[ctcLinkfinaidsupport] Please read - updated timeline

[Ana Ybarra]

Good afternoon FA community -
FA Support met with App Services team yesterday, and we’ve been meeting with leadership here at the agency to confirm our most recent update to our timeline for delivering Oracle FAFSA Simplification PRP. (See attached email from Paul Francis)
As some of you know, the most recent Oracle update, which was released on Monday, still has significant bugs that we consider to be prohibitive for FAA’s to award; the work arounds (if any) are administratively burdensome and what we call showstoppers. I’ve attached the list of bugs that we are aware of thus far.

In order to meet FA Support standards of maintaining the integrity of our system we are waiting for Oracle to release an update with fixes to several of the bugs listed in the attached document, which were NOT addressed in Monday’s release. We’ve been referring to what we’re waiting on as ‘Jar Update #2’. Oracle refers to the release in My Oracle Support (MOS) as follows:
“Post-Regs 2 PRP4 FAFSA Simplification Update #3 and FM Need Analysis Calculator Jar update #2”.
As of today that release is scheduled “early-Mid April 2024”.

A promising note about Oracles constant moving timeline. Jar Update #1 was listed to be released mid-March, and they followed through with that date by delivering on the 18th. After that release, they updated their Regulatory Release Schedule to reflect Jar Update #2 BEFORE they release COD updates. To us, this signifies Oracle understands the urgency for bug fixes being addressed by moving Jar Update #2 ahead of COD updates.
Silver linings at this point y’all - we’re taking what we can get with this shifting landscape.

What does this mean?
We are going to be testing as soon as the Jar Update #2 is in our test environment, during a couple weeks in April and for the month of May, scheduled to move Production on the weekend of June 8th.
We will hold open webex sessions that 1st and 2nd week of June, similar to our post go Live webex sessions. We’ll forward specific dates and times later this week. Stay tuned.

We’re prioritizing Summer Header colleges for those webex sessions so we can focus on assisting with getting funds out to students as quickly as possible for Summer term start on July 1st..
As you’ll see in the attached announcement from Paul Francis, there are a few items we’re hoping FA offices can do to streamline the file review processes and get funds out the door.
I’ll be reaching out to FAST members to strategize when best to discuss these items, which likely will require a vote or survey - Deann/Joshua - stay tuned 😉

Listen everyone - it’s been quite the year already. Sorry to repeat myself but the sentiment remains true, we are acutely aware that all in the ctcLink FA community are on edge eagerly awaiting for us to get the PRP tested, turned around and put into production as soon as possible. We completely understand how difficult this timeline is for all of you and our most importantly, our students.

We’re going to work our hardest to get this out the door and be at the ready to assist once deployed to production - stay strong FA - stay strong.


Peace be with you,


[Title: SBCTC logo - Description: Compass]Ana Ybarra, MA
Associate Director Campus Solutions - Financial Aid
Washington State Board for Community and Technical Colleges
• o: 360-704-1024

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