PowerFAIDS Glossary
A
Academic Year
An academic calendar at your institution that meets the federal requirements of a standard term, nonstandard term, or non-term program. May span multiple award years.
For more information see: Academic Years
Award Year
The school year for which financial aid applies, for federal regulations and reporting. This is a federally standard 12-month period that begins on July 1 of one year and ends on June 30 of the following year.
C
Code Lookup
A type of data entry field with a list of defined values for the user to select from.
Previously known as: user string
For more information see: Custom Data
Cost of Attendance
The estimated amount it will cost a student to attend your institution for a given period, either for the full academic year or for a specific term.
Previously known as: budget
For more information see: Cost of Attendance
Custom Data
An institution-specific student data field used to capture information not captured elsewhere in PowerFAIDS.
For more information see: Custom Data
Custom Process
An institution-specific workflow used to analyze or calculate student data.
Previously known as: algorithm
For more information see: Custom Processes
Custom Process Target
Parameters for storing the results of a numerical custom process in a custom data field.
Previously known as: put into target rule, PIT rule
For more information see: Custom Process Targets
F
Field Alias
The unique identifier for each field in the student record.
A field alias is typically the page or section of the student record followed by a period and then the field name, with all spaces removed. For example, the field alias for the Actual Start Date field for a payment period in the Academic Years & Payment Periods page is PaymentPeriod.ActualStartDate.
Previously known as: mnemonic
For more information see: Field Aliases, Selection Sets
Fund
An overall pool of financial aid from a specific source.
For more information see: Funds
L
Lock
A flag set on a student data value protecting it from any user or system-driven updates.
P
Packaging Formula
Institution-defined parameters used to award aid across a student population.
For more information see: Packaging Formulas
Payment Period
Individual terms within an academic year that can be used to divide and spread out financial aid disbursements.
Previously known as: period of enrollment
For more information see: Payment Periods
Private Loan
An education loan provided by a private bank or financial institution, rather than by the federal government.
The file specifications used to share private loan data between schools, third-party management platforms, lenders, and guarantors is called Commonline.
Also known as: alternative loan
For more information see: Private Loans
R
Requirement
An item needed from a student to award a specific fund, or to package or disburse aid.
Previously known as: document
For more information see: Requirements
S
Sandbox Environment
A copy of your production environment that can be used for testing or training purposes.
You can access your sandbox environment by adding “-sandbox” after your school name in your PowerFAIDS production URL. You can view and update settings related to the sandbox environment within your school profile.
Selection Set
A population of students defined by specific criteria.
For more information see: Selection Sets
Shield
A flag set on a student data entity (such as an award) protecting it from any system-driven updates. A shield protects the entire entity from updates; individual fields can also be locked to protect a single data value from being updated.
T
Timeline
A log of all changes to a student record, including details of what was updated, added, or removed, and by which user.
For more information see: Timeline