CSU Financial Aid: The Machine Proves to be Well-Oiled

How the Financial Aid Dept. Works and a New Solution to an Old Problem

By: Matthew Kraus

April 28, 2017

Columbus State University’s Financial Aid department is often criticized for its disappointing processing speed and accuracy. With a department sixteen people strong — which bottlenecks down to only 4 key players — and around 7,000 students to process every academic year, the situation seems to call for more hands-on-deck. However, the CSU News Team’s interview with one of the financial aid counselors revealed that the department isn’t understaffed.

“Actually I, I think we’re good,” said Jeannie Hartley, a CSU financial aid counselor of three years, as she responded to the idea of needing more employees in the office. The interview with Hartley breaks down how the financial aid office handles so many students with so few people.

How does it all get done?

Given how many students need processing, it’s reasonable to wonder how long the average, problem-free student application takes to process. “I would say from the point when I look at an account,” said Hartley “it’s usually, at most, two weeks.” This means that multiple student applications are processed simultaneously by the financial aid counselors, a job that would seem hectic at best; “you would think that it would be a lot and that it would take forever,” said Hartley “but it really isn’t that bad.”

The system set in place isn’t as complex or chaotic as it seems. The first thing to understand is that the people who usually talk face-to-face with students are the Enrollment Services Representatives, and they don’t do anything but accept student documents and answer financial aid questions. Technically, these people aren’t even employed by the Financial Aid office, because they perform the same tasks for the Admissions and Registrar’s offices. The bottom line is that they don’t solve problems, they direct them to the people who can.

The people who can solve financial aid problems are the Financial Aid Counselors. When a student submits their applications to fafsa.gov, these applications enter CSU’s financial aid database called “Knowledge”. From here, the applications are alphabetized and split between the counselors. The split may not be even, as each counselor is responsible for processing students in special programs (like the Command College).

Lastly, above the counselors are the two Financial Aid Coordinators. These people act as supervisors for either the first or second half of the alphabetized list. They also create reports to ensure that refunds are being processed on time and are getting out to students.

16 becomes Four?

In total, there are sixteen people who work to keep the CSU Financial Aid office running smoothly: the director, the two coordinators, the five counselors, one technology coordinator with an assistant, and finally the 6 enrollment service reps.

A bottleneck occurs during the actual “processing” of each student, an action that only financial aid counselors (like Hartley) can perform. In the financial aid office, “processing” includes awarding the financial aid onto the student accounts and emailing students if their applications have errors or are missing information.

CSU Human Resources claims that the financial aid office retains five financial aid counselors. In reality, however, one counselor focuses solely on “reconciliation” (to confirm that the correct amount of funding is being given to each student), whittling it down to only four counselors to process all the CSU students receiving financial aid.

Solutions?

Hartley estimated that more than half of the students who submit their applications, do so late. “My favorite thing to tell students is, you know, we have a priority deadline for a reason,” said Hartley “if you do it late, I’m sorry, but you’re gonna have to expect some extra hoops or some extra time somewhere.”

Hartley also mentioned Campus Logic, a new software system that the financial aid department is implementing to speed-up student processing, and making it easier for students to submit their documents. “We’re putting that through now [this week],” said Hartley “it’s really convenient for the students and we’re hoping that it’s going to make things more streamlined for our processing.”

There are many positive aspects to the new Campus Logic system. Students will be able to take pictures of necessary documents and upload them online, all though their phones. According to Hartley, students will receive weekly text notifications when their FAFSA’s are up for renewal or if they have outstanding documentation, a feature that will be much more efficient than just emailing students.