Terms and Conditions in the In-System Offer

Lindley Davis

Trying to get a feel for how other schools incorporate Terms and Conditions into their Offer Emails or In-System Offers. Blackbaud is extremely limited when it comes to what fields can auto-populate and we're reviewing T&C from a legal perspective right now. Our concern is that communications are set by opportunity and we need to be able to customize on a more nuanced level.

Do any other schools tell students:

• How many semesters a scholarship can be renewed
• Required enrollment or GPA to maintain said scholarship
• The amount per semester (Vs total award amount)

Do you use Award Management to communicate T&C or do you run a mail merge type of communication separately to share this information?

Open to all thoughts and feedback here!

Thank you

Christina Mohler

@Lindley Davis We typically include as much of this information as possible in the opportunity description. Our descriptions include what the scholarship covers (tuition, fees, books, stipends, etc.), whether or not it can be received for multiple terms, a range of the award amount, scholarship criteria, etc. Required enrollment, for example, is often part of the criteria to receive a scholarship, so it's helpful for students to have that information before/as they apply. Of course, the amount the students receive may vary depending on an student's exact enrollment, but the in-system offer email allows you to customize it with the amount that has been encumbered for the student who is receiving the offer.

Mallorie Fonseca

Hi, @Lindley Davis

At our school, we have a checkbox in our General Application that indicates they understand that all awards will go towards their student account balance first to pay any remaining amount (and then possibly result in a refund) and are subject to any Financial Aid regulations and to see their student account for more information or contact our FinAid office. But outside of that, our apply-to search pages indicate the general terms and conditions and then any additional unique information is part of the Opportunity description. We usually include things like when it is announced and disbursed, how much to expect or ‘varies’ for the award amount, whether it is renewable and if there are criteria to be met, etc.. For renewing awards, we also enter in the description that this Opportunity is for renewing awards and that students must maintain XYZ criteria and/or answer questions to keep the award. It is a lot of work starting out but it's definitely helped our students better understand.

Lindley Davis

@Mallorie Fonseca

Thank you!

We currently do something similar, but I think we may be able to improve our descriptions.

How does your university handle cases where students are offered the same scholarship, but with different terms? (For example, one student receives Opportunity A in their sophomore year with renewal until their senior year (4 semesters renewal) and another student also received Opportunity A, but in their junior year and needs a T&C with 2 semesters renewal. )

This is the part that Legal wants us to tighten up on and unfortunately, Blackbaud's in-system offer can't be customized by student.

Arly Douglass

@Lindley Davis We have similar situations as you described in Opportunity A. In our in-system offer letter, we keep it general so that it is applicable to all students who receive the award. This is an example of the type of language we use: “You have been selected to receive the {{ portfolio.name }}, which is a recurring scholarship, to be paid out over multiple semesters. Scholarship recipients are required to maintain satisfactory progress with no professionalism issues.” Some of our scholarships do not pay out for all remaining semesters students are in the program, which is why we don’t get too specific about the # of semesters. In saying that, our school does not strictly enforce us to lay out the Terms and Conditions as it sounds like yours does.

Lindley Davis

It sounds like our goal is fairly unique. We need terms and conditions customized to each individual student rather than the opportunity. Because we can only change phrasing on an opportunity level, we're having problems meeting requirements established by General Counsel.

Perhaps, given many of the legal challenges several universities are facing in court cases regarding scholarships, Blackbaud will consider more options for tailored offer letters in the future.