Postsecondary education: student financial aid verification.

Existing law establishes a system of postsecondary education in this state, including the University of California, the California State University, the California Community Colleges, independent institutions of higher education, and private postsecondary educational institutions as the segments of that system. Existing law establishes the Student Aid Commission as the state agency that generally administers student financial aid programs. These programs include, among others, the Cal Grant Program. This bill would prohibit the Student Aid Commission or an institution of higher education from performing a verification to establish eligibility for state financial aid on a student more than once, unless there is a break in attendance of more than one year by the student or the student transfers institutions, in which circumstance an additional verification would be authorized. This bill would, however, authorize the Student Aid Commission through an institution, or an institution internally, to verify student enrollment and grade point average for the purpose of verifying student eligibility under existing state financial aid eligibility requirements.