HESC UPDATE
September 2007
Accelerated Study Term Report
Report HE8498, the
Accelerated Study Term Report is now available on the HESC web site and will be
available at the end of each term’s certification period. This report is only
available for schools that have continuous enrollment and whose regular
calendar allows students to attend 3 semesters or 4 trimesters in a calendar
year.
To view the report
visit the
Math & Science Teaching Incentive Scholarship
Application Period Reopened
The competition for
the New York State Math and Science Teaching Incentive Scholarship Program has
been reopened for the 2006-07 academic year with an application deadline of
Ability to Benefit Test
Students may take the federally approved Ability to Benefit Test up until the end of the Fall term. This is for the current Fall term only and clarification will be provided for the upcoming Spring term.
New Access to Digital
Dashboard
The
Digital Dashboard is a report which contains information on all loans
guaranteed by loan type. Information
includes the number of loans, loan guarantee amount, number of disbursals,
anticipated dollars disbursing, actual dollars disbursed, total amount
canceled, number of HESC held e-MPNs and number of
HESC held paper MPNs.
The Digital Dashboard can be accessed by visiting the College Administrators center, then the
HESC Enhances Default Manager
HESC has
enhanced Default Manager once again. Beginning Aug. 1, the HESC Default Manager
program began to select delinquent accounts and assign cohort years based on
the date of repayment reported directly by the lender. Delinquent accounts were
previously based on information provided by School Certification Data (SCS).
HESC Default Manager eliminates the potential for discrepancy by assigning a
cohort year based on the lender reported, “date entered repayment” for each
identified delinquent loan. The source of the delinquency notification and the
“date entered repayment” will now be the same, considerably reducing the number
of accounts with conflicting data.
Future enhancements will include exporting of demographic information in Excel format which will facilitate mail merge functionality and the ability to create the cohort rate listing directly from Default Manager. If you have any ideas for additional future enhancements, please contact Ed Gilbert directly at egilbert@hesc.org or 518.473.3528.
Preferred Lender
List Changes
In compliance with SLATE, HESC has
added additional wording to the e-MPN process at the point where a borrower
selects a lender. The new wording
follows:
Students and their parents have the right and ability to select the
education loan provider of their choice.
If a preferred lender list is displayed, you are not required to use a
lender on that list, and will not suffer a penalty for choosing another lender.
For information regarding a school’s policy on establishing a preferred
lender, please contact your school’s Financial Aid Office.
If a college
has supplied HESC with a URL to their website, there will be a link for the
borrower to the school’s policy on determining a preferred lender. Students can review the information, close
the school window and continue with the e-MPN process
Credit Check Enhancements
HESC has updated our system for sending Certification Requests when the
borrower completes the credit only portion of the e-MPN. If a borrower chooses to complete the credit
only portion of the e-MPN, a certification request will be sent to the school
upon credit approval. To receive a loan
guarantee, the borrower will need to complete the e-MPN but the school will be
able to complete the certification request once the credit pre-approval is
complete.
Schools now
have the ability to request a list of all students and borrowers for whom HESC
has performed a credit check. Visit the College Administrators center and sign
into the
HESC’s Default Rate Lowest in 34 Year
History
The New York State Higher Education Services Corp. (HESC) has reached a
milestone in its 2005 cohort default rate – 3.9 percent, according to
statistics released by the U.S. Department of Education recently.
Leading the way in default avoidance for more than a decade, HESC assists
college financial aid administrators to successfully contact and help students
with repayment options and debt management education.
This spring, HESC awarded $1 million to 29 schools to help
prevent student loan defaults. The grants, ranging from $4,800 to almost
$50,000, were awarded to competitively selected colleges and universities for
their proposals to identify risks that contribute to student loan default, and
to develop and implement new programs which have the best potential to
significantly reduce the dollar amount of defaulted loans.