The New School has heard the complaints of students about the financial aid office and plans to introduce several changes, administrators told The New School Free Press in a wide-ranging interview.
The changes include simplifying the billing process, improving the website and holding several informational sessions beginning this summer.
In February, the Free Press reported on students outraged with the Office of Financial Aid and Student Accounts. Many students felt that there was a lack of communication, inefficiency, and discrimination towards Black, Indigenous and students of color at the offices and took to social media to demand accountability and highlight their struggles.
The Free Press interviewed Carol Kim, Rebecca Hunter and Xenia Markowitt to get a clearer picture of what actions they have taken and plan to take in response to the student outrage.
- Carol Kim, the senior vice provost for enrollment management and strategic partnerships. As part of her portfolio, she oversees the Office of Financial Aid.
- Rebecca Hunter, vice president for Integrative Enrollment Analytics for Student Success. Serves within the University Registrar.
- Xenia Markowitt, interim vice provost for Student Success. Began working for The New School in September 2020.
Here are 10 main takeaways from our interview:
1. The New School says they do not treat BIPOC students differently
Kim started off the interview by stating that the Office of Financial Aid and the university does not support or treat BIPOC students differently than white students. “I know that is one of the many things that are actually right now out in the open, that is being talked about. And, that is something that is of worry and of chatter at the moment. So, I really wanted to say that we are here to support our students. We certainly want to do better,” said Kim.
Kim acknowledged that students and families of color disproportionately feel the devastating impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic and that it is a particularly difficult time for them. “That is certainly true on our campus,” she said.
It is unclear what the university plans to do to ensure that specifically BIPOC students feel supported by the university and are getting the help they need in financial and academic planning.
2. Financial aid hold threshold to decrease from $5,000 to $2,000
In response to student outrage with the Office of Financial Aid and Student Accounts, the university increased the tuition threshold for the implication financial aid holds to $5,000. This policy change was intended to be only a temporary measure to assist students for spring 2021 registration.
Beginning in the fall 2021, the financial aid hold threshold will revert back to $2,000. These financial aid holds interfere with students’ ability to register for classes the following semester due to having an unpaid tuition balance.
Hunter added that the university does not expect to resume the pre-pandemic hold threshold of $500 until Fall 2022.
3. The pandemic hit the office hard
Like much of the worlds’ workplaces, the Office of Financial Aid and Student Accounts are operating remotely, and have been since March 2020. The pandemic has left lasting impacts on the staff members just as it has on students and faculty, some staff members having dealt with illness, death, and employment uncertainty.
“I can share with you that our Office of Financial Aid compared to my other offices, this team was disproportionately impacted, they lost over double digit number of family members due to COVID,” said Kim who oversees the Office of Financial Aid.
According to Rebecca Hunter, the student accounts team lost one position as a result of the layoffs and had four frozen positions in 2020.
4. The New School plans to increase student engagement with financial aid advisory groups and info sessions
The university plans to improve student engagement and communication with the Office of Financial Aid by creating a student advisory group and offering financial aid informational sessions.
Students can expect to see advisory meetings and sessions during the summer and the beginning of the fall semester. “I suspect, as we get closer to fall, they will become more popular. So we will add more. But roughly once a month or twice a month, depending on how, how widely attended they are,” said Rebecca Hunter.
The goal of the information sessions is to give students the opportunity to have a dialogue with other students, ask questions, and learn about financial aid policy.
Markowitt has only worked for the university since September 2020, but she said that she discovered during her short time here that there were not a lot of structures in the university for ongoing student engagement or input. Markowitt said that she has worked with the Student Senate to discuss how to form more structured ways for student participation.
“I’m trying to build scaffolding that will create actual structure. So [student engagement] can continue to happen. And it’s not dependent on student upset,” said Markowitt. “Because I want students to determine what it should look like as well. I want it to be meaningful to what students want.”
5. The university hopes to simplify the billing process
Hunter stated that one improvement that students will be able to see in the short term is simplifying the way students see their bill, the way they are charged, and the way they can pay their bill.
The university hopes that by simplifying the billing process for students, counselors in financial aid and student accounts can spend more time with students engaging in financial planning and meaningful conversation about paying for higher education. “We want to make it so simple, that we’re able to have more substantive conversations and spend our time in a more intimate, more valuable manner,” said Hunter.
She explained that through The New School’s evolution – having acquired multiple colleges that operated individually before forming together – the billing process has gotten more complicated and confusing.
The billing cycle will occur in the summer as it normally does. It is important to note that the university has decided to raise tuition back to pre-pandemic levels.
6. Improvements to New School website will roll out this summer
Hunter said that a major goal for the university is to improve The New School website to make finding information on the website more accessible and straightforward for students and their families. “We want to provide more clarity and not not require a student go from webpage to webpage to webpage, to piece together what the expectations are. I’m really excited about these changes,” she said.
Students can expect most of the changes on the website to take place over the next couple of months, by July 1, according to Hunter.
7. Even with aid, The New School cannot reach full financial need for students
In a time when many students need financial aid due to unemployment and loss of income, the school cannot fill the entire gap for each student. Kim explained that The New School is not as financially independent as they would like to be, and “do not really receive government subsidy” because it is a private university.
One function of the Office of Financial Aid is to disperse the funding that the university receives from the government amongst students. This can look like scholarships, grants, governmental grants and loans. In that respect, there are “strict guidelines and federal guidelines that we have to meet,” said Kim.
“This is where I believe there are a lot of questions [from] students because they look to the financial aid office as if they are the determining folks who say, ‘You get to have this much. And you don’t.’ Those are actually all falling within policy,” said Kim. “And, these are some of the things that we would love to actually have open conversations with students, to really help support and learn about some of these issues.”
8. The financial aid verification process to be improved
The university is looking for ways to improve the verification process for students who receive federal financial aid, a notoriously slow and oftentimes confusing process.
“It’s [the verification process] cumbersome, and manual in many respects. So we’re looking to improve in that space. So students have more rapid response, and easier ways of submitting their documents and more clarity all the way around,” said Hunter
9. The office has added staff members
This year the Office of Financial Aid and Student Accounts hired six additional staff members. With increased staffing, the university hopes to provide faster service to students and improve their response time to communications. “We know that emails and phone calls and other ways of connecting have been problematic this year,” said Hunter.
In a follow-up email, Kim explained that the most immediate impact of the pandemic on the office was an increased volume of emails and phone calls they received. In April 2020 alone, the financial aid team processed around 3360 emails, according to Kim.
“We have to get the staffing in place and then we can really work to speed up that response time,” she said. “We recognize that it is not where any of us expect it to be. And we have good, hard work to do in that space.”
10. The university is considering creating advisors for financial aid
A long term plan the university wants to embark on is having financial and student accounts counselors available to students, much like an academic advisor is available to students. The idea being students and their financial counselor can develop a more personal relationship.
“So that it isn’t you’re just emailing this general inbox and hoping somebody gets back to you. We’ll have a one on one connection,” said Hunter.
Students can get in contact with Carol Kim, Rebecca Hunter and Xenia Markowitt by reaching out over email:
Carol Kim: ckim@newschool.edu
Rebecca Hunter: hunterr@newschool.edu
Xenia Markowitt: markowix@newschool.edu