The University of Colorado’s campus Financial Aid officers help students and their families navigate the financial aid process year-round. One obstacle in their way: Officers faced an hours-long process when retrieving files from the federal government for processing.

The CU-SIS Financial Aid team in University Information Services released a new automation to eliminate those tedious hours and the manual errors that could accompany them.

The new TDClient Automations were developed over several years. The most recent iteration changes how the system intakes federal tax information to ensure security around that data.

Rick Rowcotsky, UIS lead solutions manager, collaborated with Rakesh Vangapati, UIS Peoplesoft developer, Brad Baker, UIS assistant director of Student System Development and Mayank Mittal, UIS Enterprise Applications Administration Manager.

Rowcotsky had a distinct advantage when addressing the challenges facing campus financial aid teams.

“I worked in the Financial Aid Office at UCCS for 17 years,” Rowcotsky said. “I had particular insight into what this process should look like and how much time it would save our campuses.”

What once required hours navigating through multiple systems now takes a simple click. All federal files can be downloaded and processed within the application Campus Solutions, significantly reducing workload and mitigating the risk of errors.

Rowcotsky estimates the new automation saves roughly 1,500 hours per year across all CU campuses. This flexible UIS solution will adapt to the inevitable changes within Financial Aid.

“This is one of my favorite projects I’ve ever worked on at CU System Administration — mainly because I know how much time it saves our campuses daily,” Rowcotsky said.

With fewer administrative hurdles, Financial Aid officers can focus on their true mission: assisting students in pursuing their educational goals.