November 5, 2008

How to Comment on Common Manual Policy Proposals

The Common Manual (CM), currently in it’s 14th year of production, is an excellent resource for participants in the Federal Family Education Loan Program (FFELP). The CM Policy Committee and Governing Board encourage comments from school and lender partners, because your experience can lend an invaluable perspective to policy development. 

The CM uses a listserv to communicate CM business and information to industry participants and other interested parties. By subscribing to the listserv, you'll receive information about the policy development process and other CM activities. Information distributed routinely includes:

• Draft policy proposals for review and comment.
• Final policies approved by the CM Governing Board.
• Common Bulletin Language (i.e., summaries of approved policies).
• Timeline documents for policy proposals in process.
• Updates on Policy Committee activities.
• Industry surveys.

Follow these instructions to subscribe to the CM public listserv:

1. Send an e-mail message to majordomo@michael.usagroup.com.
2. Leave the subject line blank.
3. Type "subscribe public" in the body of the message.

On the Common Manual Web site, you can view policies that are currently under development and archives of previous policies. To comment on current policy development, you can access a comment template under the “Review Proposals Out for Comment” or “Submit Comments on Policy Proposals” navigation links on the home page. You’re not required to use the template to comment on policy proposals and may modify the format as you see fit.

Comments should be submitted to the current Policy Committee Chair, Susan Fields, at sfields@isac.org or 217.785.5647 (fax). If you have questions or need more information about CM policies or processes, please contact our Policy, Compliance and Training (PCT) department at 405.234.4432 or pct@ogslp.org.