Case Study

Challenge: Legislative changes impacting Title IV participants’ training and information needs challenged the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Federal Student Aid (FSA) with overhauling training for both participants and staff. FSA needed to review all existing training content housed within FSA’s learning management system and redesign the partner training curriculum. FSA had limited time and budget to effectively redevelop and deliver the congressionally mandated training program and ensure quality, accessibility, and durability of learning content for future years.

Solution: The Summit team fully integrated across multiple partner training workstreams to provide training program management support for the redesign, development, and delivery of training, outreach, and technical assistance impacting all Title IV participants as well as internal and other operational staff. Employing a train-the-trainer model to better meet workforce learning needs and improve organizational outcomes, the team helped shift FSA’s current learning and development delivery methods through a series of virtual and in-person presentations, tailored employee workshops, job aids, and coaching to promote reskilling and upskilling while reducing resistance to change. Using Articulate Rise 360, Camtasia, and Adobe Creative Suite, the team provided a range of visual and multimedia design, content curation, and advisory support through all phases of the training development life cycle, including assessing learning support needs, developing learning exercises and assessments, providing content, and course evaluation analysis to better incorporate user feedback into the design process and documentation in alignment with organizational goals.

Result: The team leveraged a broad range of strategic planning and design expertise across several areas, including visual design and universal course design, data analysis, and visualization. By providing the coaching and staff support to successfully shift toward a learner-centered training model, the team further enhanced the impact of in-person train-the-trainer workshops and virtual instructor-led workshops for internal staff. Through the team’s support in editing instructional content, graphics production, audio and video production, and quality testing, FSA was able to reduce development time and increase the capacity to deliver high-quality partner training for financial aid professionals at over 5,600 postsecondary schools nationwide.

This project has been funded at least in part with federal funds from the U.S. Department of Education under contract number 91003121F0339. The content of this publication does not necessarily reflect the views or policies of the U.S. Department of Education, nor does mention of trade names, commercial products, or organizations imply endorsement by the U.S. government.