In this chapter, we discuss student eligibility requirements that don’t require information from the Department’s systems. The school determines on its own whether the student meets these eligibility requirements. In some cases, the financial aid office will need to get information from other school offices, such as the admissions office or the registrar, or from other organizations, such as high schools or testing agencies.
A person must be enrolled as a regular student in an eligible program to receive Federal Student Aid (FSA) funds (exceptions are discussed later in this chapter). A regular student is someone who is enrolled or accepted for enrollment in an eligible institution for the purpose of obtaining a degree or certificate offered by the school. The requirements for an eligible program are discussed in Volume 2, Chapter 2.
A school must document a student’s enrollment in an eligible program at the time of admission, and it must have a system to notify the financial aid office if the student leaves the program. It must also document that an aid recipient is a regular student.
A school allows anyone with a high school diploma or the equivalent to enroll in any course. Many of the school’s students do not intend to receive a degree or certificate; they are not regular students. The school requires those who want to receive a degree or certificate to complete a form stating the degree or certificate for which they are studying and to meet periodically with an academic advisor. The school considers them to be regular students.
Conditional acceptance. Some schools admit students conditionally, for example, until they provide further documentation, such as academic transcripts or test scores, or demonstrate an ability to succeed in the program by receiving acceptable grades in program coursework. Typically, the school will limit these students’ enrollment in terms of number of courses or enrollment status until they meet the necessary conditions.
Students admitted under such types of conditional acceptance are regular students only if the school officially accepts them into the eligible degree or certificate program. The Department does not define official acceptance or admission. A student who is merely allowed to take some courses before being officially admitted to the program, is not considered a regular student and is not eligible for Title IV funds until they are officially admitted.
A school allows students to take graduate courses before they have taken the GRE, but it limits them to no more than three courses and does not admit them into its graduate programs until they have submitted acceptable GRE scores. They aren’t regular students, and because the school hasn’t admitted them, they aren’t eligible for Title IV funds.
When a school accepts students into its graduate programs, it requires that the students receive no grade lower than a “B” in the first three courses. During this time, the school considers students to be admitted into the program, so they are eligible for Title IV aid. If, however, students receive a grade lower than a B in any of the first three classes, their admittance will be withdrawn and they then will be ineligible for further Title IV funds.
Schools may offer a trial or conditional period during which a student attends a program without incurring program charges or receiving Title IV funds. There are no restrictions as to program type (undergraduate vs. graduate level, program structure or academic level, etc.) for such students. If the student continues beyond the trial period and enrolls as a regular student, the school can pay the student FSA grants for the entire payment period and loans for the period of enrollment. See Dear Colleague Letter GEN-11-12 for more information.
Regular studentsHEA Sec. 484(a)(1), (b)(3), (4)
Regular students may receive aid for classes they take in a school’s continuing education department as long as the classes apply to their degree or certificate program.
A school has a continuing education department that offers many online courses that students enrolled in other programs at the school may take and that apply to the degree or certificate program in which the students are enrolled as regular students.
Another school has a continuing education department that offers many courses. Some students enroll in these courses without being admitted to the university. These students are not regular students and are not eligible for Title IV funds.
Remedial coursework prepares a student for study at the postsecondary level in general (as opposed to preparatory coursework, which prepares a student for a given specific eligible program, see below). A student enrolled solely in a remedial program is not considered to be in an eligible program. If acceptance into an eligible program is contingent on completing remedial work, a student cannot be considered enrolled in that program until they complete the remedial work.
However, if the student is admitted into an eligible program and takes remedial coursework within that program, they can be considered a regular student, even if they are taking all remedial courses before taking any regular courses. You may count up to one academic year’s worth of these courses in the student's enrollment status for Title IV funds. For the purpose of this limit, that is 30 semester or trimester hours, 45 quarter hours, or 900 clock hours. If the remedial classes are non-credit or reduced-credit, you must determine how many credit hours they are worth to count toward the student’s enrollment status (see “Enrollment status” section in this chapter).
A remedial course cannot be below the educational level needed for a student to successfully pursue their program after one year in that course. Also, remedial courses must be at least at the high school level, as determined by the institution (i.e. your school), its state legal authority and its accrediting agency, or state agency recognized for approving public postsecondary vocational education. If any of those parties determine that a remedial class is below the secondary level, the school must abide by that determination, and the class cannot be included for FSA purposes. Additionally, Title IV funds cannot be used for any remedial course that uses direct assessment of student learning instead of credit or clock hours.
You cannot use non-credit remedial hours to determine a student’s enrollment status if the course is part of a program that leads to a high school diploma or its recognized equivalent. A student is never permitted to receive funds for training or for coursework prior to the completion of high school, even if the high school equivalency training is offered at postsecondary schools or is required for the postsecondary program.
Similar to other remedial coursework, a student may receive Title IV funds for English as a second language (ESL) courses that are part of a larger eligible program. There are differences though: ESL courses don’t count against the one-year limitation on remedial coursework, and they need not be at the secondary school level.
If your school permits a student to enroll in ESL or other remedial courses that don’t apply to the student's degree or certificate, be aware that awarding FSA loans or Pell Grants over a series of semesters for such work can exhaust the student's eligibility for Pell Grants and/or FSA loans before they complete their program.
Pre-requisite courses that do not advance a student toward the completion of a program or fall into the category of preparatory coursework could be considered remedial coursework under 34 CFR 668.20, as such courses meet the definition of coursework which is “designed to increase the ability of a student to pursue a course of study leading to a certificate or degree” and which either leads to reduced credit, or is one for which “no credit is given toward a certificate or degree.”
A pre-requisite course is a course a student is required to take in order to take a course that is a required part of the student’s program of study. The same limitations that apply to all remedial coursework would also apply to such pre-requisite courses, including that a school may not provide aid for more than 30 semester or 45 quarter hours of coursework in a single program.
Remedial courseworkA student not enrolled in a degree or certificate program is eligible for Direct Subsidized/Unsubsidized Loans (and a parent may receive Direct PLUS Loans on behalf of a dependent student) for up to one consecutive 12-month period if the student is taking coursework which is not necessary for enrollment at the postsecondary level generally, but is necessary for enrollment in a specific eligible program.
A student may receive Federal Work-Study (FWS), as well as Direct Subsidized/Unsubsidized Loans (and a parent may receive Direct PLUS Loans on behalf of a dependent student) if they are enrolled at least half time in required teacher certification coursework, even if it does not lead to a degree or certificate awarded by the school. For more details on Direct Loan eligibility criteria, see Volume 8.
To qualify, the coursework must be required for elementary or secondary teacher certification or recertification in the state where the student plans to teach and must be offered in credit or clock hours. Courses using direct assessment in lieu of credit or clock hours are not eligible. Optional courses that the student elects to take for professional recognition or advancement, and courses recommended by your school but not required for certification, do not qualify. You should document that the courses are required by the state for teacher certification.
A student with a bachelor’s degree who is enrolled in a post baccalaureate teacher certification program can receive a Pell Grant or TEACH Grant in limited situations. See Volumes 7 and 9 for more details.
Teacher certification courseworkThe regulations define "undergraduate student," in part, as a student "who is enrolled in an undergraduate course of study," and further specify that for purposes of dual degree programs (see below), a student is considered to be an undergraduate for at least the first three years of the program.
The regulations define a graduate or professional student as a student who is enrolled in a program or course above the baccalaureate level or in a professional program and has completed the equivalent of three academic years of full-time study, either prior to entering the program or as part of the program itself. Also, a student who is receiving Title IV aid as an undergraduate student cannot be considered a graduate/professional student for that same period of enrollment.
To satisfy the requirement that a graduate or professional student has completed three academic years of full-time study, a student must have successfully completed a minimum of at least 72 credit/semester hours, or the equivalent number of quarter hours (at least 108). You may also assign a higher number of credits required to satisfy the credit requirement component to be considered a graduate or professional student at your school, for example, 90 credit/semester hours (which may match your school’s grade level progression standard for Direct Loans). Note that these three academic year’s worth of credits may be taken over a longer or shorter period of time than three calendar years in the program.
Some programs combine undergraduate and graduate study and allow a student to complete both a bachelor's degree and a graduate or professional degree within the same program. These are referred to as "dual degree programs." For instance, a school could offer a 5-year dual degree program leading to both a bachelor's degree and a graduate or professional degree, and could define the first three or four years of study as being at the undergraduate level, and the remaining year(s) of study as being at the graduate or professional level. A student may receive Title IV aid at the undergraduate level during the undergraduate portion of such a program.
Other programs lead only to a graduate or professional degree, but may admit students who do not yet meet the regulatory requirements to be considered graduate or professional degree students. A student who is enrolled in this type of program, but who does not yet qualify as a graduate or professional student per our definition, is not considered to be enrolled in an undergraduate program of study. Therefore, such a student is ineligible to receive any type of Title IV aid until they have completed at least three years of full-time study, which may be part of the graduate or professional degree program. Once the student has completed at least three years of full-time study, they are eligible to receive graduate-level Title IV aid.
For more detail, see 34 CFR 668.2(b).
Students with an intellectual disability (see definition below) can receive funds from the Pell Grant, FSEOG, and FWS programs. They must be enrolled or accepted for enrollment in a comprehensive transition and postsecondary (CTP) program (as defined in 34 CFR 668.231) for students with intellectual disabilities and must maintain satisfactory academic progress as determined by the school for this program (a school may develop a separate SAP policy for CTP students; this program must still contain all of the required SAP elements, see the SAP section later in this chapter). These students:
do not have to be enrolled for the purpose of obtaining a degree or certificate, and are not required to have a high school diploma or its recognized equivalent.Students who meet both of the following conditions may be considered students with intellectual disabilities for Title IV purposes if they:
have a cognitive impairment characterized by significant limitations in intellectual and cognitive functioning and adaptive behavior as expressed in conceptual, social, and practical adaptive skills; and
are currently or were formerly eligible for special education and related services under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) (20 U.S.C. 1401), including students who were determined eligible for special education or related services under the IDEA but were homeschooled or attended private school. See 668.233(c) for documentation requirements.
Except for the provisions governing need analysis, the Secretary has the authority to waive any Pell Grant, FSEOG, FWS, or institutional eligibility provisions necessary to ensure that programs enrolling students with intellectual disabilities are eligible for these three types of federal student aid and that eligible students receive those funds.
Students with intellectual disabilitiesHEA Sec. 484(s), HEA Sec. 760, 34 CFR 668.230–233
A student enrolled in elementary or secondary school is not eligible for aid from the FSA programs, even if they are simultaneously enrolled in an eligible college program. A student is considered to be enrolled in secondary school if they are pursuing a high school diploma or if they have completed the requirements for a diploma, but have not yet received it, and are either taking college coursework for which the student's high school gives credit or the high school still considers the student to be enrolled there.
An adult pursuing a high school equivalency certificate (not a high school diploma) is not considered to be enrolled in secondary school. However, as stated earlier, a student cannot get aid for high school equivalency training. However, an adult can take a course offered by a high school, such as a driver’s education course, without being considered enrolled there.
A junior in high school enrolls in an electronics technician program at a community college (the student is above the age of compulsory school attendance for the state where the school is located and therefore can be admitted as a regular student). The coursework is offered evenings and weekends, so the student can still attend high school classes. The electronics technician program is an eligible postsecondary program, and the student will receive a certificate from the community college upon completion of the program. However, the student is not eligible for aid because they are still enrolled in high school.
Elementary/secondary enrollmentTo receive Title IV funds, students must be qualified to study at the postsecondary level, i.e., if they:
have a high school diploma (this can be from a foreign school if it is equivalent to a U.S. high school diploma);
have the recognized equivalent of a high school diploma, such as a general educational development (GED) certificate or other state sanctioned test or diploma-equivalency certificate;
have completed homeschooling at the secondary level as defined by state law;have completed secondary school education in a homeschool setting which qualifies for an exemption from compulsory attendance requirements under state law, if state law does not require a homeschooled student to receive a credential for their education; or
have completed one of the ability-to-benefit (ATB) alternatives and are either currently enrolled in an eligible career pathway program or first enrolled in an eligible postsecondary program prior to July 1, 2012.
A student may self-certify on the FAFSA that they have received a high school diploma or high school equivalency certificate or that they have completed secondary school through homeschooling as defined by state law. If a student indicates that they have a diploma or high school equivalency certificate, your school isn’t required to ask for a copy (except as noted below), but if your school requires a diploma for admission, then you must rely on that copy of the diploma or high school equivalency certificate and not on the student’s certification alone.
Awards submitted to the Common Origination and Disbursement (COD) system for all students require a Student Eligibility Code (previously Ability to Benefit Code) to report how the student (including graduate and professional students) is qualified to study at the postsecondary level (e.g. by obtaining a high school diploma or its recognized equivalent). For more detail on submitting the appropriate Student Eligibility Code, see the COD Technical Reference in the Knowledge Center.
Academic qualificationsHEA Sec. 484(d), 34 CFR 668.32(e), COD Technical Reference
If your school or the Department has reason to believe that a student’s high school diploma is not valid or was not obtained from an entity that provides secondary school education, you must develop and follow procedures to evaluate the validity of the student’s high school completion. To satisfy this requirement, your school may:
check with the high school to confirm the validity of the student’s diploma; andconfirm with the relevant department or agency in the state in which the secondary school is located that the secondary school is recognized as a provider of secondary school education.
The above two-part description satisfies the high school validity requirement. Other approaches may also be used if they if they serve to validate the student’s high school completion. Students who indicate on their FAFSA that they graduated high school must give the name, city, and state of the high school. FAFSA on the Web will not allow students to skip these items, and it will have a drop-down list of both public and private high schools populated by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES). Inclusion on the list does not mean that a diploma from the school is valid, nor does exclusion from the list mean that the diploma is invalid. Acceptable documentation for checking the validity of a student’s high school completion can include the diploma and a final transcript that shows all the courses the student took.
Diplomas from unaccredited high schools can be valid and qualify students to receive Title IV funds, as well as to meet college admission standards. One resource that a school may consider using to determine if a high school diploma is valid is the department of education of the state in which the high school is located, if that agency has jurisdiction over the high school. Colleges are also free to consult with each other as they develop their procedures for checking the validity of high school diplomas. For students who completed their secondary schooling outside the United States, comparable documents can help, as can the services of companies that determine the validity of foreign secondary school credentials.
A student’s self-certification is not sufficient to validate a high school diploma that is in question. If there is conflicting information between the student’s certification on the FAFSA and other documentation or information obtained from the student, the institution must resolve this conflict. For an institution to be a Title IV eligible institution, it must admit as regular students only those with a high school diploma or the recognized equivalent and/or those who are beyond the age of compulsory school attendance in the State where the institution is located. As in other areas of FSA administration, schools have final authority in meeting this requirement. The Department does not plan to have an appeal process or to intervene in reasonable determinations made by school administrators, such as a decision to move a high school from a college’s acceptable to unacceptable list or a case where one school has different lists than another.
Checking the validity of high school completionHigh school diplomas/transcripts from other countries are acceptable toward the student eligibility general requirement, as long as the diploma is equivalent to a U.S. high school diploma.
A school that is qualified to evaluate the credential may do so. A school that is not qualified or chooses not to evaluate the credential can instead require students to have their credential evaluated by a company that offers such a service. The school may pay for the evaluation, but if it does so, it can only have students reimburse it for the cost if it requires the evaluation as part of its admission process for all students who have a foreign credential.
You may not require only students who are applying for federal student aid to pay the school to have their credential evaluated because that would amount to the school charging a fee to complete the FAFSA, which is prohibited under HEA 483(a)(6). In such cases, because the cost of evaluating a foreign credential is incurred as a charge of admission prior to enrollment in an eligible program, it cannot be included in students’ cost of attendance (COA).
You may accept self-certification that a student has completed a foreign high school (or equivalent) education if:
The student is selected for verification tracking groups V4 or V5 (see the Application and Verification Guide for more information), in which the student must provide proof of high school completion; and
It is impossible for a refugee, asylee, or victim of human trafficking to obtain documentation of their completion of a secondary school education in a foreign country.
In these cases, the applicant must:Present their entry status documentation that demonstrates their current or prior status as a refugee, asylee, or victim of human trafficking who entered the U.S. after the age of 15; AND
Provide proof of their attempt to obtain documentation of their completion of a secondary school education in a foreign country, i.e. a copy of an e-mail or letter (including proof of mailing) (see item FHD-Q2/ A2 at www2.ed.gov/policy/highered/reg/hearulemaking/2009/hsdiploma.html).
The Department recognizes several equivalents to a high school diploma:
A GED certificate;a certificate or other official completion documentation demonstrating that the student has passed a state-authorized examination (such as the Test Assessing Secondary Completion (TASC) the High School Equivalency Test (HiSET), or, in California, the California High School Proficiency Exam) that the state recognizes as the equivalent of a high school diploma (certificates of attendance and/or completion are not included in this qualifying category);
an associate’s degree;successful completion of at least 60 semester or trimester credit hours or 72 quarter credit hours that does not result in the awarding of an associate’s degree, but that is acceptable for full credit toward a bachelor’s degree at any institution; or
enrollment in a bachelor’s degree program where at least 60 semester or trimester credit hours or 72 quarter credit hours have been successfully completed, including credit hours transferred into the bachelor’s degree program.
for a student who enrolls without completing high school, a transcript indicating the student has excelled in high school. The student must no longer be enrolled in high school, must satisfy your school’s written policy for admitting such students, and must be starting a program that leads at least to an associate’s degree or its equivalent.
Note that merely possessing a certificate of attendance and/or high school completion is not sufficient for a student to be Title IV aid eligible. Such a certificate may be issued without a student having completed all of the academic graduation requirements, including passing any required examinations. A state must consider a certificate or high-school-completion-equivalency test as equivalent to a high school diploma in that state in order for it to be considered equivalent to a high school diploma for Title IV aid eligibility purposes.
A student enrolls in the bachelor’s degree program at a university. The student completes their high school requirements early, but the high school does not formally issue the high school diploma until a later time. The university can award the student Title IV funds if it obtains a statement signed by an official from the high school attesting that the student has completed all of the required coursework and has successfully passed any required proficiency examinations for the high school diploma. The statement must include the date when the actual high school diploma will be issued. For more detail, see 34 CFR 600.2, and https://www2.ed.gov/policy/highered/reg/hearulemaking/2009/hsdiploma.html.
When a student gives conflicting statements regarding their diploma status, for example, stating one year that they had a high school diploma, and in a subsequent year either notifying you that the previous submission was a mistake, or simply answering “no” to the high school diploma question, then the student was ineligible for all TitIe IV aid in the prior award year, and is ineligible for all Title IV aid going forward. Before removing all aid, you should verify their answer.
In this case, the student is responsible for any overpayment they received when ineligible, including aid received for completed award years. You (the school) must communicate to the student that they have the responsibility for repaying the overpayment(s). You may also be required to report the overpayment to the National Student Loan Data System (NSLDS) ; for more details, see Volume 4, Chapter 3. You may refer the case to the Department for collection if the student does not repay the overpayment(s). See Volume 4, Chapter 3 for a sample report form.
Though homeschooled students are not considered to have a high school diploma or equivalent, they are eligible to receive Title IV funds if their secondary school education was in a homeschool that state law treats as a home or private school (see https://hslda.org/legal for requirements for each state).
Some states issue a secondary school completion credential to homeschoolers. If this is the case in the state where the student was homeschooled and the state requires receipt of the credential, the student must obtain it to be eligible for Title IV funds . You may rely on a homeschooled student’s self-certification that they completed secondary school in a homeschool setting. The student can include in their homeschooling self-certification that they received this state credential.
An eligible institution is defined in part as one that admits as regular students only those who have a high school diploma or equivalent, are beyond the compulsory age of attendance for the school’s state, or are dually enrolled at the college and a secondary school. For students who finish homeschooling at a younger age, the Department considers them to be beyond the age of compulsory attendance if:
your school’s state would not require them to obtain a secondary completion credential as provided under state law; or
the student has completed a secondary school education in a homeschool setting that qualifies as an exemption from compulsory attendance under state law.
See also Volume 2, Chapter 1.
Homeschooled students and institutional eligibility Homeschooled students State regulations (for home-schooling and other purposes)Students may become eligible for Title IV aid through the ATB alternatives in one of two ways. If a student first enrolled in an eligible postsecondary program prior to July 1, 2012 (regardless of receipt of any Title IV aid), the student may enroll in any eligible program and can become eligible through one of the ATB alternatives. However, if a student first enrolled in an eligible postsecondary program on or after July 1, 2012, the student may only become eligible through one of the ATB alternatives if the student is enrolled in an “eligible career pathway program” (see below for more details about eligible career pathway programs). An ATB student need not be enrolled concurrently in both the eligible postsecondary program and the component for attaining a high school diploma or its recognized equivalent.
The ATB alternatives include:
Passing an independently administered Department of Education approved ATB test (see chart at the end of this section).
Completing at least six credit hours or 225 clock hours that are applicable toward a Title IV-eligible degree or certificate offered by the postsecondary institution (neither remedial nor developmental coursework count toward this requirement). The coursework must demonstrate that the student has the ability to benefit from the postsecondary program in which the student is enrolled or intends to enroll, but need not be applicable to the specific degree or program in which the student is enrolled.
Completing a state process approved by the Secretary of Education. Note: To date, state processes have been approved by the Secretary for the states of Washington, Illinois, Iowa, Mississippi, Minnesota and Wisconsin.
Eligible Career Pathway Programs. An eligible career pathway program is a program that combines rigorous and high-quality education, training, and other services that:
Align with the skill needs of industries in the economy of the state or regional economy involved;Prepare an individual to be successful in any of a full range of secondary or postsecondary education options, including apprenticeships registered under the Act of August 16, 1937 (commonly known as the “National Apprenticeship Act”; 50 Stat. 664, chapter 663; 29 U.S.C. 50 et seq.);
Include counseling to support an individual in achieving the individual’s education and career goals;
Include, as appropriate, education offered concurrently with and in the same context as workforce preparation activities and training for a specific occupation or occupational cluster;
Organize education, training, and other services to meet the particular needs of an individual in a manner that accelerates the educational and career advancement of the individual to the extent practicable;
Enable an individual to attain a high school diploma or its recognized equivalent, and at least one recognized postsecondary credential; and
Help an individual enter or advance within a specific occupation or occupational cluster.You must make a determination on whether a program meets these criteria, and you are responsible for documenting that your career pathway program(s) meet each of the requirements described above. The Department does not require that you receive approvals or endorsements from a State or local workforce agency to fulfill these requirements, although that may be one way that you document your compliance.
You must maintain documentation that each eligible career pathway program that you use as a basis for determining a student’s eligibility under the ATB alternatives meets the above requirements. This must include documentation that the program(s) in question include workforce preparation activities and training for a specific occupation or occupational cluster, and that the program is aligned with the skill needs of the U.S. state or regional economy in which your school is located.
Additional information regarding the requirements for eligible career pathway programs can be found in Dear Colleague Letter GEN-16-09.
Eligibility of Other Students Without a High School Diploma (Grandfathered Students). As discussed in Dear Colleague Letter GEN-12-09, students who were enrolled in an eligible program of study prior to July 1, 2012 may continue to establish Title IV eligibility in any eligible program under one of the ATB alternatives by using the following grandfathering test:
Question 1: Did the student attend an eligible program at any Title IV institution prior to July 1, 2012? If yes, the student may use any of the ATB alternatives (as described above) to become eligible for Title IV funds. If no, continue to Question 2.
Question 2: Did the student, prior to July 1, 2012, officially register at a Title IV institution, and was the student scheduled to attend an eligible program? If yes, the student may use any of the ATB alternatives (as described above) to become eligible for Title IV, HEA student assistance. If no, the student may not use the ATB alternatives to become eligible for Title IV, HEA student assistance, unless the student is enrolled in an eligible career pathway program.
For a student who qualifies to use one of the ATB alternatives through enrollment in an eligible program prior to July 1, 2012, you must document that the student successfully completed one of the approved ATB alternatives described above. Such documentation could include documentation from NSLDS that shows a student’s prior receipt of Title IV funds, or a transcript or other receipt that demonstrates enrollment in an eligible program.
When a student becomes eligible through enrollment in an Eligible Career Pathway program or by completing “at least 6 credit hours or 225 clock-hours that are applicable to a degree or certificate offered by your school,” as an ATB alternative, the student does not gain eligibility during the period in which they are completing those hours. The student only becomes eligible for Pell Grants and Campus-Based aid in payment periods following the period in which the hours were completed, and a school may only originate a Direct Loan for a period which follows the period in which the hours were completed.
A student who gained Title IV eligibility under one of the ATB alternatives ceases to be an ATB student when they obtain a high school diploma or its recognized equivalent. At that point, the student is no longer subject to the restrictions on ATB students, including that the student be enrolled in an eligible career pathway program in order to be (potentially) Title IV-eligible.
ATB options & Eligible Career Pathway ProgramsConsolidated Appropriations Act of 2016 (Public Law 114-113)
Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (29 U.S.C. 3102(7))
Approved ATB Tests
Publishers & Passing Scores
Wonderlic Basic Skills Test (WBST) Verbal Forms VS-1 and VS-2, Quantitative Forms QS-1 and QS-2. This is a paper test.
Wonderlic, Inc., 400 Lakeview Parkway, Suite 200, Vernon Hills, IL 60061 Contact: Chris Young, 847-247-2544 Passing Scores: Verbal 200, Quantitative 210
Wonderlic Basic Skills Test (WBST) Verbal Forms VS-1 and VS-2, Quantitative Forms QS-1 and QS-2. This is an online version of the tests.
Wonderlic, Inc., 400 Lakeview Parkway, Suite 200, Vernon Hills, IL 60061 Contact: Chris Young, 847-247-2544 Passing Scores: Verbal 200, Quantitative 210
Spanish Wonderlic Basic Skills Test (Spanish WBST) Verbal Forms VS-1 and VS-2, Quantitative Forms QS-1 and QS-2. This is a paper test.
Wonderlic, Inc., 400 Lakeview Parkway, Suite 200, Vernon Hills, IL 60061 Contact: Chris Young, 847-247-2544 Passing Scores: Verbal 200, Quantitative 200
Spanish Wonderlic Basic Skills Test (Spanish WBST) Verbal Forms VS-1 and VS-2, Quantitative Forms QS-1 and QS-2. This is an online version of the tests.
Wonderlic, Inc., 400 Lakeview Parkway, Suite 200, Vernon Hills, IL 60061 Contact: Chris Young, 847-247-2544 Passing Scores: Verbal 200, Quantitative 200
Combined English Language Skills Assessment (CELSA), Forms 1 and 2.
Association of Classroom Teacher Testers (ACTT), 1187 Coast Village Road, Suite 1, 378 Montecito, CA 93108 Contact: Pablo Buckelew, 805-965-5704 Passing Scores: CELSA Form 1: 97, Form 2: 97.
ACCUPLACER Computer-adaptive tests and Companion ACCUPLACER Forms J & K: Reading, Writing, Arithmetic
The College Board, 250 Vesey Street, New York, NY 10281 Contact: The ACCUPLACER Program, 800-607-5223 Passing Scores: Reading 233, Writing 235, and Arithmetic 230.
Texas Success Initiative (TSI) Assessment Computer-adaptive tests and COMPANION TSI Forms T and V: Reading Placement Test, Writing Placement Test, Mathematics Placement Test
The College Board, 250 Vesey Street, New York, NY 10281 Contact: The TSI Assessment, 800-607-5223 Passing Scores: Reading Placement Test 336, Writing Placement Test 345, Mathematics Placement Test 326
To refer to ATB tests which were approved in the past, see the June 24, 2015 E-Announcement on FSA Partner Connect
To be eligible for Title IV funds, a student must make satisfactory academic progress, and your school must have a reasonable policy for monitoring that progress. The Department considers a satisfactory academic progress policy to be reasonable if it meets both the qualitative and quantitative criteria explained in this section.
Your SAP policy must be at least as strict (in terms of the qualitative and quantitative standards discussed below, not the frequency with which these are checked) as your SAP policy for students enrolled in the same program of study who are not receiving Title IV funds at your school, and it must apply equally to all students within categories, e.g., full-time, part-time, undergraduate, and graduate students. A school may create different SAP policies for different categories or groups of students, e.g. full-time vs. part-time, undergraduate vs. graduate students, and students enrolled in different academic programs.
You may use standard rounding rules on any SAP measurements for both qualitative and quantitative components (i.e. round up X.5 and higher, round down if below X.5). If you choose to round any SAP measurements, your policy for doing so must be included in your school’s general SAP policy. A student is either making SAP for all Title IV programs, or is not. You cannot say a student is making SAP for Pell but not for Direct Loans.
Your policy(ies) must include an academic progress evaluation at the end of each payment period for students in programs lasting one year or less. For all other programs, the policy must include annual reviews which must correspond with the end of a payment period. For programs greater than one year, your policy may also call for progress reviews after each payment period. If you review at each payment period, you must review SAP after every term, (including any summer terms) the student was enrolled. You may have reasonable rules for students who initially enroll in specific courses but modify that enrollment within a limited time.
Your school’s policy must specify that both the quantitative (pace) and qualitative (grade-based) standards are reviewed at each evaluation point, if required for that program (nonterm credit, subscription-based and clock-hour programs are exempt from the quantitative/pace evaluation, see discussion of the quantitative standard below). Each component may include a payment period-based standard but must include a cumulative standard. You may review SAP via satisfactory progress checks more frequently, (for example, monthly), but the more frequent reviews are considered informal checks and cannot replace the review that is required to be conducted at the end of the payment period.
Your policy must specify the qualitative standard (grade point average or GPA) that a student must have at each evaluation or, if GPA is not an appropriate qualitative measure, a comparable measure against a norm. In addition, the HEA requires a specific qualitative review at the end of the student’s second academic year. Students enrolled in a program of more than two academic years must have a GPA of at least a “C” or its equivalent or must have an academic standing consistent with your school’s graduation requirements.
Having a standing consistent with the requirement for graduation means you could use an escalating GPA instead of a fixed one. For example, if your school uses a 4-point scale, it could require students to have a 2.0 average by graduation but allow their average to be lower earlier in their program. If your policy permits such a progression and a student falls below a C average, you must be able to document that her average is consistent with the academic standard required for graduation.
Remedial coursework must be included in the qualitative assessment of SAP. The courses need not be included in the student’s GPA; however, your school must have some means of assessing a student’s qualitative academic progress in remedial coursework. Similarly, you must have a means of assessing student progress in programs comprised entirely of pass/fail coursework.
Courses attempted on a pass/fail basis count as attempts for SAP purposes (see the guidance below on pace), but are not factored into a student’s GPA for SAP purposes. When there are just a few pass/fail courses in the overall program, such courses do not have to be included in the qualitative/grades SAP component as long as they are counted in the quantitative/pace component. However, a program comprised primarily or 100% of pass/fail coursework must be counted in both qualitative and quantitative components.
Your SAP policy must also specify the quantitative standard (pace) at which students must progress through their program to ensure that they will graduate within the maximum timeframe (see below for full definition of maximum timeframe), and each satisfactory progress check must measure this. Nonterm credit, subscription-based and clock-hour programs are now exempt from the quantitative/pace evaluation. For these exempt programs, your school may, at its option, include the exempt programs/credits in an SAP calculation for the quantitative component of SAP (see the 9/2/20 final regulation).
For credit-hour programs using standard or nonstandard terms that are not subscription-based programs, you calculate the pace at which a student is progressing by dividing the total number of hours the student has successfully completed by the total number they have attempted, or by determining the number of hours that the student should have completed by the evaluation point in order to complete the program within the maximum timeframe. You may include, but aren’t required to include, remedial courses when making the assessment of the quantitative component of SAP.
As noted above, subscription-based programs are exempt from including a quantitative/pace component as part of SAP. However, a student enrolled in a subscription-based program must meet certain coursework completion requirements to receive a disbursement of Title IV funds. For more detail on the coursework completion requirements to receive disbursements in subscription-based programs, see Volume 3, Chapter 1, Appendix B.
You may exclude from the SAP quantitative/pace calculations any credits a student attempted, but could not complete due to the COVID-19 national emergency. It is not necessary for a student to have filed a SAP appeal for a school to exercise this flexibility, but you must have reasonably determined that the student’s failure to complete those credits was the result of a COVID-19 related circumstance. Allowable circumstances include, but are not limited to: