The Financial Aid department at WTAMU has advised students to apply for federal aid on time, and to keep an eye on their e-mail and student accounts for further requests for missing documents and/or notification of awards.

Dan Garcia, Vice President for Enrollment Management, said he has been asked by students to intervene when they feel they have significant issues getting their financial aid and he has found, in almost every instance, the reason for the issues are due to students applying late.

“I’m very concerned if a student is not being treated the way they should or is having a difficulty that is causing them to be distressed,” Garcia said.  “In nearly every instance, in my seven years [at WT], that I have been asked to intervene on behalf of a student, it has been revealed that the student applied very late.”

Garcia said the Financial Aid department has a large number of requirements that must be met in order for federal aid to be provided to students, and they are very conscientious in going through the process.

“From their perspective,” Garcia said, “if they distribute aid to a student that is not entitled to receive aid, one of a couple of things can happen:  the institution has to repay that money back to the state or federal government, or if we commit substantial errors it puts us at risk for not being able to distribute [millions of dollars] worth of aid to anybody.  So they are very concerned that they follow the rules.”

Jim Reed, Director of Student Financial Aid, said each segment of the application process has been slightly amplified by the school record 8,389 students enrolled this fall, but the department hasn’t seen anything out of the ordinary.

“[The amplification] has been fairly well spread for us,” Reed said.  “Our primary difficulty with the verification process is response time, as far as students getting information back to us that we request and accurately returning the right information.”

Reed said the federal government has made the verification process more personal, and they are able to review individual applications more in-depth than ever before.

“There are certain basic things we are expected to look for anytime someone is selected for verification,” Reed said, “but then each year, beginning with last year, they identified individual things.  Now, if students are selected for verification, they may fall into one of four or five categories, and which category they are in depends on what information we need to follow up on.”

Lynette Lough, Student Accounts and Billing Coordinator, said the Business Office at WTAMU has been very busy this semester, and they are doing a lot of educating students on the process of reviewing their student accounts online.

“Any time you have lots of new students, you have lots of questions to start with,” Lough said.  “We’ll get questions such as, “How does the payment plan work?  When will I get my financial aid?”  One of our main goals is to help students [keep up with their accounts] so that they can continue going to class and finish their education.”

Lough said the best advice she can give, especially for ACE students, athletes and veterans, is to get applications in early because those student applications must get extra reviews for verification so they can set up a billing process in the High Risk Merchant Accounts used.