By Ron Kruzel

Welcome to the January/February 2017 issue of the ARC/STSA E-newsletter! The Board of Directors and staff team are excited for the year that is ahead of us!

With February drawing to a close, that can mean only one thing: It’s time for the ARC/STSA 2017 Annual Report! The Board of Directors has been working hard on streamlining initiatives related to reporting requirements, and ARC/STSA staff has been preparing to open the report on March 1, 2017. We look forward to working with you this year on your submission!

The 2017 Annual Report submission process includes the opportunity for programs to report on the NEW ARC/STSA Retention threshold of 60 percent. As a reminder, programs may report Retention for cohorts at 60 percent under the following criteria:

Effective August 1, 2015, programs are required to meet or exceed the minimum Retention threshold set at 60 percent. This threshold is for all cohorts that begin on or after August 1, 2015. For cohorts that started before August 1, 2015 the threshold will remain at 70 percent.”

By this time, you should have received your initial 2017 Annual Report e-mail from the ARC/STSA with your program-specific login instructions and the Annual Report Information Acknowledgement Form (due back to the ARC/STSA on March 10, 2017). If your program has not received the initial 2017 Annual Report e-mail, please notify the ARC/STSA office as soon as possible. The 2017 Annual Report filing instructions will be available on the ARC/STSA website by no later than February 27, 2017. Keep an eye out for this information, which will guide you through the 2017 Annual Report submission process.

Finally, programs have a two-month window to enter the 2017 Annual Report, with the submission period ending on May 1, 2017. If you need assistance with your filing, please do not hesitate to contact ARC/STSA staff with your questions.