Cornell Children's Tuition Scholarship (CCTS)

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All right. So I'll get started. Good morning. My name is Michelle LaFave and I am a benefits associate in the, human. And, sorry for the health and welfare department of the Cornell Human Resources Division. This morning, we're going to get some information on the Cornell Children's Tuition Scholarship. And so just it takes about a half an hour.
A little bit of housekeeping. So we do have a Q&A section. I'm going to ask you to place your questions into their Q&A. And as I go through the presentation, I'm sure there'll things that will be answered. But at the end of the presentation, I will be, answering any questions that come in. So I will repeat the question and give the answer for anyone who's, not able to see the question.
Please note as well, this is being recorded and it will be available on our website through air.cornell.edu. So if you are not able to get all the information you need or you know, there's someone who was trying to attend today but wasn't able to, the recording will be available for them to watch. So we're going to go ahead and get started.
What I will do today is provide information on the Cornell Children's Tuition Scholarship, which you will hear me refer to as Ccts. You'll get information on the benefit, what exactly it is, how you and your child would be eligible. If you are eligible for the benefit, how you apply for this benefit and how payments are made. I will also go through a bit of an example of how those payments are calculated, and what would be considered, what wouldn't be considered.
I'll give you information on if there are any tax implications that come with that benefit. And also what happens if you have an employment change here at Cornell. And then I'll go through some facts and frequently asked questions. The questions that you may have or others frequently have and give important reminders. Closeout. And then we will go through the portion where it is, answering the questions that you ask.
Now note again this is recorded. The question and answers are not recorded. So that portion at the end will not be recorded. But I will still ask that if there's any personal questions about your specific situation, that you send us an email rather than putting it into the chat. Better use of time to answer that. But also, keeping your information from being displayed to the public.
So if you do have any specific questions that are not answered in the presentation or that specifically may apply to you, please go ahead and send an email and that information will be at the end of the presentation. So let's get started. The six benefit the Cornell Children's Tuition Scholarship Benefit provides children of employees with partial scholarships for study, whether they're studying at Cornell or at another institution.
Now, this benefit plan was approved, adopted into, the Cornell benefit plans in January of 1966 by the Board of Trustees. And one important factor about this plan is it is a reimbursement program. So the funds for the program are not reimbursed to you or your child. They would be sent directly to the institution where the child is attending, whether that's Cornell or an outside institution.
So that's how the benefit will be paid now for eligibility. So if you are a Cornell employee and you've been here and you're in a benefits eligible position, you would qualify for the benefit based on certain criteria. You would be eligible based on your hire date. And then the benefit payment would depend on whether you've been here consistently or whether there's been a break in service and you've been rehired here at Cornell.
Note that you have to be at Cornell for a minimum of four years in a full time. Benefits eligible position, and that's the equivalent of that. So you'll see that now the part time, employees are now eligible, but you must be here for an equivalent of four years in full time service. You're also able to apply for the benefit, if you've had, prior service at the university.
So if you've left and come back, is that service will be counted as long as it's in a benefits eligible position. So you'd need to contact our office for us to check that for you. Now, note that you may be required to provide us with documentation on that prior service here at Cornell. So you know, pay stubs, whatever you may have.
Make sure you can provide that if we're not able to readily find that information. Now, if you're a newly hired faculty member or new staff member, and you did work at an institution of higher education immediately prior to coming to Cornell, you may also be eligible for the benefit. Now, that institution must have a substantially similar benefit to Cornell, but if you can provide us with the school the information, then we can let you know if you would be eligible to use that time at the prior institution for eligibility towards Ctfs.
One other, saying that the board has allowed as a part of the eligibility for Ctfs is if your child has a medical condition that prevents them, precludes them from completing a standard degree, then they would allow a certificate or a diploma. And of course, we would need documentation on that. So if this is something that does apply to you, please contact our office so we can look at your situation specifically.
Now, for your child, in order for your child to be eligible for the benefit, they must be a natural born child, an adopted child, a stepchild, or the child of a domestic partner. And we ask that the domestic partnership agreement be on file with our office, with the H.R. office, if that is a situation that applies to you.
If you have a foster child, that child may also be eligible for the benefit if they've been living in your house for at least five years prior to applying for this. Benefit. So if this situation also applies to you, feel free to contact our office so we can collect the necessary documentation. For the benefit. Now, how do you apply?
So the application for the KTS benefit is available on our website. And here is the link here. Note this presentation as I said will be recorded. So you can find the link. Or you can visit air.cornell.edu and search for Ctfs. And you'll also find the KTS page. Every academic year we open a new application, where we add the upcoming academic year to our Dropbox.
So that's going to happen on in April, likely on Wednesday, April 1st. So you can look at our website and apply for that. Note that you only need to submit one application per academic year. So the online application that's done only needs to be done one time. What happens then is there's a certification process for if your child's attending in other semesters, that would need to be done every semester of attendance, but the application that's submitted online for the full academic year just needs to be done with one time.
If there are any changes to the application. So let's say your child decides to take a winter course or you didn't apply for the spring, but they are attending in the spring semester. You can just call or email our office and we're able to, we're able to edit the original application you sent. There is no need to submit a new one.
So just reminder, the online application is only submitted once per academic year. Now, if the if Cornell employee is retired or they are deceased, and you are the parent of a child who you believe would be eligible for the benefit, please contact our office and that application would be done by paper. So on our website there is a paper application available.
You would go visit our website, download that and sign the application. There, if you are a retiree of Cornell and you so remain eligible for the benefit, as long as your net ID is eligible, you will be able to apply online. So please visit our website. Try to apply online first. If you're a retiree, just to make sure that can go through.
And if not, the paper application would need to be submitted. Now how are the payments made? If your child is attending Cornell, you would submit the application and our office would make payments directly to the Cornell Financial Aid office. So we will communicate to them, your child is receiving funding for the upcoming academic year, and we'll make sure the funding is shown on their account.
If your child is not attending Cornell, the child would, you would need to fill out a form. And that's the certification form you're going to receive. Once the application is processed and approved, that form will that email will have instructions on how you complete the form and then what needs to be done. So you would follow the instructions.
A certification form is needed and you would need to submit it every semester your child is attending now. Semester trimester, quota system. Whatever the school system is, your child has, note that you would have completed in that way. Our office processes applications at certain times of the year and then the payments at certain times of the year. So the application process opens at the beginning of April.
We process them as they come in, so it usually takes about 3 to 5 weeks depending on how many are in and the schedule of how they're being done. But they are processed in the order they are received and then payments are made in July. We start July 1st to make payments for the fall semester, and then the spring semester.
Payments are made, are processed after Thanksgiving. So this is the form that's considered the certification form that's given, by email. When you're approved, the section in blue, the top section, part one, is completed by you as a parent. Given your information, your address, your email, your child's name, and, and the student ID of the school your child is attending.
The yellow section here is completed by the school, and this is submitted every semester, completed every semester by the school. Because, it will change every semester for a child. So sometimes they may be taking a course that has a fee, sometimes they may be taking a course, or they have another fee for something else. It will not be the same every semester.
So we will need a newly completed form every semester. They attempt. Very important to note, and this form does note it. If your child is staying on campus and there is room and board associated ccts does not cover room and board. So just be aware of that. What we do cover is tuition and fees. Fees would be considered anything that applies mostly to every student.
So if there is a matriculation fee, if there is, a card fee, a graduation fee, any of those such fees that apply to every student would be also covered by KTS. So let's get into what the benefit is, how it's calculated, and what you would get if your child is attending Cornell and you were hired here at Cornell prior to July 1st of 1983, and you've had no break in service here with Cornell, then you would receive 100% of tuition minus what is known as the administrative fee.
So these fees are a part of the tuition. But because of the way the benefit is set up, they are taken out. If you are hired prior to July 1st of 1983. So you would receive 100% of tuition minus that administrative fee of $9,980. If your child is attending Cornell and you were hired after July 1st of 1983, then you would receive 50% of the tuition.
The administrative fees are a part of it and wouldn't be excluded or factored in when the payment is made. So hired after July 1st of 1983 and your child is attending Cornell, you would receive 50% of tuition. If your child is attending an institution outside of Cornell, you would receive 30% of the tuition and applicable fees of that school.
But there is a maximum. So the maximum Cornell can pay is 30% of Cornell's endowed tuition. So if your child is attending a university in Florida University and Las Vegas University in Virginia, we would look at what the tuition is presented on that completed form, and we would take 30% of that tuition and pay it to the school directly.
As noted, but it's up to a maximum of 30%. So this academic year, for example, the maximum that can be paid out is $10,257. Oh, I'm sorry this semester. I'm sorry. It's actually $10,689. So the maximum amount that we can pay to a school is $10,689 per semester, based on what the tuition is. And that's 30% of Cornell's endowed tuition.

But we would calculate specific to the school your child is attending once we receive the completed form. One very frequently asked question. And one important thing to note is if there is other funding coming in for your child for their tuition and it can only be applied to tuition. Then we would have to factor that in when we decide how much is paid on the behalf.

And I will show you an example of that in the next slide. But note that we can also make payments to international schools, and it can also be used for study abroad. So six will provide funding. If your child is at a school outside of the United States and they're attending an accredited university for an associate or bachelor's degree, and same being used for study abroad, if they're studying abroad for a semester or a year for their program.

Now, let's get into a little bit of, the calculations and a little bit of an example. So you may be able to understand, and again, this is recorded. So if you need to take a look back just to understand what may be covered and what's, factored in when we make the calculation, please feel free. You can also feel free to contact our office and we can review your child's tuition, once you know it and give you an answer.

But again, all payments are based on this completed form by the school. So we can provide hypothetical information. But until we have this form, we cannot tell you what their true amount will be. So here's the form. We're using this example with 5000 as the tuition for the school in question here, as well as $1,000 in fees.

So the total tuition and fees, that would be presented on the form from the school is $6,000. Here we see in the right box of the form, there is other funding coming in, and we ask that the only information to sit here is anything that applies to tuition and fees. So if there is a scholarship your child is receiving, if there's funding your child is receiving, that can go to anything.

It can go to room and board, it can go to books. We wouldn't need to know about that. But if it's something like, for instance, a tap, which is, tuition aid payments under the state, then that would need to be listed here. In this example, the child is receiving an A scholarship from the ABC Corporation, and they're receiving tap in the amount of five 500.

So the ABC scholarship is $3,250 and top is $5,500. Other funding coming in would be $3,750, with a tuition of $6,000 is the total. We would take the numbers 6000. We would find, what, 30% of that is. In this case, it's $1,800. So $1,800. And so looking at that, we would be able to make the full payment. The reason for this is the 18,000, the 1800, excuse me, plus the $3,750 in other funding would not exceed $6,000.

So we would be able to pay the full ccts, which is $1,800, in addition to whatever funding is being received. In the second example here, using the same amounts, for the tuition and fees. So a total of $6,000 in tuition and fees. But we've seen here that the, amount of funding received between the ABC scholarship and tap is now $5,000.

The calculation, as we did before, is based on the tuition and fees presented by the school. So it would be $6,000. And the six payment, if we were to pay 30% would be $1,800. Now, considering the fact that the child is receiving $5,000 in other funding, we would not be able to pay 1800 because 5000 plus 1800 would exceed that $6,000.

So the only thing we would be able to pay here is a thousand, which is a difference between that 6000. And then the other incoming funding from the two other sources.

Again, room and board cannot be paid under CC. So this is something you would have to pay if your child is, attending a school and staying on campus. And then, you know, fees like savings fees, travel fees, books are not included as well. So we just want you to be aware of that when you apply and look at what funding would be available.

Now for the tax implications. If your child is an undergraduate student, you would not be taxed on the benefit unless, the child is a domestic partner is child are they are no longer your dependent when you apply for the benefit. One of the questions this asked is if your child is a dependent and if they're not, we're asking you to say no.

But what is considered a dependent for this benefit? So if you or the child's other parent, whether you're together or not, provides at least 50%, so you provide more than 50% of the child's living expenses, then the benefit would not be taxable. If you provide if you're not providing more than 50%, then we would have to tax that benefit and the benefit would be tax through payroll.

So if your child, let's say you, your child and the child's other parent are not together and the child lives with the other parent, and then the Cornell employee is applying for the benefit, as long as you, both of you or one of you provides at least 50% of housing for that child, the child's living expenses, housing, all the other things, then the child would be considered a dependent, even if you do not claim the child on your tax returns.

Now, we do not get involved in the tax return portion of it or who claims a child, but the child would be eligible for the benefit if at least 50% of their living expenses are covered. As noted. If the child is the child of a domestic partner, you will be taxed on the benefit. So please be aware of this.

And again, your domestic partnership agreement should be on file with our office. In order to receive the kids Benefit. Now, we cannot provide, any tax information. So please note, if there is any tax implication, you would need to contact some type of tax consultant, in order to get information on that and the taxation. Now note the graduate benefit is taxable.

But again this is based on your eligibility for your most recent hire. So graduate level benefits are only available for anyone who's been with the university without a break. Since July 1st of 19 prior to July 1st of 1985. So just be aware that there is a graduate benefit, but there is a very limited population of people who may qualify, if they were with the university without a break in service since prior to July 1st of 1985.

If you have some type of employment change with Cornell. So if you are laid off, if you are on a short term leave, if you're in a long term leave us to retire, you can visit our website to see what would happened with your benefit, as long as you remain an employee of Cornell and an active status and you have qualified for the benefit, your eligibility stays.

And it also states the requirement through retirement. Excuse me, but if you term from the university for any reason, then your benefit ends at that point. So just be aware. Please check our website to see if any of the employment changes listed there. Apply to you. And of course, you're welcome to contact our office. If you do not see something specific to your situation.

So I'm going to answer a few questions here. Here's our general usually asked most top usually asked questions here. I'll answer these questions give you information on this. And then we'll wrap up and I'll get to any questions anybody specifically may have. The questions are not going to be recorded. But I will read them out loud for you who are here on the call.

So you can, you know, hear what was asked and get the answer. But maybe your question was already answered through the presentation. So, first question in our Q&A is how soon am I eligible for the benefit? So if you are, in a full time benefits eligible position for at least four years, you are eligible for the benefit, and we are happy to review your employment history to verify that is the case.

Note that, you must be in a benefits eligible position and then it must be a regular position. So if you are the temporary benefits eligible position, that time in that temporary position or any time in a temporary position does not count towards Ccts. So just please be aware of that. And please contact our office if you have any questions.

Note that also the eligibility and the amount paid is based on your most recent hire. So if you were hired, let's say in 1990 here at Cornell, and you left Cornell for ten years and then you came back to Cornell, we would look at when you started your second service period here at Cornell, and any benefit paid would be based on that second period of hire.

So even though you were here back in 1990, if there was a break in service with Cornell, we would consider at the time back to 1990. But note that your benefit will be based on your most recent hire date. So is there an age limit or marital status exception? There is not. So any child, it's your child.

As mentioned before, your natural child, an adopted child or foster child in your home for at least five years would be eligible for the benefit as long as you qualify for the benefit. Note so if the child is not your dependent or child is a domestic partner's child, that benefit would be taxable. So if there's a marital status change, let's say they are married.

Likely they're not your dependent anymore. And the benefit would be taxable to you as a Cornell employee, if you are retired and your child is getting or seeking the Act's benefit. And they are not your dependents that tkts funding amount would be applied to a 1099 and provided to you for tax purposes, to be filed with the next year's taxes.

So be aware of that. Anything awarded to a child of a who is not a dependent, whether it's if it's a retiree or in, active service, you would be taxed on the benefit. I have two or more children. Would both be eligible. Yes. So there is no limit on the number of children you can have. Let's say you have a triplet.

Obviously they would be attending school about the same time or at the same time. You can apply for all three. There's no penalty for having more than one child. So you will make the payment for the 3 to 7 whatever number of children you do have at the time they are attending college. My spouse or domestic partner and I are both Cornell employees.

So this mean that our child would receive the benefit through both of us? Unfortunately, no. So while you both may be eligible for the benefit, as long as you've been here in a benefits eligible position for at least four years, only one parent can apply. So if you have parents who hired who are hired at different times and have different eligibility for the benefit, the parent with the better, better benefit can use this benefit for the child, but not that you wouldn't both be able to get 30% less than an outside school, or a 50% at Cornell.

If you're both employees here at Cornell, you can file in alternate years. So if you file for one parent files, this year, the other parent could file next year. That's not a problem. The child would still, though only have ten semesters of eligibility. So I'll address that in just a moment. But there are ten semesters available. Or the attainment of, bachelor's degree, whichever comes first.

So how, do you determine which institutions are eligible for Ccts. So we're able to make payments to accredited universities, colleges and universities. So as long as the degree is accredited, there's a website you can check or you can feel free to email our office to find out if the school of attendance is an accredited, institution that we accept.

But note the degree must be going towards an associate or a bachelor's degree in order for Ccts to make payment. Okay, continuing our Q&A, what is the benefit for part time study? So you are allowed ten semesters or the attainment of a bachelor's degree for the six benefit. Note that if your child is attending part time, they must take at least six credits in the fall and spring semester in order to qualify for the benefit.

If they're applying in the summer or the winter semesters, they can be part time without a requirement, a minimum requirement of credits, but fall and spring must be at least six credits, of enrollment in order for kts to make a payment. And the way how it's calculated again, ten semesters in which you're allowed to use the benefit.

If your child is attending part time, a portion of a semester would be use. So if they're attending, for at least six credits in the fall, let's say you would use a portion of one of those ten semesters if they attend again part time in the spring. Again, you would use a portion of those ten semesters, but any full time period counts towards a full use of a semester.

So one full use of those ten semesters.

Are there any deadlines for the Ctsa application? So you must be a Cornell absolute, Cornell employee or a retiree, active or retiree in order to qualify. And you need to be, have you completed the service requirement in order to get the benefit? Obviously, but there is no deadline. So a few things to note, though, with this non deadline or not having a deadline, the school that the child attended is the school to which payment would be made.

So you would need to contact that school to make sure that they can take payments for past semesters. Sometimes close schools will close their books after a certain academic year or after a certain period of time, and they wouldn't be able to process a payment for 2 or 3 years ago, maybe even last year. So it is important that if you haven't submitted the applications and the ccts certain certifications while the child is attending in those specific semesters, it's important to check with the school to make sure that the school can accept the funds, and the funds then can be reimbursed to you.

Because we cannot make payment to the student or the parent, the school must receive the payment. The other thing to consider with submitting applications after your child has attended, if your child is no longer your dependent when you submit that application for reimbursement, the payment will be taxed. So if your child has graduated and you've just discovered that you're able to get the benefit and the school will accept the funding once we process, if your child has moved away from home, they're now providing their own living.

Maybe they're even married. We can still make the payment, but the payment would be taxable to you. So it would come out of your paycheck if you're still employed, or it would be reported on a 1099. If you've retired from Cornell going to the same question here, or a similar question, can payments be made retroactively? Yes.
They can be made retroactively, as noted, but the school must be able to accept the funds because they're paid directly to the institution the child attended during the semester, submit it, and it would be taxable. If the child is no longer your dependent. No less. Before, one other question is will we reduce by other scholarships that student receives?
Yes. If the scholarships and funding being received are tuition only awards, we will have to factor those in. And as noted previously in the example, if the funding is more than 30% of what the tuition fees as stated by the school would be, then we have to factor that in and then CT's payment may be less than we could provide if there wasn't funding of another source.
So the last question and that's asked usually is will the Ctsa award reduce the employee's parental contribution amount? The answer to this is possibly so. Our office is not able to provide information on whether that would happen. What we can tell you is we know that some schools may know or when you let them know that you're having this funding come from Cornell as a benefit, some of the stuff that they receive, some other scholarships, income and scholarships or other funding may be reduced.
Will it reduce your parental contribution? That's a factor you need to discuss specific to your situation. With the financial aid office of the school the child is attending. So it is possible. Yes. We have had situations where parents have not taken the cash because it does affect other funding or may in some way, disrupt the parental contribution amount.
But we do ask that you contact the financial aid of the school your child is attending in order to see if that would be a factor.
So that's the information provided. I'm going to just go, over a few important things, and then we'll get to questions. But know that the KTS benefit is a reimbursement program and it's paid directly to the school the child is attending. So this payment cannot be paid to you as the employee, and the payment cannot be made to the child.
Please be aware that, it is a reimbursement program. So if the payment is due, while we do try our best to make payments as quickly as we can prior to when they are due, we cannot guarantee that the school receives and process the payment in time or that we are able to pay it before so late.
Fees. Any finance charges that may be assessed would not be something that you would reimburse you for. So if you have to make the payment to the university prior to receiving the Cornell funding, we ask that you do so to avoid any late fees, and then the funds will be sent to the school and they can reimburse you as a parent, reimburse it to the child, or, apply it to another semester as applicable, applicable if you desire.
So just note the reimbursement element of the program. Your eligibility is based on initial higher date, but note that the benefit amount would be based on your most recent date of hire. So if you have a break in service and you previously qualified, or you're adding that time that you were prior here, the benefit would still factor in based on when you were most recently hired here at Cornell.
So please be aware of that. You're only required to submit one application, and the online application is an online process. You submit it, through workday. When you go in. So you visit our KTS website and you would be, applying there if you're, an active employee or recent retiree, there is a paper form that you would submit if you're not able to access the system, but you only need to do that process once.
What needs to be done each semester is a certification form that's received and filled out by the school. So the school needs to fill out the certification form in order for us to make payments for each semester. Because we make payments based on exactly what the tuition would be in that semester, based on what the student is enrolled in.
If your child is attending Cornell, the payments for the fall and spring, if you've checked both the semesters and your child is attending, those payments would be applied through financial aid, to your child's account before your first invoice. So take a look at your invoice when you get it. If it is not there and you have applied or you have not applied as yet, we can make payment directly to Cornell.
As long as we have the application on file. The payment paid to outside schools is 30% of Cornell's endow tuition for the year. So the maximum we can pay to an outside school based on this year's number is this year's tuition, for example, is $10,689. But that's maximum we can pay what we pay is 30% based on what?
The school fills out the certification form as a child's tuition and fees for that semester. Note that the graduate level benefit, which, like I said, many people are not eligible for. It's very really a small population of folks. But that benefit is only for students attending Cornell. So your eligibility is based on being hired prior to July 1st of 1985, but not that any graduate level benefit would be based on the most recent date of hire.
If you have a break in service with Cornell, so please be aware of that. If you need more information, if you want to see this video again, which will be posted in the next few days, you can visit our website. The information is here. If you can also contact us by email. That's probably the best way to get an email.
I'll email response from us. We ask for at least 2 to 3 days, for a time frame to respond because we do get quite a bit of entries, but the email address is CC, tz at cornell.edu. And then here's my information as well. If you have any questions, you can feel free to contact me. But I would, if you can prefer that you send an email to the KTS, email box so that we can also track questions in frequently asked questions.
There. Thank you all for listening. Hopefully you were able to get the information you needed.
the information provided here, as you can imagine, is a summary. Our website does provide information, but we, want to let you know that we have our plan documents and the regulations based on the IRS, and they prevail. So if there's anything in this summary that you may need to report back to, or check our plan documents, please let us know so we can make sure we are administering it consistently and correctly.