2022-2023 TRIO ESS Assessment
Unit Name: Educational Supportive Services
Unit Director: Eric C. Thompson
Unit Mission/Purpose: Educational Supportive Services (ESS) is a federally funded TRIO Student Supportive Services (SSS) program that provides a comprehensive support community for students who are first generation, income-limited, and/or have a documented disability, while pursuing their undergraduate degree.
Program Overview
Educational Supportive Service (ESS) TRIO Student Supportive Services objectives for grant years 2020-2025 is the following: to serve 300 eligible students each school year; at least 66.67% of students served should be low-income and first-generation, students with disabilities, or students with disabilities who are low-income; at least 33.33% of students with disabilities are low-income; 86% of all students served by ESS will persist from one academic year to the beginning of the next academic year or graduate during the academic year (persistence rate); 84% students served by ESS will meet the performance level required to stay in good academic standing at the grantee institution(academic standing): and 60% of new students served each year will graduate within six (6) years (graduation rate).
Outcomes Selected for Assessment
Outcome 1: To study the impact of Grant Aid received by ESS students over the past five years.
What is TRIO SSS Grant Aid?
U.S. Department of Education (DOE) provides statute written by the Congressional House for SSS Grant Aid on the TRIO website:
“Section 317 (a) Section 402D of the Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1070a-14) is amended— USE FOR STUDENT AID. – A recipient of a grant that undertakes any of the permissible services identified may, in addition, use such funds to provide grant aid to students. A grant provided under this paragraph shall not exceed the maximum appropriated Pell Grant or, be less than the minimum appropriated Pell Grant, for the current academic year. In making grants to students under this subsection, an institution shall ensure that adequate consultation takes place between the student support service program office and the institution’s financial aid office.
“(2) ELIGIBLE STUDENTS. —For purposes of receiving grant aid under this subsection, eligible students shall be current participants in the student support services program offered by the institution and be—
“(A) students who are in their first 2 years of postsecondary education and who are receiving Federal Pell Grants under subpart I; or
“(B) students who have completed their first 2 years of postsecondary education and who are receiving Federal Pell Grants under subpart I if the institution demonstrates to the satisfaction of the Secretary that—
“(i) these students are at high risk of dropping out; and
“(ii) it will first meet the needs of all its eligible first- and second-year students for services under this paragraph.
“(3) DETERMINATION OF NEED. —a grant provided to a student under paragraph (1) shall not be considered in determining that student’s need for grant or work assistance under this title, except that in no case shall the total amount of student financial assistance awarded to a student under this title exceed that student’s costs of attendance, as defined in section 472.”
That is, a student must be a current ESS participant and currently receiving a Pell Grant. The ESS student should be in their 1st or 2nd year of postsecondary education. Any students beyond their 2nd year of postsecondary education can receive a Grant Aid award but only if they are at high risk of dropping out and the program has met the needs of all its eligible first- and second-year students.
If a student receives a Grant Aid award, the award should be more than the minimum appropriated Pell Grant, which it has been averaging around $620 over the past five years. There is a maximum award amount that shall not exceed the maximum appropriated Pell Grant amount, which it has been averaging around $6,500 over the past five years. The average ESS Grant Aid award for the past five years was $1,507.06, and the range amount of the award was $606 to $5,800. In addition, the total amount of all financial aid a student receives cannot exceed the student’s costs of attendance. For in-state students, the cost of attendance averaged $36,000 over the past five years. Out-of-state students’ cost of attendance averaged $45,000 over the past five years.
All potential ESS Grant Aid awards are reviewed through K-State Student Financial Aid office to assure awards are properly awarded according to the policies provided by DOE and K-State.
Outcome 1 Assessment Methods: To study the impact of Grant Aid received by ESS students over the past five years.
This a quantitative study. The data is a combination of reports downloaded through Blumen, KSIS and the K-State Office of Institutional Research. The data that was request included the following variables: ESS students, WID, School Year of the Award, Race/Ethnicity, Adjusted Gross Income (AGI), Dependent or Independent Status, Household Size, Expected Family Contribution (EFC), Unmet Needs, Gender-male or female, In-State or Out-of-State Residency, Eligibility, 1st year Enrolled in ESS, Expected Graduation Year, Credit Hours Earned, Coach Name, Amount Awarded, Amount Owed, Graduation Date, Participant Status, and Cumulative GPA. Excel was used to run the analysis on the data.
Some Definitions:
Eligibility – First Generation and Low-income student (FG, LI), Low-income only student (LI), First Generation only student (FG), Student with a disability (DS), and Student with a disability and low-income (DS, LI).
Cost of Attendance (COA) - is the amount it will cost a student to go to school.
- tuition and fees;
- the cost of room and board (or living expenses for students who do not contract with the school for room and board);
- the cost of books, supplies, transportation, loan fees, and miscellaneous expenses (including a reasonable amount for the documented cost of a personal computer);
- an allowance for childcare or other dependent care;
- costs related to a disability; and/or
- reasonable costs for eligible study-abroad programs.
Expected Family Contribution (EFC) - is an index number that college financial aid staff use to determine how much financial aid you would receive if you were to attend their school. The EFC is calculated by using the student’s family's taxed and untaxed income, assets, and benefits (such as unemployment or Social Security), family size and the number of family members who will attend college or career school during the year.
Unmet Need - is defined as a student's cost of attendance minus his or her expected family contribution (EFC) and all financial aid, such as grants, scholarships, work-study, and loans. This is the amount that students and/or their families must cover out-of-pocket.
Amount Awarded – the total amount of Grant Aid awarded to an ESS student.
Owed - is the amount of money the student currently owes to K-State. This is an outstanding debt to K-State that can affect students in different ways. For example, a student cannot enroll in classes until a certain amount has been paid off or some other type of arrangement has been worked out.
Outcome 1 Assessment Results:
111 Grant Aid awards were distributed between 2017 - 2022. 17 students received Grant Aid awards twice during this time period. Therefore, there were 94 different students that received the award over the past five years.
Table 1 shows the number of Grant Aid awarded to ESS students by school year. The last two years, ESS awarded a smaller number of Grant Aid awards than the three previous years. The reason for the change is that the unit had a change of procedure. ESS procedure between to 2017 to 2020 was to give out Grant Aid awards with less money in order to give out more awards to ESS students. After 2019-2020 school year, it was decided that students with greater financial needs should receive more money than to distribute the awards equally among students that are eligible for Grant Aid.
Table 1: Number of Grant Aid Awards to Students by School Year
|
School Year |
No. of Students |
|
2017-2018 |
25 |
|
2018-2019 |
27 |
|
2019-2020 |
25 |
|
2020-2021 |
18 |
|
2021-2022 |
16 |
|
111 |
Table 2 shows the number of Grant Aid awarded by gender each school year. Female students are more likely to receive Grant Aid awards than male students, respectively 66% v. 34%. The gender average for awarding Grant Aid for females is slightly above the overall average for female participants in ESS, which is 60%.
Table 2: Number of Grant Aid Awards by Gender each School Year
|
School Year |
Female |
Male |
|
2017-2018 |
18 |
7 |
|
2018-2019 |
18 |
9 |
|
2019-2020 |
15 |
10 |
|
2020-2021 |
12 |
6 |
|
2021-2022 |
10 |
6 |
|
73 |
38 |
Table 3 shows the number of Grant Aid awards by race/ethnicity and by school year. White students are more likely to receive Grant Aid awards than Black, Hispanic, Multiracial, and Asian, respectively 34% v. 26% v. 27% v. 8% v. 5%. Although White students are more likely to receive Grant Aid awards more than the other racial groups individually, Grant Aid awarded to White students is about 20% lower than the overall average of all White participants in ESS. In addition, ESS students of color account for 64% of all of the Grant Aid awarded in the past five years.
Table 3: Number of Grant Aid Awards by Race/Ethnicity and by School Year
|
School Year |
White |
Black |
Hispanic |
Multiracial |
Asian |
|
2017-2018 |
14 |
5 |
3 |
2 |
1 |
|
2018-2019 |
6 |
10 |
7 |
3 |
1 |
|
2019-2020 |
4 |
10 |
9 |
1 |
1 |
|
2020-2021 |
8 |
4 |
4 |
1 |
1 |
|
2021-2022 |
6 |
0 |
7 |
2 |
1 |
|
38 |
29 |
30 |
9 |
5 |
Table 4 shows financial means and household size differences between White, Black, and Hispanic students. This report does not include financial means for multiracial students and Asian students due to the small sample size. The AGI means between the races show only small differences. The EFC means differences are larger than the AGI means, especially between White and Black students. White students’ EFC mean is larger than Black students’ EFC mean by $423.83. AGI and EFC means show that White students are in a better financial situation to meet the COA than Hispanic and Black students. Unmet need means show that White and Black students have similar financial needs that are not yet met. However, Hispanic students almost have a $1000 less of unmet needs than White and Black students. Black students have the largest debt average owe to K-State. Hispanic students have the second largest debt owe to K-State but owes $919.21 less than Black students. White students owe the least debt to K-State and owe $1731.83 less than Black students. Hispanic students are more likely to come from a larger household size.
Table 4: Race/Ethnicity Financial Mean Information and Household Size Differences
|
(n) |
AGI mean |
EFC mean |
Unmet Needs mean |
Owe Mean |
Household Size |
|
White (38) |
$ 31,836.82 |
$ 1,091.82 |
$ 4,935.46 |
$ 249.99 |
3.5 |
|
Black (29) |
$ 27,786.32 |
$ 668.00 |
$ 4,924.48 |
$ 1,981.82 |
3.5 |
|
Hispanic (30) |
$ 29,298.97 |
$ 829.03 |
$ 3,967.25 |
$ 1,062.61 |
4.4 |
Table 5 shows the number of Grant Aid awarded by eligibility and by school year. The majority of the students that are awarded Grant Aid money are students with limited income. Seven students did not qualify as limited income, but they still met the Pell Grant requirement for receiving Grant Aid.
Table 5: Number of Grant Aid Awards by Eligibility and by School Year
|
School Year |
LI,FG |
LI |
FG |
DS |
DS,LI |
|
2017-2018 |
18 |
4 |
1 |
0 |
2 |
|
2018-2019 |
20 |
4 |
0 |
0 |
3 |
|
2019-2020 |
16 |
4 |
3 |
1 |
1 |
|
2020-2021 |
13 |
3 |
0 |
1 |
1 |
|
2021-2022 |
11 |
2 |
1 |
0 |
2 |
|
|
78 |
17 |
5 |
2 |
9 |
Table 6 shows the number of Grant Aid awarded by students’ residency and by school year. The majority of the students that are being awarded Grant Aid money are students with residency in Kansas verse out-of-state students, respectively 86% v. 14%. This distribution between in-state students and out-of-state students receiving Grant Aid has a similar overall distribution for all ESS students participating in the program, respectively 85% v. 15%.
Table 6: Number of Grant Aid Awards by Students’ Residency and by School Year
|
School Year |
In-State |
Out-State |
|
2017-2018 |
23 |
2 |
|
2018-2019 |
21 |
6 |
|
2019-2020 |
22 |
3 |
|
2020-2021 |
13 |
5 |
|
2021-2022 |
16 |
0 |
|
95 |
16 |
Table 7 shows the number of students that currently owe money to K-State by residency. Students with debts owe to K-State are outstanding debts. Some of these debts are as old as 2018. Out-of-state students are usually burdened with a higher COA than in-state students. This report reflects the additional financial burden carried by out-of-state students. That is, 43% of the out-of-state students currently owe money to K-State compared to 29% of in-state students that owe money to K-State, even after students received their Grant Aid awards. This gap of out-of-state students that received Grant Aid awards and owe money to K-State could have been larger but there has been an effort by the unit to limit out-of-state students receiving Grant Aid awards. There is an opinion among the staff that out-of-state students are less likely to continue their education here at K-State due to their higher financial burden. Thus, out-of-state students have an additional barrier to overcome than in-state students. Therefore, out-of-state students are considered for Grant Aid if they can meet a higher academic standard than the standard that is applied to in-state students. All students with large outstanding debt to K-State are scrutinized more than students with low or no debt. Even with the higher standard applied to out-of-state students, out-of-state students that received Grant Aid awards still have a higher average debt than in-state students, respectively $1,806.09 v. $899.57.
Table 7: Number of Students Currently Owe Money by Residency (2017-2022)
|
Residency |
No. of Students Owe Money |
|
Out-State |
6 |
|
In-State |
23 |
Furthermore, there is a significant correlation between students owing money to K-State and students’ GPA. The correlation coefficient of -0.447 indicates this is a negative relation between owing more money to K-State and student’s GPAs. Running a regression model on this relationship also shows a negative coefficient of -0.00012 with a P-value less than 0.001. This regression model confirms that money owed to K-State affect student’s GPA in a negative way. So, not only does outstanding debt makes it difficult for students to enroll but may be one of the factors in reducing students’ GPA. In addition, students with a GPA below 2.5 owed K-State much more money than students with a GPA above or equal to 2.5, respectively averages $3,121.11 v. $448.55.
A correlation path between students awarded Grant Aid awards and their success in the ESS program is still unclear in this report. Student success outcome for this report is defined if students have graduated or are enrolled for Fall 2022. Over the past 5 years, 68% of students that received Grant Aid awards are considered successful. This is same successful rate for all ESS students served in 2021-2022 school year. Statistically, there is a very small positive correlation (R=0.20) that was significant at P<.05 level with a positive coefficient of 0.000107 for students awarded Grant Aid and student success. That is, students that received Grant Aid money had more success with their academic studies, but this success rate is statistically insignificant.
Conclusion to Outcome 1:
The impact of Grant Aid received by ESS students over the past five years has very weak significant correlation, and it should not be seen as pathway for success for ESS students. Even though this report does not show a strong significant correlation, there are some caveats that may have an impact on why the pathway is not as clear as it should be if one is to believe that easing students’ financial burden should help them lead to greater academic success. First, students are not randomly selected for Grant Aid. Students that voice their financial burden to their ESS coach and how it is affecting their chances of staying school are often asked to apply for Grant Aid. Coaches will advocate for these students because they feel Grant Aid will increase their students’ chances to stay in school. Thus, these students are more likely to receive the award. Second, even if ESS students do not voice their financial burden, the Student Services Coordinator will search all ESS students that are eligible for Grant Aid. This search includes students’ unmet needs, outstanding debt to K-State, and their student loan burden. With the knowledge of students’ financial records and their academic statuses, this allows coaches to encourage certain students to apply for grant aid. For these reasons, most students selected for Grant Aid awards are already financially burdened and it is affecting their academics. Grant Aid awards are more about reversing the financial burden process that is already a problem for students. Grant Aid students may have the same success rate (68%) as other ESS students do, but that does not account for the success that Grant Aid money helps reverse students’ financial burden. Or at the very least help keeps the financial burden from increasing to a point that it cannot be manage by the student anymore.
It will take more research to understand if giving Grant Aid awards to students to ease their financial burden is helping them to be successful at K-State.
Future Plans to Outcome 1:
Over the years, staff have refined the procedure to award students with Grant Aid money. Procedure refinement is still ongoing as situations change. For example, starting the 2022-2023 school year, some of the Grant Aid money will be going to ESS students taking EDCEP 111 class, a 1st-year seminar for TRIO students. Grant Aid money will be used to pay for the 3-credit hours tuition cost for this class. These students will be randomly selected for Grant Aid since the ESS instructors cannot select the students themselves because academic advisors will be enrolling students into the course. Academic advisors don’t have access to student financial information so they can only select students for this course based on whether they are 1st Generational students or not.
Limited income definition is sometimes unclear due to how it is supposed to be measure and how it is measured in practice. The Department of Education (DOE) sends out Federal TRIO Programs Current-Year Low-Income Levels at the beginning of each year. DOE determines that the term "low-income individual" means an individual whose family's taxable income for the preceding year did not exceed 150 percent of the poverty level amount. Taxable income is not what FASFA use to determine financial need for students. FASFA uses Adjust Gross Income (AGI). ESS has access to FASFA information, so we have access to students’ AGI but not their taxable income. To figure out if students are low-income, ESS uses the DOE list of taxable income determine by size of the family. ESS adds the appropriate taxable income to the standard deduction if the family is led by the head of the household or add the standard deduction if the family is led by a married couple filing jointly tax returns. Standard deductions can be found on IRS website on Form 1040. For example, if the DOE’s taxable income for a family of 3 is $32,580 and the family is led by a married couple filing jointly than add the standard deduction for married filing jointly, which is $25,100 to get your AGI. In this case the AGI is $57,680. So, the student needs to have reported on their FASFA that their family earned $57,680 or less for a family of 3 headed by a married couple to qualify as a low-income student for ESS. Some of the blurring of low-income comes from the DOE determining if the student is eligible for Pell Grant. The Pell Grant awarding process uses more measures to determine if students are eligible to receive a Pell Grant. Thus, this is the reason why there are students that are not low-income but still receive a Pell Grant and are eligible for Grant Aid.
Why do Black Grant Aid recipients owe more money to K-State than the other races even though all students’ AGIs are similar amounts? This report was unable to find factors that may have contribute to Black students accumulating much more debt than the other races. Some of the factors that may be considered in the future research are: employment at school, living arrangements, and other financial factors.
The policy for out-of-state students receiving Grant Aid needs to be reviewed. There is an opinion among the staff that out-of-state students are less likely to continue their education here at K-State due to the higher financial burden. However, just looking at Grant Aid students there was no correlation between being an out-of-state student and failing to have successful outcomes in their academic studies. This research needs to be expanded to all ESS students and all K-State students to see if the COA is affecting students being successful at K-State.
Why do Hispanic Grant Aid recipients have $1000 less in unmet needs than White and Black students? This report was unable to find factors that may have contribute to Hispanic students having much less unmet need than the other races. Some of the factors that may be considered in the future research are: employment at school, living arrangements, borrowing money (loans) and other financial factors.
Why do ESS Grant Aid students with a GPA lower than 2.5 have a much greater debt owe to K-State than Grant Aid students with a GPA above/equal to 2.5? The most obvious reasons are that students with lower GPAs are not as prepared for college. Students with lower GPAs are more likely to accumulate more debt because they are more likely to:
- retaking a class, which doubles the cost to take that class;
- take development courses that cost money but does not contribute toward graduation;
- take prerequisite courses, which will increase the number of credit hours to graduate thus costing the student more money to graduate.
This report found a correlation between debts and GPAs. When split the GPAs into two levels, the debt amount difference is pretty noticeable but the correlation between debt and GPA disappeared. Further research is needed with more targeted variables to include the reasons why students with lower GPAs are more likely to accumulate debt.