TRIO provides answers below to questions about the 2008-09 annual performance report format that came to our attention after the Office of Management and Budget approved the APR.

Objectives

1. More and more regions are starting school before Labor Day. If a senior is served by a Talent Search project beginning the day school starts (e.g., August 15, 2009), he or she will not graduate or enroll until 2010 (in the subsequent budget period); thus for the 2008–09 budget period the student cannot be counted in the graduation and postsecondary enrollment objectives. This decreases a project's success rate for these objectives. How can a project avoid this?

Response: Talent Search projects are encouraged to follow the academic year, not the budget year, in determining when and how to count participants. Thus, ED recommends that a student first served in August 2009 as part of the 2009–10 academic year be reported as a new participant in 2009–10.

2. In EOC, may a project count a postsecondary student in the objectives for postsecondary admission and financial aid?

Response: No. This would be inconsistent with the wording of the objectives, and accordingly in the APR postsecondary students (III.A5) are not included in the denominator for objectives for postsecondary admission and financial aid.

3. Where in the APR are data found for calculating prior experience points for reentry students in Talent Search? Which of the new objectives covers reentry students?

Response: In Talent Search, reentry students (i.e., those returning to high school after dropping out) were not covered by the objectives for the 2006 competition (though of course these students count towards the total number of participants served). In developing the objectives, TRIO responded to grantees' desire for greater simplicity; since Talent Search projects serve small numbers of dropouts, and since in the past not all projects set objectives for serving these students, services to dropouts seemed a logical thing to cut from the new objectives. TRIO noted, moreover, a significant disadvantage that some projects experienced in reporting services to dropouts: since most projects that served these students assisted only a small number of dropouts, if only one or two of these students failed to meet the reentry objective, the effect could be large (for example, if the project served five dropouts and one did not reenter, the maximum reentry percentage would drop by 20 percentage points).

Enrollment

4. If a student completes all requirements for registration at an institution of postsecondary education but never attends class, may a project count him or her as enrolled?

Response: According to the wording of the objectives, yes, such a participant would count as an enrolled student in the APR.

5. If a participant enters military service after high school graduation, how should a project count him or her?

Response: While joining the military is a service to the country, it does not constitute postsecondary education (unless, of course, a participant enrolls in a postsecondary military school, e.g., the U.S. Coast Guard Academy).

Target Schools

6. Under what circumstances should EOC projects list target schools in Section II?

Response: Target schools are defined in the Talent Search program regulations as schools designated as foci of project services. The program regulations allow EOC projects to serve participants under the age of 19 under certain circumstances. If an EOC project is serving participants 18 or younger in target schools included in the approved application or approved separately by the program specialist, then the project should list those schools in Section II. Target schools do not include postsecondary institutions.

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