From Requests to Payments: Ramping up for the Financial Support Payments Tool (FSPT)

You may recall the July 2023 newsletter article F-S-P-T Find Out What It Means To Me, which explained the initial project information. The Financial Support Request Tool (FSRT) will be replaced by the Financial Support Payments Tool (FSPT) as part of the project. Below are important updates about the FSPT project we have to share.

Three Phases and Go-Live

Go-live for phase 1 and phase 2 of the FSPT project are scheduled for Spring 2024 in preparation for Summer 2024 entries. Please note that these go-live dates are subject to change pending system and stakeholder readiness. Tiffany Swiderski, the Director of Graduate Student Financial Support for Graduate Education and Postdoctoral Affairs (GEPA) shares, “The implementation team has targeted the MVP go-live to be available in time for Summer 2024 fee payments, so that a clean transition from the legacy FSRT application can be made between academic/fiscal years.”

To meet the target go-live timeline ahead of the 2024-2025 academic year, the tool will launch with the minimum viable product (MVP). The implementation team has put critical and intentional thought into what the MVP is, taking into consideration the most urgent policy priorities, realistic technical limitations of integrated systems and the pain points most often expressed by our campus partners across the graduate financial support community. 

Development Progress

The design team is hard at work developing the new application. Backfill has been hired to assist with the application development. The implementation team meets twice a week to clarify and discuss information to help with FSPT development. 

Carlo Del Frate, the Assistant Director of Academic Affairs IT Services for Information Technology Services, shares, “We have completed all the initial work to manage security and authentication. We have also made considerable progress with developing the automated fee remission process and we hope to be able to start testing that aspect of the functionality sometime towards the end of January.” 

Project Committees and Groups

Over the past few months, the implementation team has been identifying members for the project’s steering and advisory committees as well as the user acceptance testing (UAT) group. You can view the steering and advisory committee members on the FSPT webpage. All of these roles are critical to the success of the project and ensuring that both high-level and end-user perspectives are included and represented.

How to be Engaged

The launch of the new FSPT application will primarily impact people who work in academic departments that are responsible for managing financial support for graduate students, including staff in both student affairs and financial roles. The following are ways that you can stay engaged: 

• Microsoft Team FSPT: Join the Microsoft Team, Graduate Student Financial Support, where there is a dedicated FSPT channel. This channel will be a space to ask GEPA Financial Services Units (FSU) questions as well as seek support and receive guidance from fellow colleagues. It will be especially helpful when the FSPT application goes live. 

• Enhancement Request Form: If you have an enhancement request or suggestion for FSPT, we encourage you to complete the FSPT Enhancement Request Form. Tiffany Swiderski shares that, “Directing requests and suggestions to the form streamlines the collection and review of your inquiries, and allows the implementation team members shared visibility into the trends of recommendations from users. We’re thankful to all of you for both your input and your cooperation in making the feedback and review processes as efficient as possible for the implementation team.” While all ideas will be reviewed and taken into consideration, please keep in mind that there are limits to what enhancements are currently actionable, and we may not be able to address or respond to every idea.  

More information on the FSPT project will be provided as the project progresses. You can view the FSPT project webpage at any time to get the latest updates.