Senior Director of Financial Aid Systems - Randstad USA

job summary:

The Senior Director of Financial Aid Systems (SDFAS) oversees the technology and operations supporting financial aid processes, reporting directly to the AVP for Financial Aid and Scholarships. This role serves as the technical expert for systems such as Ellucian Banner, Cognos, and Technolutions Slate, ensuring compliance and efficient integrations across university functions like admissions, retention, and the registrar. The SDFAS develops financial aid strategies to support enrollment management goals, including managing net revenues and enhancing recruitment and retention. As a key member of the Enrollment Management Group, they ensure data integrity and operational excellence in financial aid processes and analytics. This position requires strong leadership and technical expertise to streamline and optimize financial aid systems and policies.

 
location: Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
job type: Permanent
salary: $150,000 - 175,000 per year
work hours: 8am to 4pm
education: Bachelors
 
responsibilities:

Continuously report to, coordinate and consult with the Director of Financial Aid and Scholarships.

• Configure, maintain, and improve Financial Aid processes.
  
  

• Oversee, review, and test Banner and provide data to outside sources. Functions as the data steward to ensure data integrity, accreditation standards, privacy laws, and best practices for Banner (Admissions), COGNOS (Admissions), and Slate. Conducts Cognos testing during system upgrades.
  
  

• Create, maintain, and review daily integrity and reconciliation reports to ensure compliance and system operation. Performs Cognos query reports for schools across campus in relation to endowed scholarship candidate searches.
  
  

• Serves as the CTS liaison and functional and technical expert for the Enrollment Management Group and assists with current and new technology used within the division and serves on other campus-wide committees such as the ECC, Data Standards, and Shadow Systems to ensure division data are collected and reported correctly.
  
  

• Interprets all financial aid technical findings within the tracking, imports, and processes then makes and implements appropriate resolutions.
  
  

• Engages with information systems to ensure availability of real-time, user-centric data that serves the diverse needs of college constituencies-academic departments, enrollment division, and executive leadership.
  
  

• Complete external financial aid surveys for the client; complete reports for Enrollment Management to show trends and forecasts for enrollment goals. Create annual communication for the current class.
  
  

• Assists in the development of enrollment modeling and projection databases.
  
  

• Provides analytical support by identifying trends within the data and bringing them to the attention of enrollment leadership.
  
  

• Discount Rate statistics
  
  

• Enrollment comparisons to budget and prior year statistics
  
  

• Retention statistics
  
  

• Assists and works closely with the Assistant Vice President of Operations and Services on operations management, data collection, analysis, and strategy formation.
  
  

• Review existing technology systems (primarily Banner and Technolutions Slate) instances to ensure the system supports all offices that utilize the platform. This includes creating training documents and providing training to users based on their role within the system.
  
  

• Develop detailed tasks and project plans by analyzing project scope and milestones for moderately complex projects.
  
  

• Document code and associated processes by adhering to development methodologies, adding code comments and appropriate documentation to various knowledge-based system(s) to simplify code maintenance and t