ESI Supporting Statement Part B

ICRAS Tracking and OMB Number: (1969.02) 1845-NEW v1 Revised: 7/16/2013

RIN Number: XXXX-XXXX (if applicable)

SUPPORTING STATEMENT B FOR

PAPERWORK REDUCTION ACT SUBMISSION

Experimental Sites Data Collection Instrument

1. Respondent Universe

As one of the key issues for all of the experiments is how changes in the delivery to Title IV aid affect applicant enrollment decisions we were very concerned about non-response problems with the applicants that decided not to enroll. We therefore decided to rely solely on schools who have volunteered to participate in one or more of the experiments to compile information for us. Nearly all of the information being requested is used by the schools in their ongoing delivery of financial aid. We are asking them to compile this extant information in a manner that will inform the Department about the effects of the experiments.

We will require all participating schools to submit aggregate level information on the effect(s) of the experiment. This data collection effort is applicable to the experiments approved through this initiative. Consequently, they may provide data on one or more of the eight experiments.

The benefit of this reporting tool is obtaining consistent data that will give us a chance to look at the effects of reform and recommend changes in Title IV program administration.

2. Describe the procedure for the collection of information

The reporting tool will be available from the Experimental Sites website and titled “Annual Reporting Tool”. An institution may be participating in one or more of the eight approved areas relative to financial aid processes. Upon completion of the templates, the school will electronically submit them to FSA staff using the security architecture environment.

Upon receipt of the reports, FSA will download, compile and analyze all reports. The data collection and analysis is made possible by the makeup described in the section below. Participants will address the same questions about a particular experiment thus providing uniform data.

The effect of the experiments will be assessed by comparing the outcomes observed during award year(s) after the experiments were implemented to the outcomes observed during the prior award year.

The data will be collected annually from the participating institutions. In addition to the report items and description of how the institution conducted the experiment, there is a supplemental item section and a summary area. Thus, there will be other information that lends itself to subsets of items common to the collection effort.

3. Methods to Maximize Response Rate

Ongoing participation in the Experimental Sites Initiative requires an annual report from each school. Schools were informed of this requirement and provided with a detailed description of the reporting requirements for each experiment before schools agreed to participate.

To maximize compliance with this requirement, the report formats are user friendly. Instructions are included to help the respondent navigate through the worksheets. The cells are formatted so there is no need to enter commas, dollar signs, or percentage signs. The participants have direct access to personnel in FSA for support.

4. Pilot Testing

Department of Education staff test the reporting system annually prior to release to the public. Any problems found during testing will be resolved before public release. The system will contain several edits that check the internal validity of the responses provided by the schools. We will review all responses to check for error patterns that might signal the participants were misinterpreting questions and address with changes to the data collection instrument or training in the future.

5. Contact Information

Warren Farr at Warren.Farr@ed.gov