Common Manual

History of FFELP Made Easier to Use

In response to input from financial aid professionals, a group of volunteers from several guarantors have worked together to improve the Common Manual's highly regarded appendix H, which details the history of the FFELP and its predecessor programs and the Common Manual.

Enhancements
Although the history appendix to the manual has elicited positive comments from the FFELP community, several users have noted that its current structure and length make it difficult to efficiently research student loan policy issues. The nation's guarantors, which work together to publish the Common Manual, have responded by introducing some structural improvements to make the history appendix more accessible and efficient for users:

• Topical subheadings have been added to better organize historical information under each implementation date listed in the appendix.
• All information on topics for a particular implementation date has been consolidated under the new topical subheadings.
• The new topical subheadings have been alphabetized for quicker reference.
• Duplicate entries have been eliminated.

The newly improved history appendix will be included in an upcoming version of the Integrated Common Manual, the monthly PDF file that shows recently approved policy changes in underline and strikeout. The Integrated Common Manual is available for download from TG's website at http://www.tgslc.org/resources/integrated_online_manual.cfm. Watch Shoptalk Online for details on when the version with the improved history appendix will be posted.

More Changes Coming
The Common Manual Restructuring Subcommittee, the group that streamlined the history appendix, has some other structural changes in the works to make information in the manual easier to find. The core chapters of the manual—chapters 5 through 8—are being split into shorter, more tightly focused segments. Details on these changes were provided in Edition 177.

Interested community members have already reviewed the subcommittee's division of Chapter 6, "Guarantee, Disbursement, and Delivery," into two shorter new chapters entitled "Loan Origination" and "Loan Delivery." The positive feedback that the subcommittee received indicates that the new structure of the two completed chapters is intuitive and more closely follows the life-of-the-loan format around which the Common Manual is generally designed.

Three other core chapters are being restructured:

• Chapter 5, "Borrower Eligibility and Loan Certification," becomes two smaller chapters: "Borrower Eligibility" and "School Certification."
• Chapter 7, "Loan Servicing," becomes two smaller chapters: "Loan Servicing" and "Deferment and Forbearance."
• Chapter 8 and Chapter ^CCI 8, "Delinquency, Default, and Claims," will merge and become four smaller chapters: "Forgiveness and Discharge," "Delinquency," "Claim Filing," and "Cures and Penalties."

The new chapter lineup is slated to debut in the July 2003 edition of the Common Manual.

More Information
For more information about the efforts of the Common Manual Restructuring Subcommittee, contact Kelly Kaelin, TG Policy Advisor, at (800) 252-9743, ext. 4783, or send an message to kelly.kaelin@tgslc.org.

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