College Zone - Printable Version - ISAC Gift Assistance Programs

collegezone.com	Print page	Close window

In addition to the data elements that are required to determine a student's Expected Family Contribution (EFC), there are critical data elements that must be reported on the FAFSA and appear on the SAR and/or ISIR in order for ISAC to determine a student's eligibility for the Monetary Award Program (MAP) and Silas Purnell Illinois Incentive for Access (IIA) Program grants.

If any one of the following items on the FAFSA/SAR/ISIR is blank, incomplete or incorrect, ISAC will not be able to determine a student’s MAP and IIA eligibility. When counseling students on how to properly complete the FAFSA, please review these critical items to ensure students are providing the information necessary for MAP and IIA. If any corrections are needed, they must be made through the Central Processing System (CPS) to update a student’s record for calculation of MAP and IIA eligibility.

Critical Data Items for 2008-09 Eligibility

2008-09 Paper FAFSA & SAR/ISIR Items	MAP and IIA Eligibility Results
Step One: Item 18*	Student's State of Legal Residence -- ISAC will load a dependent student's record to the ISAC database when the student's state of legal residence is blank or is a state other than Illinois, but the parents’ state of legal residence is Illinois and a MAP-approved school is listed as one of the college choices. If this situation applies, there is no need to process a SAR/ISIR correction.**
Step One: Item 24	Grade Level in 2008-09 -- must report an undergraduate grade level to be processed for a MAP or IIA award. If blank, ISAC will assume grade level of "2" for IIA eligibility.
Step One: Item 28	Will you have your first bachelor’s degree before July 1, 2008? -- must report “no” to be processed for a MAP or IIA award.
Step Three: Item 49	At the beginning of the 2008-09 school year, will you be working on a master's or doctorate program? -- must report “no” to be processed for a MAP or IIA award.
Step Four: Item 68	Parents' State of Legal Residence -- must be Illinois for dependent students. Failure to complete this item will produce an incomplete application for MAP and IIA for dependent students.
Step Six:	Federal School Code or College Name, Address, City and State - must report a MAP-approved school as one of the college choices.

* Please note: ISAC does not use FAFSA/SAR/ISIR Items 19 - 20 (Student’s Residence as-of date), nor FAFSA/SAR/ISIR Items
69 - 70 (Parents' Residence as-of date) to determine Illinois residency.

** If an independent student indicates a state other than Illinois in Item 18, ISAC will not receive the student's information from the CPS.

Student Aid Report (SAR) Corrections

ISAC’s policy regarding corrections to the Student Aid Report (SAR/ISIR) for the Monetary Award Program (MAP), remains consistent with ED's policy on corrections and verification tolerance options of no errors in non-dollar items such as household size or number in college. Corrections must be submitted to the Central Processing System (CPS) if the Social Security number is wrong or if there were problems with other application questions that are subject to data matches, such as the citizenship questions.

The guidelines for dollar items for Federal Student Aid programs and MAP grant recipients depend on the program, the impact of the changes on the student's eligibility and whether the student is selected for Federal Verification. Refer to the Application and Verification Guide in the Federal Student Aid Handbook.

School Choices

As long as a school is listed as one of the school choices on the SAR/ISIR, MAPnet calculates the award eligibility for that student for that specific MAPnet school. Refer to FAFSA Corrections for instructions for options to add or delete a school to the schools listed on the SAR.

The number of federal school codes an applicant can include on the 2008-09 paper FAFSA is four. Applicants can change up to four previously identified school codes on their paper SAR. The number of federal school codes that can be entered on FAFSA on the Web was increased to 10 choices. The CPS will send data to each of the school choices listed. When new schools are added, a corresponding number of schools will be removed from the list and will not have automatic access to the student’s information. The Institutional Student Information Record (ISIR) was revised to include up to ten school choices.