LITTLE ROCK — With the Fall 2010 Semester drawing near prospective college students around the state continue to await word on the status of their scholarship applications that were submitted to the Arkansas Department of Higher Education (ADHE). Since June 1 ADHE has received thousands of phone calls from students wanting to know their status, which is something ADHE personnel are working on continuously.
“I think it is obvious that the initial projections for the number of students who would apply were under the actual number that we have received,” said Dr.
Jim Purcell, ADHE director. “Our staff is working diligently to notify all students of their award status but we have a convergence of events that are hampering this effort.”
Dr. Purcell cited the volume of applications being processed - 55,551 for the Arkansas Academic Challenge Scholarship alone - with a shortage of qualified personnel to deal with the volume as the primary factors that are causing delays in processing, coupled with the volume of phone calls agency personnel are attempting to answer.
“We have temporarily reassigned personnel to assist but the volume of phone calls we receive is creating a challenge to our goal of notifying all students by the end of July,” he said. “We understand the concerns of thesestudents and we cannot be unresponsive, but our financial aid staff is literally in a position where they can either answer the telephones or they can process applications, but they cannot do both.”
Two factors have contributed to the backlog which ADHE financial aid personnel are dealing with the new YOUniversal Scholarship Application which has made it easier for students to identify which program they may qualify for and new legislation that has opened up the Academic Challenge Scholarship to thousands more Arkansans than ever before. Last year, ADHE received a total of 23,105 scholarship applications, of which 7,645 were for Academic Challenge. This year, the department has received 125,170 applications for all programs.
“This is a good problem to have but we have to recognize that a good problem will create just as much havoc as a bad problem if it isn’t dealt with,” said Dr. Purcell.
“The response to the wider availability of these scholarships has proven that Arkansans recognize the critical need for higher education and our mission is to ensure that we respond appropriately to those we serve. Our central mission is to ensure that all qualified students possible receive the financial aid they are entitled to and we are asking those students waiting to hear from us to help us in that effort by giving our staffthe time they need to accurately process these applications.”
“We know there are times when students need to communicate with our financial aid staff and when they call they will get to talk to someone,” said Dr. Purcell. “But everyone needs to understand that calling to inquire about your award status will not speed that process up. It will slow it down. Your patience will not only allow us time to get through these applications and transcripts, it will also be beneficial to all the students in Arkansas who are waiting to hear their status.”
To better assist students and to help lower the volume of phone calls to financial aid personnel, ADHE has posted a copy of the most frequently asked questions (FAQs) on its website. Dr. Purcell said the posted questions represent more than 80 percent of the call volume from students seeking information. The FAQs may be accessed online at HYPERLINK “http://www.adhe.edu/divisions/financialaid/Pages/AcademicC hallengeScholarship(Lotte ry)FrequentlyAskedQuesti ons.aspx”.
“By doing this we can provide the students with a resource to get the information they are seeking while hopefully giving our financial aid staff some breathing room to get these applications processed in a timely fashion,” he said.
News, Pages 12 on 07/14/2010