ABUSING ACCESS. Our new all-online grade reporting system requires a date of last attendance to be provided for any student who earns a failing grade. A message from headquarters tells us why.

After the Senate meeting on Thursday, we sought direction from Vice Provost Gip Seaver on the new policy of assigning a date of last attendance for students who earn an F or U grade.

Dr. Seaver explained that this new method of determining last date of attendance was adopted as a way to deal with our having been cited more than once by federal auditors for not providing timely information in cases of student "abandonment" of course work. That concept refers to students enrolling to receive financial aid, sometimes at more than one institution, and then "voluntarily withdrawing" (leaving, abandoning) their course work. This is viewed as fraud, as such students are receiving a financial aid award under false pretenses. The university has an obligation to report to the federal government those students who receive federal financial aid, then abandon all of their courses.

Dr. Seaver said: "We are under a time deadline to respond to the Feds and typically have difficulty meeting that deadline, thereby placing us in violation of Federal law. . . . [In new system,] upon receiving all of the grades, we can follow up on those students who received financial aid and appeared to leave the institution having earned no credit. Therefore we can comply with the law and resolve our continuing problem with the external auditors (they did not like our procedure and have been consistent in noting that we are not meeting the specified time deadline)."

Student loan welfare scams, imagine that. Headquarters doesn't see it quite that way.

The date of last attendance is only germane for those students who "abandon" all course work in a term. If multiple faculty provide differing dates, the university will report the one most advantageous to the student. In such cases, students are invited to submit their own independent evidence if they can document their participation in the semester past the date assigned by the faculty member. As long as faculty use their best professional judgment to determine, based on all available information, a date of last participation in the course, the university will defend faculty if any disputes that arise from students contesting the assigned date.

What's a little welfare fraud, if it fosters access?

Highlighting another aspect of the affordability crisis, the study notes that financial aid granted by colleges and universities tends to go to those who can already afford an education. The educational institutions use their financial aid funds largely to attract the most qualified students to improve their rankings, rather than to help those most in need of financial assistance.

Those few institutions that game the rankings are doing so in response to a perceived flight to quality, not because of animus against poor but striving students.