Seamless Student Experience aims to streamline district’s financial aid
Aaron Webster
Maricopa County Schools has changed the way it handles financial aid; it’s called the Student Seamless Experience.
No longer will each of the 10 colleges have their own plan for dealing with financial aid, but will instead be using a standardized system to eliminate any hiccups.
“We want to eliminate barriers,” said Lauren Shellenbarger, Project Director for the Seamless Student Experience, “we want students to focus on being students, not filling out paperwork.”
Previously, each school had their own way of dealing with financial aid.
When a student wanted to transfer to another school inside the Maricopa County School district, they would have to start the paperwork process dealing with enrollment, registration, financial aid, and requesting transcripts all over again.
A process that would often delay a student from getting into classes on time; sometimes even being dropped from classes already signed up for, or not receiving financial aid in the proper time frame.
With the Seamless Student Experience, these problems will be taken care of. At least, that is the hope. “We have seen success but also have seen some difficulties,” said Shellenbarger about the new program, “it’s a new program and system, so the kinks are still being worked out.”
“The process is not seamless,” said MCC student Jared Becker, “this is my third time coming down to financial aid and I have waited at least an hour to two hours each time.”
The first time Becker was at financial aid, they told him that on a specific date his funds would be available.
When he didn’t receive his funds on the date told, he waited another hour and half in line. He was told that financial aid money was sent to Citibank but when he called Citibank, they said they had not yet received any funds from Maricopa County Schools.
“They told me a third time that my funds would be available Aug. 31 and now it is Sept. 4 and still nothing,” said Becker. The program was an initiative from the chancellor of the Maricopa County School district, Rufus Glasper, back in 2011.
To help with the overwhelming task of everything that goes into financial aid, the district hired Vangent, a third party source, to deal with the verification process of financial aid.
The district has signed a contract with Vangent until January of 2014, with four one-year options after that.
