| PublicationDate: 4/26/99 Summary: Student Financial Aid Year 2000 Project Status and Testing Opportunities for Postsecondary Institutions and Trading Partners Author: PSS - Program Systems Service y2kpmsga.pdf  TO: All Destination Points FROM: US Department of Education RE: Student Financial Aid Year 2000 Project Status and Testing Opportunities for Postsecondary Institutions and Trading Partners The office of Student Financial Assistance Programs (OSFAP) is proud to announce that OSFAP systems, which deliver and administer student assistance, are Year 2000 ready. However, this achievement alone does not assure the delivery of student aid. Trading exchange testing with our large population of OSFAP customers will further reduce the risk of a Year 2000 failure in the delivery of student assistance. OSFAP encourages each institution (school or agency) to test their data exchanges with the following systems during the windows of opportunity listed below. Testing plans and test cases can be found at http://www.ed.gov/offices/OCIO/year/events.html. [[This file contains the "Scheduled Dates for Institution Testing" in Portable Document Format (PDF). It can be viewed with version 3.0 or greater of the free Adobe Acrobat Reader software.]] The preliminary Year 2000 Student Financial Assistance Business Continuity and Contingency Planning is another milestone accomplishment OSFAP has completed. Our plan can be found at www.ed.gov/offices/OCIO/year/reports.html. This plan provides OSFAP business continuity should any portion of the student financial assistance business process fail for a Year 2000 problem. The plan identifies eight core business processes and numerous key sub-processes, normal and emergency levels of performance, potential failure scenarios, and a variety of risk mitigation strategies and contingency plans addressing potential failures. Review by the Office of Management and Budget is in process. OSFAP encourages institutions and agencies to review our plan and develop similar plans to ensure their ability to continue student financial assistance delivery and other core business functions associated with their mission. In conclusion, OSFAP wants to ensure that the student financial assistance community will not be disrupted on account of the Year 2000 problem. The SFA Year 2000 project team may be reached via email at: |