Foreign Graduate Medical School Consumer Information Form

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Instructions for completing the Foreign Medical School Consumer Information Form
Reporting Requirements and Definition of U.S. Student: 

    • Reporting. The Foreign Medical School Consumer Information Form, issued by the Secretary and included as Attachment A, should be mailed to the Department by April 30 of each year, starting April 30, 2013, accompanied by a certification on letterhead stationery signed by the President/CEO/Chancellor, in accordance with the certification instructions included in Attachment A.

    • U.S. Student.  The definition of U.S. Student for the purposes of this consumer information collection is in 34 CFR 668.33 
        ◦ (a)(1) “Be a citizen or national of the United States; or” 
        ◦      (2) “Provide evidence from the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service that he or she – (i) Is a permanent resident of the United States; or 
        ◦    (ii) Is in the United States for other than a temporary purpose with the intention of becoming a citizen or permanent resident;…”.  
Information to Report to the U.S. Department of Education
The following is a summary of the information that must be reported by a foreign institution for each of its approved graduate medical programs. 
    • The on-time graduation rate for U.S. students completing the program
    • The median and mean Title IV loan debt incurred by U.S. students who completed the program 
    • The median and mean private loan debt incurred by U.S. students who completed the program
    • The median and mean institutional financing debt incurred by U.S. students who completed the program
    • The combined median and mean debt incurred by U.S. students who completed the program
Foreign graduate medical institutions are required to report to the Department the consumer information listed above. The Department will publish this information on a Departmental consumer Web site.  The data used for the calculations is that for the cohort of U.S. students that earned a degree in the medical program in the prior calendar year. The reporting data due on April 30, 2013 would include information applicable to U.S. students who graduated between January 1, 2012 and December 31, 2012.
Calculation of Data Elements
Below is some information on each of the data elements included on the reporting form.
    1) Loan Definitions
For the purposes of the median and mean Title IV loan debt, all loans provided under the Federal Family Education Loan (FFEL) Program and the William D. Ford Federal Direct Loan (Direct Loan) Program are to be included in the calculation of Title IV loan debt.
For the private educational loan median and mean loan debt, the Truth-in-Lending regulations, at 12 CFR 226.46(b)(5), provide the definition of a private education loan.  Examples of private education loans include, but are not limited to, loans made expressly for educational expenses by financial institutions, credit unions, institutions of higher education or their affiliates, and States and localities.
For the median and mean institutional education loan debt, institutions must include any loan (other than an FFEL or Direct Loan or a loan that would be considered a private education loan), extension of credit, payment plan, or other financing mechanism that results in a debt obligation that a student must pay to an institution after completing the program and that is outstanding at the time that the student completes the program.
For the median and mean combined education loan debt, the combined education loan debt includes all loans provided under the FFEL and Direct Loan Programs, private education loans, as defined above, and institutional education loan debt, as defined above.

    2) On-Time Completion Rate

Normal completion time is defined as the amount of time necessary for a student to complete all requirements for the degree or certificate as provided in the institution’s catalog or other promotional materials. Note that “normal time” is not 150% of the published time.  
To calculate the on-time completion rate, divide the number of U.S. students who completed the program during the most recently completed calendar year within normal time by the total number of U.S. students who completed the program in the most recently completed calendar year and multiply the result by 100. 
Example: During the 2012 calendar year 100 U.S.  students completed the program but only 75 of them completed in normal time. Divide 75 by 100 to get .75. Then multiply .75 times 100 to get 75. Thus for this program, 75% is the “on time completion rate”.
Leaves of absence are to be included when determining whether a student completed a program within normal time. For example, if the normal time to compete a Medical Program is 2 years and a student took 2.5 years to complete because of a 6 month leave of absence, the student would NOT be one that can be included as having completed the Medical Program within normal time when calculating the Medical Program’s completion rate. Thus, students who do not complete the Medical Program in normal time because of a leave of absence (or any other reason) are to be included in the denominator of the completion rate fraction but not in the numerator.
    3) Calculating Median Loan Debt
The median is the middle value in a distribution of values, above and below which lie an equal number of values. To calculate the median loan debt for a program, an institution would follow these steps.

Step 1: Determine which U.S. students completed the Medical Program in the most recently completed calendar year.  
Step 2: Arrange each student’s debt in ascending order, including students with zero debt.
Step 3: Identify the middle value since the median is the middle value in the distribution of all values. If there is an even number of values in the distribution and thus there is no middle value, calculate the mean (average) of the two values at the halfway point.

Example A: The following are the loan debt values for nine (9) U.S. students in the 2012 calendar year listed in ascending order:

1.

$0
2.

$0
3.

$1000
4.

$1750
5.

$2343
6.

$4709
7.

$6881
8.

$6881
9.

$9995

Since this distribution includes an odd number of values, the median loan debt is $2343 because the fifth value is the “middle” number when these debts are ranked in ascending order.

Example B: The following are the loan debt values for twelve (12) U.S. students in the 2012 calendar year listed in ascending order:

1.

$0
2.

$0
3.

$500
4.

$1674
5.

$2126
6.

$3000
7.

$4000
8.

$4000
9.

$6524
10.

$8326
11.

$8591
12.

$10000

Since this distribution includes an even number of values, to determine the median loan debt for these twelve students the institution must calculate the mean of the sixth and seventh values ($3000 + $4000 = $7000; $7000 ÷ 2 = $3500). The median loan debt for this cohort of twelve students is $3500. 
When calculating the median Title IV debt and private educational loan debt for a Medical Program’s reporting information, the total amount that each U.S. student received for attendance in the Medical Program, without regard to how much went to institutional charges, is to be included. 
For example, a U.S. student may have received a loan totaling $10,000 for attendance in a Medical Program where $6,000 went to pay institutional charges and $4,000 was provided to the U.S. student to meet other educational expenses (e.g., books and supplies, living expenses). When calculating the median loan debt for the report, this U.S. student would be considered to have $10,000 in loan debt.
For debt from institutional financing, the amount to be used in the calculation is the amount the U.S. student has outstanding upon leaving the program.

    4) Calculating Mean Loan Debt
The mean is the average value of a distribution of values.  To calculate the mean loan debt for a program, an institution would follow these steps.

Step 1: Determine the number of U.S. students who completed the Medical Program in the most recently completed calendar year.
Step 2: Add the amount of each U.S. student’s Title IV debt, private education loan debt, and institutional loan debt, including students with zero loan debts.  
Step 3: Divide the total amount of each type of debt determined in Step 2 by the number of U.S. students determined in Step 1. 
The outcome from Step 3 is the mean loan debt. 
An institution must include in its reporting its own calculation of median and mean debt - separately showing Title IV debt and other educational debt as well as the combined debt.  

Attachment A
To satisfy the annual consumer information reporting requirement, complete the following information and submit to ­­­­­­­­­the Foreign Schools Participation Division at the following address:

U.S. Department of Education, FSA
Foreign Schools Participation Division
830 First Street NE, Room 73C3
Washington, DC 20202-5402



Foreign Graduate Medical School Consumer Information Reporting Form 



Institution name

OPEID

Name of medical program

Length of medical program

Most recently completed calendar year

Number of U.S. students completing medical program on-time in the most recently completed calendar year

Number of U.S. students completing medical program in the most recently completed calendar year

On-time completion rate for U.S. students completing medical program in the most recently completed calendar year

Median Title IV loan debt incurred by U.S. students who completed the medical program in the most recently completed calendar year

Median private education loan debt incurred by U.S. students who completed the medical program in the most recently completed calendar year

Median institutional education loan debt incurred by U.S. students who completed the medical program in the most recently completed calendar year

Median combined educational loan debt incurred by U.S. students who completed the medical program in the most recently completed calendar year

Mean Title IV loan debt incurred by U.S. students who completed the medical program in the most recently completed calendar year

Mean private education loan debt incurred by U.S. students who completed the medical program in the most recently completed calendar year

Mean institutional education loan debt incurred by U.S. students who completed the medical program in the most recently completed calendar year

Mean combined educational loan debt incurred by U.S. students who completed the medical program in the most recently completed calendar year



Certification of Information Required on Institution’s Letterhead Stationery   
You must also include a signed certification on your institution’s letterhead that includes the following information on the data being provided.  Please have the President/CEO/Chancellor or appropriate designee review, sign, and date this document:
I hereby certify, to the best of my knowledge and belief that all the information provided on on-time completion rates, and mean and median debt for U.S. students is true and correct.  I understand that if my institution provides false or misleading information, the U.S. Department of Education can take an administrative action to end our participation in the U.S. student loan program.  
Signature of President/CEO/Chancellor
_______________________________________________              Date: ______________
Printed Name: _______________________________________________


Paperwork Reduction Act Statement

According to the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995, no persons are required to respond to a collection of information unless such collection displays a currently valid OMB control number.  Public reporting burden for this collection of information is estimated to average 16 hours per response, including the time for reviewing instructions, searching existing data sources, gathering and maintaining the data needed, and completing and reviewing the collection of information.  The obligation to respond to this collection is required by 34 CFR 668.14(b)(7).  Send comments regarding the burden estimate(s) or any other aspect of this collection of information, including suggestions for reducing this burden to the U.S. Department of Education, 400 Maryland Avenue, SW, Washington, DC 20210-4537 or e-mail [email protected] and reference OMB Control Number 1845-XXXX.  Note: Please do not return the completed form to this address.