XI. Tuition and Scholarships

Please clarify what is meant by: “A component of all applications must be direct training costs that allow participants, without tuition payments, to be enrolled in the training program.”

ETA’s intent with this condition is that grantees do not “double dip” by charging tuition AND direct training costs from the grant for the same enrollee. It is ETA’s expectation that the grant will cover the direct training costs for a substantive number of targeted students and that those students would not be charged tuition. Grantees must identify and track the number of individuals trained using grant dollars as well as the number of individuals trained using leveraged resources.

The SGA requires that each project include a component of direct training. Traditionally, institutions of higher education charge a per-credit hour tuition to cover these costs. ETA intends that students participating in the direct training component of the project not be required to pay costs already covered by the grant. Applicants may recoup the costs of the direct training component in two ways: (1) charging the grant the normal tuition rate for the course or (2) charging the actual direct and indirect costs of the course. If the applicants choose to recoup the costs through tuition charged to the grant, they may also charge the grant for the non-tuition costs of attending the course such as lab fees or books.

For the targeted number of students to be trained with leveraged resources, direct training may be leveraged with Department of Education PELL grants, WIA training funds, and other cash sources. Also, these leveraged resources may also cover the non-tuition costs of attending the course such as lab fees or books.

In addition, the capacity building component of the grant may enable students beyond those targeted for training under the grant to access training at the college. The college may charge those students tuition. In these instances, applicants should estimate the impact of this capacity building activity by projecting the numbers of students that will be trained in addition to those targeted for training under the grant and/or leveraged resources.

For reference, direct training costs are the costs associated with the actual provision of a training course as opposed to the capacity building costs associated with the development of training capabilities or curriculums. Direct training costs may include (please note that this is not an exhaustive list):

• Faculty costs, including salaries and fringe benefits
• In-house training staff
• Support staff costs such as lab or teaching assistants
• Classroom space, including laboratories, mock-ups or other facilities used for training purposes
• Books, materials, and supplies used in the training course, including specialized equipment used in the training course

Direct training costs do NOT include costs that support the college in general, but not the training program, such as fees to support student activities, the library, gym or recreation center, etc, which may be covered through some other mechanism, such as student fees. Indirect training costs may include the applicable share of the Institution’s indirect costs (overhead) and library or other student activity fees associated with the operation the Institution. Both direct and indirect training costs must be allowable costs under the applicable OMB circular. All direct and indirect training costs should be linked to a specific course or curriculum as specified in the proposal or the statement of work.

Can scholarships be funded as part of the training costs? Is there a limit on the amount of money that can be budgeted for scholarships?

A required component of each grant is the provision of direct training. Should the applicant choose to recoup the cost of the direct training component using the tuition method, the use of a scholarship as a means of making that payment would be allowable.

There is no stated limit on the use of scholarships as a means of paying for training. Applicants should describe the type of training program in the proposal and the extent that the proposed program provides scholarships for the training costs of individuals.