Southern Adventist University’s administration plans to release a new software called Financial Aid Self Service. The program will help students as they go through their financial aid application process.
The software will be released in early Dec. 2018 and should be ready to use for the coming winter semester. With this program, students will be able to see an online summary of the scholarships and loans that they are eligible for.
“Currently this is all done through snail mail,” said student finance counselor Xenia Figueroa. “[Financial Aid Self Service] is beneficial for the students because they can view the information online and can see what [scholarships or loans] they want to accept or decline immediately. It is faster; they don’t have to necessarily give us the document or scan it in.”
The homepage will also have a checklist for students to see where they are in the process of accepting their awards as well as links to the FAFSA site, outside scholarships and other resources to help with financial planning. In addition, there will be a summary of the loans the student may have already taken.
“We want students to know how much debt they have and to plan wisely how they are going to do summertime work and work during the school year and to apply for other outside scholarships,” said Enrollment Vice President Glenn Carter. “This is more of a tool to provide [students] information and resources so [they] can make better decisions about [their] financial path to graduate.”
The software was designed by Colleague Ellucian, the same company that designed the current student planning program. It cost approximately $12,000.
“I know $12,000 sounds like a lot of money for a piece of software, but it was an easy decision to make,” Carter said. “We won’t be sending out awards letters for everybody because that information will be available electronically. We won’t be printing. We won’t be paying posts. We will save money in the long run. In the first year it will pay for itself.”
In an effort to test for any possible problems, members of the student senate were given the chance to try the program in late October. Administration received no negative feedback from student senators.
“The financial software that they have is a little easier to use than the student planning,” Cristofer Trana, Senate member and senior physics major, said. “They have a lot of resources. I would recommend for students to use the program even if they aren’t ones to check their finances; it’s really good to know where you stand financially.”
A tutorial video has been created to guide students as they explore the software once it is launched. Students are also encouraged to seek help when needed.
“My hope is that if somebody looks at it [Financial Aid Self Service] and is confused about it then they will let us know,” Figueroa said. “We are here to help. We can go through it with them and explain it to them.”