Procedure No. 611.1

Adopted: 3/24/2020

In accordance with the Tuition and Fee Transparency Act, the following procedures provide a system of internal controls over the development and management of mandatory student tuition and fees.

The CFO/Finance department collaborates with the respective President’s Cabinet member and departmental Dean/Director to review the assessment of each mandatory student fee. Each mandatory student fee is reviewed to determine the purpose of the fee, what expenses the fee covers, which courses/credits should be assessed the fee and the rate to be assessed. The proposed mandatory student fees and rates are discussed with the President and Cabinet for recommendation to the Board of Trustees.

During the development of the annual Fiscal Year budget, the mandatory student fees and other projected revenue are incorporated into the next Fiscal Year’s operating Revenue Budget and the Tuition Rate and Fee Schedule to be reviewed and approved by the Board of Trustees.

Assessing Mandatory Student Fees

For each mandatory student fee, the Finance department will document the following:

1. Purpose of the student fee
2. Calculation of the projected mandatory fee revenue
   1. For per credit fees, the number of projected credits
   2. For per course fees, the number of projected student courses
   3. For per semester fees, the projected student headcount
   4. Where applicable, documentation will include an audit trail of the course sections/credits assessed the fee
3. Criteria used to determine the rate
4. Responsible Department and VP/Dean
5. Appropriate use of the revenue: Expenses related to the mandatory fee revenue
   1. Budgeted Salary/Wage Costs
   2. Budgeted Benefits Cost
   3. Budgeted Operations Costs
   4. Respective general ledger expense accounts will be documented to clearly identify the expense related to the mandatory fee

Establishing Separate Funds

1. Separate general ledger accounts have been established for each mandatory student fee to clearly report on budgeted to actual revenue for the academic year, also broken down by semester:
   1. General Fees 20-0-00-14110-440X0
   2. Lab Fees 20-0-00-1431X-440X0
   3. Online Course Fees 20-0-00-14320-440X0
   4. Culinary Program Fees 20-0-00-14410-440X0
   5. Nursing Program Fees 20-0-00-14415-440X0
   6. Aviation Program Fees 20-0-00-14430-440X0
   7. Radiology Program Fees 20-0-00-14440-440X0
   8. Registration fees 20-0-00-14520-440X0
   9. Campus Safety fees 20-0-00-14750-440X0
   10. Facilities Fees 75-0-67-75000-440X0
   11. Activity Fees 80-0-00-14800-440X0
2. Also, in the Student ERP system (Colleague ST), each mandatory fee is separately stated and assessed to each student by the use of AR Codes. A separate AR Code has been established for each mandatory student fee. Ad hoc reports can be run on demand to analyze student charges by AR code.

Accounting Procedures

1. 1. The College utilizes Ellucian’s Colleague CF module for its Finance ERP system. Separate general ledger accounts have been established to track expenses and identify transactions related to mandatory student fees as discussed in A4 above. The expenses can be tracked by department and by object code.
      1. The College has established internal controls over the distribution of payroll charges to ensure that salary and benefit expenses are charged to the proper department and object code.
      2. The College has established internal controls over the procurement process to ensure that operating costs are charged to the proper department.
         1. General Ledger account access is limited to the general ledger departments under the user’s respective purview
         2. Approvals authority is limited to the general ledger departments under the approver’s purview; each purchase requires two departmental approvals
   2. The Chief Financial Officer will report to the President’s Cabinet on the actual revenue and expense activity for each mandatory student fee.
      1. The projected revenue will be compared to the actual revenue achieved.
      2. The budgeted expenses will be compared to the actual expenses related to that mandatory fee.
      3. The actual revenue and expenses for each mandatory fee will be compared to determine if the fee assessment was reasonable.
   3. The actual activity will be taken into consideration when developing the assessment of the following academic year’s mandatory student fees.

Description of Fees

1. The College will include all expected uses of the fee revenue in the institution’s description of each mandatory student fee.
2. The Institution’s description of mandatory student fees will be available to students.