TICUA Policy Update

March 18, 2005

TSAC Grant Deadlines

The Tennessee Student Assistance Award (TSAA) application deadline for 2005 – 2006 has passed.  According to TSAC staff students wanting to be considered for the TSAA needed to have processed their Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) by March 11, 2005.  This deadline is nearly two months earlier than the traditional May 1 deadline.  The earlier deadline is due to lack of State appropriations to fund all eligible students.

Those needy students attending one of Tennessee’s private colleges or universities wishing to be considered for the TSAA supplemental Ben Atchley Opportunity Grant had to complete the FAFSA by March 5, 2005. 

Keep Those Emails Flowing!

To date, over 130 emails have been sent to Legislators thanking them for the TSAA and requesting consideration for additional to fund the over 31,000 students not funded.  All of the emails have been sent from students attending a TICUA member college or university.  Please continue to encourage your students to use the TICUA Action Center to write emails and strongly consider how you might get parents involved in saying “thank you” as well! 

Yesterday TICUA sent a message to all of our public university partners to join us by mobilizing their students in writing emails and notes of thanks for the TSAA.  Consequently, beginning this next week we will see a large influx emails reaching legislators concerning the importance of the State’s need-based grant program.

TSAC Executive Director Search

The search committee to recommend a new Executive Director for Tennessee Student Assistance Corporation to the TSAC Board of Directors met this past week to begin the review of applicants.  Twenty-eight candidates are currently under review.  The committee will meet again this next week to narrow the pool of applicants.

Perkins Loan Data Available

TICUA is posting institution level data related to the Federal Perkins Loan program.  The data show each participating institution’s Federal Contribution to the loan program that may need to be refunded to the Federal Government if it phased out.  President Bush recently announced that a part of his plan to fund the long-term increase in the Pell Grant was to eliminate the Perkins program and recall the Federal Contributions from the campuses.  The impact on TICUA members will exceed $70 million; per institution impacts range from under $1 million to over $12 million.

NAICU is sending a letter to each participating campus to urge college and university Presidents to write their congressional delegates about the importance of the low-interest loan program.  Recent visits to the nation’s Capitol from financial aid administrators Forrest Stuart (Rhodes College), David Gelinas (University of the South), and Brent Tener (Vanderbilt University) proved helpful in raising the awareness of the importance of the Perkins program.  Hill staffers said that they were more interested in institution level responses than from associations.  So please, look for the NAICU letter in the next few days and take action!

The data are available at http://www.sitemason.com/files/b/bN6HOo/TN%20Perkins%20data.xls

Lottery Oversight to Meet ... Again

The Joint Lottery Oversight Committee will meet March 23, 2005 at 4:30 p.m. (CST) to continue the review of bills related to lottery scholarships.   This will be the Committee’s second meeting and hopefully more productive.  The last time the committee met they failed to review the majority of the 50+ bills related to the lottery program.  Once the joint committee makes its recommendations on the bills they will begin to move through standing committees for consideration.