Office of Student Financial Assistance

• There was no central reporting system in place to track the historical CVO hours used by students or to indicate when students reached the 124 credit hour maximum.
• There was no uniform procedure for collecting and tracking residency information for students or veterans.
• There was no process for verifying the relationship between the student and the veteran.
• There was no system to identify students who were in overpayment or default of federal aid.
• Students were potentially eligible for other state and/or federal aid but had not filed a FAFSA.

In order to combat the issues and concerns raised prior to 2001, SSACI has initiated a number of new processing procedures and eligibility guidelines to regulate the CVO program.

1. Students seeking CVO benefits are required to file the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) for each year they wish to receive CVO. (The March 10 FAFSA filing deadline does not apply to student applying for CVO.) This will not only allow students to be considered for other state and/or federal aid, but it will also allow Indiana institutions to determine residency, verify the veteran-student relationship, and identify students who are in default or overpayment of federal aid.
2. The student's FAFSA must be clean. This means that all errors and SSACI edits that could affect a student's eligibility for state or federal aid must be cleared. This does not include SSACI edits dealing with the FAFSA filing deadline, the eligibility time limit for SSACI grants, or the first time undergraduate student.
3. Students must not be in default of a government loan or in overpayment on a government grant.
4. Students must meet the residency requirements of the Indiana institution they are attending. (Non-resident students admitted into the CVO program prior to July 1, 2005 will be grandfathered in if they received CVO in the 2004-05 academic year .)
5. The veteran must have, at some time, been a resident of Indiana for 36 consecutive months.
6. Students must meet Satisfactory Academic Progress standards.
7. Awards will not be made retroactively. Once a semester is complete, CVO award can no longer be made.

NOTE: From 7/1/05 through 6/30/06, the Indiana Department of Veteran's Affairs only considered new applications from dependents of veterans with disabilities greater than zero percent. As of 7/1/06, applications from dependents of veterans with disabilities of zero percent will again be considered.

Exceptions to the requirement for the 2005-2006 academic year (all applications processed from 7/1/05 through 6/30/06) are listed below.

• Students who are dependents of veterans with 0% disability and are currently enrolled using CVO benefits will be grandfathered into the program.
• Any dependent student of a veteran with 0% disability who was previously enrolled using CVO benefits and renews their enrollment will be grandfathered into the program.
• New students of veterans with 0% disability whose applications were approved prior to July 1, 2005 and who will start school by fall 2005 will be grandfathered into the CVO program.
• This requirement does not apply to students of veterans who have received the Purple Heart Medal or who died of a service connected death.