Operational Information – Reporting Calendar Year 2023 Federal Work-Study Earnings to the COD System Using the Campus-Based XML Schema Version 1.0b (2024)

As noted in a March 14, 2024 Electronic Announcement, we will implement Common Origination and Disbursem*nt (COD) System functionality and the Campus-Based XML schema version 1.0b. Implementation is planned for June 30, 2024. In this Electronic Announcement, we provide operational information to assist schools in the reporting of student-level earnings information for the Federal Work-Study (FWS) Program.

Information about other changes to be implemented with the COD System update on June 30, 2024, is provided in a separate Electronic Announcement.

Under the FAFSA Simplification Act, we will continue to use school-reported data for the FWS Program to accurately calculate the Student Aid Index (SAI) for aid recipients. We will begin collecting this data for the 2023 calendar year after July 1, 2024, to be used in the 2025–26 Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA^®) processing cycle.

In the following sections, we provide information about reporting FWS earnings to the COD System.

Schools must report, for each student, the total (both institutional and federal share, as applicable) gross amount of all FWS earnings for any portion of the applicable calendar year. Amounts reported in COD must be rounded to the nearest whole dollar. For the 2025–26 FAFSA processing cycle, schools will be reporting FWS earnings disbursed at their institution from Jan. 1, 2023, through Dec. 31, 2023.

FWS earnings amounts must be reported to the COD System in a manner consistent with the requirements for including such amounts on the W-2 (see General Instructions for Forms W-2 and W-3). Per the “Calendar year basis”, the amount of FWS earnings should include all amounts that were paid during the calendar year, from January 1 through December 31, even if the work was performed outside of the calendar year. In addition, any portion of a student’s FWS earnings that is paid in the form of non-cash contributions (e.g., payments toward tuition, room, or board, etc.), must be included in the total FWS earnings that are reported to the COD System, except when such non-cash payments are made by a federally approved Work College for work performed under the comprehensive work-service-learning program.

Schools must report for any student who received FWS earnings regardless of that student’s enrollment status at the school (i.e., a school will report FWS earnings paid even if the student is no longer enrolled at the school).

Because some students may attend different schools, there will be instances where more than one school is reporting FWS earnings for a particular student. The COD System will allow multiple schools to report for the same student. FSA will use the combined total of the student’s FWS earnings by all schools in the SAI calculation. Note: Schools will be able to view the total FWS earnings for each student (including other reporting schools and the respective amounts) on the COD website.

As explained in the COD Technical Reference, schools will report FWS earnings information via batch submission using the Campus-Based XML Schema version 1.0b or via the COD website. When reporting data, schools will be required to submit the following information:

Additional data elements may be submitted. Full details about required and optional fields, valid values, and other business rules are in Volume 4 of the COD Technical Reference.

Note to EDExpress Users: We plan to post EDExpress for Windows 2024–25, Release 3.0 in July 2024 which will incorporate the Campus-Based schema version 1.0b and allow for reporting FWS earnings using EDExpress.

Note: The Campus-Based XML Schema 1.0b includes an additional reporting block for FSEOG-related data, but this data will not be collected and will be reserved for future use, if needed.

As noted above, schools will report the total FWS for the 2023 calendar year, however, because the calendar year will overlap two different award years, schools will be able to report FWS data using two different methods:

As an example, the table below shows information about Student A who was paid FWS earnings of $300 on each of the listed dates.

In this case, for reporting method 1, the school would report two separate FWS amounts of $900 and $600. Alternatively, for reporting method 2, the school would report one FWS amount of $1500. In either option, the amounts paid in 2022 or 2024 would not be reported.

Important Note: A school cannot change the reporting method it chooses after records have been accepted, without first zeroing out all accepted records and starting over. For example, if a school submits a record for the 2023 calendar year with the amount paid during the 2022–23 award year, and it is accepted, a subsequent record that denotes the 2023 calendar year only (but no award year is provided) will be rejected.

The ability for one campus to report on behalf of its locations and/or other main campuses with which it is affiliated is driven by the reporting and attending relationships established in the COD System. These relationships will be set up in accordance with existing relationships between main campuses and their locations, as well as the FISAP reporting structure currently utilized by schools. If your school has an issue with its reporting and attending relationships as established in the COD System, it may submit a request to change them via the FSA Partner and School Relations Center.

To ensure accurate SAI calculations at start-up, it is strongly recommended that schools plan to complete the submission (and COD System acceptance) of FWS earnings for the 2023 calendar year prior to the release of the 2025–26 FAFSA form which is targeted for Oct. 1, 2024. Timely advance reporting will also help limit unnecessary subsequent Institutional Student Information Record (ISIR) transactions.

In the sections below we provide a high-level summary of the changes made to the COD System as of June 30, 2024, and related to the reporting of FWS earnings.

As a reminder, with the June 2024 system implementation, Campus-Based XML Schema Version 1.0b will be in place. For more information about the changes to the Campus-Based schema, including new or revised tags and new or revised valid values, refer to the March 14, 2024 Campus-Based schema publication.

Many existing COD Reject edits will continue to apply to Campus-Based records. These edits will trigger under similar conditions as they do for COD records. For example, COD Reject Edit 100 (Sender does not have reporting permission for the School identified in the Reporting School Entity ID), will also apply to Campus-Based records.

This summer, two existing edits will be modified to include triggers to also apply to Campus-Based records.

Detailed information about the edits for Campus-Based records are in Volume 4, Section 4 of the COD Technical Reference.

As a reminder, for technical information about the Campus-Based schema, schools and third-party software providers can refer to the Campus-Based XML Schema Version 1.0b and the 2024–25 COD Technical Reference documents posted on the Knowledge Center.

If you have questions, contact the FSA Partner and School Relations Center at 1-800-848-0978. You may also email CODSupport@ed.gov.