggregate Source

Select the source for aggregate lifetime totals that Packaging should reference when determining lifetime limits. Values are:

NSLDS: Packaging uses National Student Loan Data System (NSLDS) aggregate history totals that have been pushed into the aggregate tables for packaging.

PS: This is the default value. Packaging uses the existing undergraduate and graduate totals currently maintained by the institution on the aggregate tables for packaging.

Inst Application Source (institutional application source)

Enter the institutional application used when you select Fed, Inst, Inst Only, or Inst, Fed as the Packaging Data Source. You can select Inst App (institutional application), or Profile.

Projected Housing Type

Select a default Projected Housing Type for students who don't not respond to the school's request for Housing Type.

Beginning with the 2024-2025 Aid Year, Housing Type isn't reported by the student using the FAFSA. The list of values is the same used in FAFSA/ISIR for 2023-2024 Aid Year. For more information, see Student Planned Housing Type for the 2024-2025 and Future Aid Years (Doc ID 2990217.1) at https://support.oracle.com.

CNAS FM Rule Set (Canadian need analysis system federal methodology rule set)

Enter the rule set that defines the CNAS calculation guidelines that use federal methodology.

CNAS IM Rule Set (Canadian need analysis system institutional methodology rule set)

Enter the rule set that defines the CNAS calculation guidelines that uses institutional methodology.

Last Loan Batch Sequence

Enter a new sequence number of the last loan batch ID code processed. The system automatically updates this field each time a CommonLine or Direct Loan transaction file is created. You may need to update this if a conflict occurs.

Loan Counseling Version

Select the Loan Counseling Version for use throughout the system. This selection controls what components of Loan Counseling are available and how Authorization and Disbursement processing evaluates loan counseling requirements to release funds for disbursement. This selection also controls how loan counseling is displayed on the Packaging Status Summary page.

• Simple: Select to limit the management of loan counseling to annual evaluation and processing. This is the default value.

• Expanded: Select to enable multiple loan counseling setup options: annual, multiple aid year, and student self-service,

Do Not Use PKG Data Source (do not use a packaging data source)

Select this check box to have the system not check for either an existing federal application (ISIR) or an institutional application (such as PROFILE) when accessing the Award Entry component.

Clear this check box to have the system check for the existence of either a federal application or an institutional application when accessing the Award Entry component. If the student doesn't have either application, a warning message appears.

Use Pell Table

If selected, the system uses the Pell Table Enablement program (FAPPKPTE) to calculate Pell awards (applies to Aid Year 2016 and forward). Electing to use the Pell Table Enablement program implies downloading of the Pell Grant Payment and Disbursement Schedules from the Department of Education, and loading them into the system for Packaging to use to evaluate your students for Pell grant eligibility.

If not selected, the system uses the old Pell Program (FAPPKPEL) to calculate Pell awards.

Background Errors Allowed

Enter the number of background errors that your institution wants to allow during background processing before the system terminates the run. You may want to set this field to a number greater than one. If you do not increase this value, background processing stops after encountering only one error.

Last Packaging Batch Nbr (last packaging batch number)

Displays the number that the system generates when you run the Mass Packaging process.

Use PELL Crossover Logic

Select this check box if you want the system to a check the summer/crossover term to determine if a Pell Grant award for that term would be higher if it is awarded using the Additional Pell Item Type for the current Aid Year (e.g. Aid Year 2018) or the Initial Pell Item Type in the forward Aid Year (e.g. Aid Year 2019).

If selected and the award would be higher for the forward Aid Year, the system awards zero Pell Grant for the summer/crossover term under the Additional Pell item type the current Aid Year. If the Pell Grant award for the summer/crossover term is higher using the current Aid Year, it will award the amount as Additional Pell.

If not selected, the system awards Pell Grant for the summer/crossover term as Additional Pell in the current Aid Year without additional checks against the forward Aid Year.

CIP Code Year (Classification of Instructional Program Code Year)

From AY 2021, the COD origination process looks at this field to determine the value to use in the <ProgramCIPCodeYear> tag.