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New, Improved Pell Grant Website

PublicationDate: 10/12/2000
Summary: New, Improved Pell Grant Website
Author: PDD - Policy Development Division/SAIS

Posted on October 12, 2000

TO: All Destination Points
FROM: Pell Grant Program
RE: New, Improved Pell Grant Website

Beginning at 8:00 a.m. (Eastern Time) on Friday, October 13, 2000, the Pell Grant website (http://ifap.ed.gov/IFAPWebApp/currentPGRFMSProcessPag.jsp/) will not be available for use. This outage is necessary to implement new and improved features for the website. We expect the updated website to be returned to service by Monday, October 16, 2000.

With our October 2000 website release:

We introduce an Open View to many of the functions that the website offers. While the Pell Grant website continues to restrict access to information protected by the Privacy Act, you no longer need to have a Title IV Wide Area Network (TIVWAN) User ID for certain features including viewing FAA Information, retrieving Batch Status information, accessing Disbursement Summary data for your school, navigating to other sites via the Links function, requesting information through the Contact Us feature and, finally, using the soon-to-be available FAQ information section for searching and finding additional information about the Federal Pell Grant program.

We provide a revised “Privacy Policy” statement. Only users with a TIVWAN User ID, and a password authenticated through the “first time user” process of the Pell Grant website, may use the secured functions. These include the Batch Detail Status view, the POP Information (Student data) view, Data Requests, and Institution data updates. A forthcoming Dear Partner Letter will describe a new TIVWAN service, which allows multiple individuals at a school to have their own TIVWAN User ID, and to view Pell data within secured functions.

We offer a revised Help tab to assist in guiding you with browser information.

We present a redesigned Disbursement Summary page that displays school identifiers.

We have corrected the Total Eligibility Used on the POP Information (Student Data)
view (accessed through the POP function button). The POP Information displays all Origination records accepted by the Pell Grant program, including those from all other schools that reported the student. For each student and each campus attended, the display gives the Scheduled Award, Total Accepted Disbursement Amount, Eligibility Used, as well as the Total Eligibility Used at all campuses attended. The data available in the POP Information view is NOT limited to just those students with reported payments in excess of 100% eligibility used but lists all students with accepted Origination records.

As announced in Dear Partner Letter P-00-02, we implement, for the first time, Postdeadline functions that allow you to enter Origination, Disbursement and Special Disbursement records directly through the website for 1999-2000. We expect most schools will continue to submit postdeadline adjustments through their usual batch process (EDE or tape), however, the Postdeadline functions now give you a new flexibility which will be especially useful if you only need to make a few adjustments at a time. Effective with this release, all schools may submit 1999-2000 award decreases (Disbursement or Special Disbursement records with a negative indicator) through the web.

Initially, to enter or change 1999-2000 Origination records, or to increase Awards(Disbursement or Special Disbursement records with a positive indicator), only schools to which we have granted administrative relief or received approval through audit will be able to use the Postdeadline function. In early November, however, we will announce another Web release, which will permit entry, directly through the website, of 1999-2000 increases for awards previously blocked (disallowed by Potential Overaward edits). Please watch for this coming attraction. Until then you will be limited to the batch process (using EDE or tape) for these functions.

(Note: You will receive your processed results back in the usual Acknowledgment message classes via TIVWAN, or in a Year-to-date file, not via the Web.)

The Federal Pell Grant program staff is excited about these new website features. We would be delighted to receive your comments regarding future improvements we might make. If you have any suggestions, comments or questions, please contact Pell Grant Customer service at 1.800.4PGRANT (1.800.474.7268) or by e-mail at pell_systems@ed.gov. You may also use the Contact Us feature on the website itself.