Do the words “compliance” and “licensure” have you rethinking this session in favor of the pool? Hear how we engaged in a collaborative university-wide effort to obtain and organize our licensure program information and provide required disclosures to students. Learn from our successes, and challenges, and take away helpful compliance strategies!
Recent Department of Education regulations require institutions receiving federal financial aid to disclose to students whether an educational program leading to a professional credential will satisfy educational requirements and qualify them to work in the state where they are located. NC-SARA member rules contain similar requirements.
Before the federal regulations, a decentralized system managed by academic units provided licensure information to students. These new federal disclosure requirements necessitated moving to a centralized system that contains data listing all licensure programs and licensure status for each U.S. state.
This case study reviews the process we developed to comply with the regulations, which included program identification, communications with academic leadership about the programs, and sustainability planning. Critical to the success of this project was the ability to create the dashboard and data collection system to allow students to find the program licensure status for any state. Next, a Salesforce CRM coding mechanism identifies applied and enrolled students for these programs. Finally, automated communication streams direct students to the licensure information they need.
This collaborative effort engaged colleagues across the university, including the Office of Online Education (analytics, IT, compliance, and student services), the University Director of Financial Aid, and academic leaders and faculty. This case study will describe the processes we created and demonstrate how the information is presented to students.
Learning Outcomes:
Participants in this session will be able to:
- Describe the compliance problem, including regulations and requirements from NC-SARA and the federal government.
- Identify the various stakeholders needed to solve the problem.
- Create a plan of action that will educate academic leadership on compliance requirements, gather appropriate licensure information, and communicate information to students clearly and effectively.
- Use our discussion of successes and failures to inform their institutional compliance efforts.
Engagement:
We plan to use online and/or in-person polling, Q&A with participants, and engage participants in a discussion of compliance efforts at their institutions.
Presentation Outline:
- Overview of Regulations
- NC-SARA
- Federal
- Description of Problem (no central repository or even list of programs leading to licensure).
- Overview of various stakeholders involved.
- Solution Design:
- Data Collection/Organization Component (templates, spreadsheet storage, very manual)
- Data Presentation Component (Tableau, website)
- Student Communications Component (applicants, current students, location change issue)
- Continuing Challenges (getting complete data, keeping up-to-date).
- Successes.