Study Abroad
February 8, 2020If you have approved practical training within a credit hour based program and certify that practical training in clock hours you must add a remark to the certification. Otherwise when the claims examiner checks the approval data base (WEAMS) they see the degree approved in semester or quarter hours and will not pay clock hours without verification.
Additionally, they need to know if the credit and clock hours belong to the same course or different courses.Please follow the directions in the SCO Handbook when certifying practical training in Clock hours for a program approved in credit hours. If the program is approved in credits you can certify the applicable practical training in credit hours or clock hours, whichever is to the student’s advantage. If you certify in clock hours the claims examiner will also need to know what is considered full time for that training.
VA considers full time training for clock hour based training as follows:If the course/program is 50% or more classroom training 18 clock hours per week is considered full time.If the course/program is 50% or more hands on/lab etc type training 22 clock hours per week is considered full time.
If you are certifying in clock rather than credit as it is to the student’s advantage you should add a remark such as “student is enrolled in a 30 clock hour per week internship. 18 clock hours per week is full time.” You will certify 30 in the clock box in VA Once and 0 in the res box.
If you are not sure which is to the student’s advantage you can certify both and let VA determine which to pay by adding a remark such as “student enrolled in a 20 clock hour per week externship which is worth 6 credits. Please pay credit or clock to the student’s advantage. 22 clock hours per week is full time” You would enter 6 in the res box and 20 in the clock box in VA Once.
If you have a student who has both a credit course(s) and practical training in the same term you can certify both and add a remark such as “Student taking a 3 credit res class and a 12 clock hr/week internship worth 4 credits. 18 clock is considered full time. Please pay cr or clock for internship-whichever is to student’s advantage” You would enter 3 in the res box and 12 in the clock box.The VA needs to know all of the information that I have listed for the remarks. You cannot just add a remark “practical training” as that does not provide VA with enough information to properly pay your student and with no remark at all VA will often just deny the claim.
