Dive Brief:

• The U.S. Department of Education issued a “Dear Colleague” letter Friday reminding schools and states that a rule first approved in 2011 as part of financial aid eligibility regulation will be enforced starting July 1.
• The Chronicle of Higher Education reports that the enforcement delay is meant to give states time to set up a system that allows students to file complaints against colleges and create procedures for follow-up.
• The letter does not indicate an immediate threat to most colleges’ financial aid eligibility, as they will only have to prove such state authorization during recertification, when they apply for new programs, and if their student aid programs come under federal review.

Dive Insight:

While few colleges will come under regularly scheduled review soon after the July 1 deadline, the U.S. Department of Education committed in its letter to allow a “reasonable” amount of time for state processes to be finalized if colleges come up for review but have yet to receive state authorization. Even colleges that have been denied authorization by states will not have financial aid dollars cut off on July 1. The federal government will deal with those cases “in the ordinary course of business,” according to the letter.

When the new regulations became part of the Higher Education Act, they were set to be effective starting July 1, 2011, but colleges have received successive one-year stays of enforcement since then.