As the spring term has come to an end, financial aid administrators must now calculate the Satisfactory Academic Progress (SAP) for students from the spring semester. As calculations are prepared, a common question may arise: how do we treat withdrawals due to COVID-19 in our SAP calculation? Last month, the Department of Education (ED) released an updated guidance for interruptions of study related to Coronavirus which provided additional flexibitilies on the SAP procedure, including revised calculation and appeal requirements amid the current national emergency.
The CARES Act, passed in March, allows institutions to exclude any attempted but not completed credits from the quantitative component of SAP, which includes both maximum time frame and pace calculations. While a formal appeal is not required for this change, institutions must reasonably determine that the student was unable to complete the credits due to the COVID-19 national emergency. The guidance from last month provided a non-exhaustive list of allowable circumstances, including illness of the student or family member, need to become a caregiver or first responder, economic hardship, added work hours, loss of childcare, inability to continue with classes via distance education, inability to access wi-fi due to closed facilities. If an institution temporarily closed during the period of enrollment, attempted credits for all affected students specific to that enrollment period may be excluded.
SAP regulations require that the pace at which students progresses through the program ensures completion of that program within the maximum timeframe. However, under this guidance, attempted but not completed credits would not be included in the calculation. For example, the pace of a student who has completed 78 of 120 attempted hours is 65 percent, below what is necessary to be making SAP. With the 12 credits not completed during the Spring 2020 semester excluded, the pace becomes 72 percent (79/108) and the student is making SAP. The 12 credits are effectively excluded from the maximum timeframe as well as the measurement of pace.
These flexibilities also extend to pass/fail courses that were not completed due to the COVID-19 national emergency. Typically, pass/fail courses do not affect a student’s GPA and are not factored into the qualitative component of the SAP calculation, but are a part of the quantitative measure. With the update from the CARES Act, institutions have the option to exclude the quantitative component from the calculation for courses not completed due to COVID-19, as stated above. If an institution exercises this option, pass/fail courses could be excluded from the SAP calculation entirely.
Institutions that implement these updates for the Spring 2020 semester, must revise their SAP policy to include the updates to the SAP calculation.
Sources:
IFAP Announcement: UPDATED Guidance for interruptions of study related to Coronavirus (COVID-19)
AskRegs Update: Where Can Schools Find Guidance on SAP Flexibility Due to COVID-19?
Trending AskRegs Q&A: How do We Calculate SAP if We Converted to Pass/Fail Grades Due to Coronavirus?
Trending AskRegs Q&A: How do We Treat COVID-19 Related Withdrawals in Our SAP Calculation?