Youve just joined the financial aid office at your school. The director gives you the following form

Question:

You’ve just joined the financial aid office at your school. The director gives you the following form and asks you to redesign it. The director says: We need this form to see whether parents have other students in college besides the one requesting aid. Parents are supposed to list all family members that the parents support—themselves, the person here, any other kids in college, and any younger dependent kids. Half of these forms are filled out incorrectly. Most people just list the student going here; they leave out everyone else. If something is missing, the computer sends out a letter and a second copy of this form. The whole process starts over. Sometimes we send this form back two or three times before it’s right. In the meantime, students’ financial aid is delayed—maybe for months. Sometimes things are so late that they can’t register for classes, or they have to pay tuition themselves and get reimbursed later.

If so many people are filling out the form wrong, the form itself must be the problem. See what you can do with it. But keep it to a page. As your instructor directs,

a. Analyze the current form and identify its problems.

b. Revise the form. Add necessary information; reorder information; change the chart to make it easier to fill out.

c. Write a memo to the director of financial aid pointing out the changes you made and why you made them.

Hints:

â– Where are people supposed to send the form? What is the phone number of the financial aid office? Should they need to call the office if the form is clear?

â– Does the definition of half-time apply to all students or just those taking courses beyond high school?

â– Should capital or lowercase letters be used?

â– Are the lines big enough to write in?

â– What headings or subdivisions within the form would remind people to list all family members whom they support?

â– How can you encourage people to return the formpromptly?