Aviation Technology Center update

 

Here is a message I shared with the College community earlier today:

I am pleased to give you good news on the status of our Aviation Technology Center (ATC).

You will recall that when a college offers more than 50 percent of courses for a specific program at a location geographically separate from a main campus, the Higher Learning Commission (HLC) must approve the site.  Further, colleges are prohibited by the U.S. Department of Education (ED) from disbursing federal financial aid for programs at sites that have not been HLC-approved.

We discovered that PCC had never obtained this approval for the ATC site, and self-disclosed this fact to the HLC and ED.  We immediately filed for approval with the HLC, and did not disburse financial aid to Aviation students for the summer semester.  Instead, the College and the PCC Foundation provided affected students with institutional and Foundation scholarships.

I want to emphasize that through this whole process the Aviation program itself has remained fully accredited and approved by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and the HLC.

On June 27, 2016, the HLC approved the ATC at Pima Community College as an additional location.  This means that the College is able to offer the various Aviation degrees and certificates at the ATC.  This approval also allowed the College to seek approval from ED to offer federal financial aid at this location.

We are awaiting final approval from ED, but based on our conversations with them, we are optimistic that this will occur before the fall financial aid disbursement date of September 9.  We also have learned that the Department is in the process of reviewing our Program Participation Agreement (PPA) and updating our Eligibility & Certification Approval Report (ECAR), which contains the ED list of Pima’s approved locations.  These are very positive signs.

On Thursday, August 4, 2016, Aviation leadership met with students, updated them on our progress, and discussed the College’s efforts to ensure that financial aid students remain unaffected.  The College is working to have contingency plans in place, should the ED approval be delayed past September 9.

I am encouraged by these developments, and I am proud of the staff and faculty who proactively identified this issue, and have been working to correct it.  Thanks to their efforts, this is one more example of the College’s progress toward becoming a premier institution of learning.

 

Aviation Technology Center update

Below is a message I sent to the College community July 1:

I have good news to share about our Aviation Technology Center (ATC).  The College was notified today that the Higher Learning Commission has approved the ATC as an instructional site.

If you’ll remember, when a college offers more than 50 percent of program instruction at a location geographically separate from a main campus (in ATC’s case, Desert Vista), the HLC must approve the site.

Today, I received a letter from HLC President Barbara Gellman-Danley notifying the College that the Institutional Actions Council of the HLC on June 27 approved our request “to open three additional locations”: the ATC, 7211 S. Park Ave.; Maintenance and Security, 6680 S. Country Club Road; and the Tucson Public Safety Academy, at 10001 S. Wilmot Road.

The letter added that the HLC, per policy, will conduct a required Additional Location Confirmation Visit to the ATC within six months.

Additionally, the HLC approved PCC’s request to open additional locations at the Arizona State Prison Complex-Tucson, 10000 S. Wilmot Road, and the Federal Bureau of Prisons’ Federal Correctional Complex at 8901 S. Wilmot Road.

It should be noted that the College, while seeking HLC approval of the ATC, self-disclosed its status to the U.S. Department of Education. The DOE is conducting a focused program review of the ATC. DOE’s review potentially affects the College’s ability to disburse financial aid at the ATC because institutions must first receive approval from their regional accrediting body, i.e. the HLC, prior to disbursing federal financial aid. We are working with the DOE to seek approval to disburse financial aid to ATC students for the Fall 2016 semester.

Today’s good news represents crucial progress for the College in the areas of compliance and accountability. We continue to improve our alignment with accreditor and regulator standards and expectations. The beneficiaries are our students, who can attain their goals through a Pima Community College education.

Thank you for your dedication to doing things right, and enjoy the holiday.

 

Aviation Technology Center update

Here is a message I sent to the College community regarding our Aviation Technology Center:

I have good news to share about our Aviation Technology Center (ATC).  The College was notified on May 17 that the Higher Learning Commission’s Review Committee has recommended approval of the ATC as an additional location, and this will be voted on at the HLC’s June 26 & 27 meeting.

If you’ll remember, when a college offers more than 50 percent of the coursework of a program at a location geographically separate from a main campus (in ATC’s case, Desert Vista), the HLC must approve the site. [You can read more about this and other topics in my synopsis of a May 5 financial aid training for administrators.]

Wednesday, Desert Vista Campus Vice President Ted Roush notified Aviation students of the HLC’s recommendation, which eliminates the need to move classes from the ATC to other PCC locations.

The students also were updated that the College still is waiting for the Department of Education to approve disbursement of financial aid to students taking courses at the ATC. The College has been reaching out to Summer 2016 Financial Aid-certified students at the ATC to inform them that their tuition and other expenses that would have been funded with federal financial aid will be paid instead with institutional and private funds. Each student’s financial situation is unique; aviation academic advisors, counselors and financial aid staff are working with Financial Aid-certified students individually to make sure there is a clear understanding of the process. But it’s important to reiterate: all eligible financial aid Aviation students will be held harmless for the summer.

Bringing the Aviation Technology Center into compliance with HLC and Department of Education rules is crucial to ensuring the success of our students in the highly regarded Aviation program. It also serves as an example of the importance of transparency and accountability amid the complexity of higher education regulation. All across the College, employees are working to bring us into compliance with accreditors and regulators so that students can reap the benefits of a PCC education. I thank you for your dedication to doing things right.

View a fact sheet, for more information regarding the Aviation site approval process.

Financial aid update

Below is a message sent to PCC employees last week regarding training for PCC administrators on the important topic of financial aid to students. The training focused on maintaining compliance with federal and state authorities and with our accrediting organizations.

Last Thursday, May 5, we held training for administrators on various compliance areas including some recently discovered PCC sites that do not appear to have gone through a required approval process with the Higher Learning Commission (HLC). This approval process is connected to federal financial aid (Title IV) regulations. At the conclusion of the training, we provided a short review of the training for other employees who were able to join us. This email includes a synopsis of the training and subsequent discussion. However, first I’d like to reiterate the importance of conversations like this.

Many of you have been proactively reviewing policies and procedures throughout the College to ensure that the institution is fully compliant with relevant regulations and requirements, especially those of the federal government and the HLC.

Together we’ve been able to uncover gaps or errors that needed to be corrected. We have self-disclosed to the HLC and the Dept. of Education the areas we’ve discovered, and we are working as a team to correct them. We have received compliments from our regulatory bodies for doing this, and they are working with us as we make these systemic changes throughout the College. Many of you have been part of this effort and your commitment to making things right shows how many people we have here at PCC who care deeply about the institution and our students.

Several aspects of how federal financial aid regulations impact College operations were reviewed in the training:

1. Selective Admissions – Students must be fully admitted into an eligible program before they can receive federal financial aid for that program. As of January 2016, PCC identified 26 programs that were not appropriately coded in Banner as having selective admission requirements, i.e. background checks or course prerequisites. As a result, some students were listed as admitted to a program even though they had not met all the program admissions requirements.
STATUS: IN PROGRESS. Programs are either being reconfigured so they are no longer Selective Admissions, or correctly coded as selective admissions. Students have been notified to either fulfill program admissions requirements or change their majors by 5-13-16.

2. Developmental Education – For developmental education courses to be eligible for federal financial aid, they must be at the 9th grade level or above, and be part of the developmental education sequence. Four courses were determined by the AZ Dept. of Education to be below 9th grade level and therefore ineligible for financial aid.
STATUS: COMPLETE. WRT 070, MAT 082, MAT 086, and REA 071 have been deactivated from financial aid eligibility, and a new developmental education sequence has been designed to comply with Department of Education regulations.

3. Course-to-Program Applicability – Students can only receive Title IV aid for courses in their declared program of study.
STATUS: COMPLETE, but labor intensive. Advisors are manually reviewing records to verify course-to-program applicability. The College is working on various I.T. solutions to automate this process.

4. Satisfactory Academic Progress (SAP) – The Financial Aid SAP policy must be “as strict as” the institutional SAP policy.
STATUS: COMPLETE. Standards were changed in Fall 2015 to meet the regulations. The Financial Aid SAP Appeals team has undergone training on the level of rigor expected in SAP Appeals review and will continue to do so to maintain compliance and consistency.

5. Administrative Capability — The Department of Education requires that conflicting information be resolved and a system of checks and balances be put in place in the administration of Title IV aid. An HLC Substantive Change application and subsequent approval is required if a college offers more than 50% of a program at a location that is geographically separate from a main campus. Likewise, the Department of Education requires this HLC approval prior to disbursing aid to students attending at these additional locations. PCC discovered a mismatch between the list of approved locations with the HLC and the list of approved locations with the Department of Education.
STATUS: IN PROGRESS. We filed substantive change applications with the HLC in February to seek approval for offering more than 50% of a program at three additional locations (Aviation Technology Center, Maintenance & Security, Public Safety Academy) , and are hoping for approval over the next few weeks.We notified the Dept. of Ed of the mismatch between HLC additional locations and those listed by the Dept. of Ed as approved. They are conducting an offsite program review of two of the locations (Aviation Technology Center and Maintenance & Security), and we should expect to hear on their process in the next few weeks. As we are awaiting approval from the HLC and Dept. of Ed., summer classes at these additional locations are being relocated to the campuses, when possible.

Because Aviation courses cannot be relocated without additional approval from the FAA, the PCC and the PCC Foundation will provide scholarships to summer session students who would have received federal financial aid (Title IV). We hope to have the appropriate approvals for the fall semester from both the HLC and the Dept. of Ed. During the May 5 training, administrators were asked to report any other additional locations where PCC courses are taught, so that we can ensure proper reporting and approval is sought with the HLC and Dept. of Education

Final thoughts
As you can see, ensuring compliance in today’s higher education world has never been more complicated or absolutely necessary. In order to become the premier institution I know Pima can be, we must be self-reflective and knowledgeable about the regulatory bodies that impact the College. We want to do more than what is minimally required—we want to exceed the standard, and ensure that we are catching these issues ourselves.

Compliance is about transparency, accountability, and making sure we are enabling our students to achieve their hopes and dreams. Thanks for your help with this incredibly important work.