The Illinois Student Assistance Commission’s decision last week to keep the state-funded Monetary Award Program applications flowing did not go over well with some state financial aid experts.

ISAC voted to process all of the applications last week and award the full amount for the fall semester. This will result in cuts of up to 50 percent in funding for the spring semester. The recession caused a flood of applications for the need-based MAP award.

The directors of financial aid at Illinois State University and the University of Illinois both argued heavily against resuming processing of MAP applications.

“I would have preferred that the commission had taken a more financially conservative position,” said Orlo Austin, director of the U of I Office of Student Financial Aid.

Austin said he wanted to avoid reducing award amounts later in the year, as was the case last spring.

However, he said, “There is still the possibility that spring awards will not be cut, and I hope that will be the case.”

The ISU Financial Aid Director Linda Maxwell said she was concerned about having to reduce the amount of spring semester awards in order to continue this semester’s processing.

“Some 92,000 students would have to face a reduction in their spring award to help 5,000 applicants who were affected by the suspension of processing now,” Maxwell said.

“This would negatively affect students who applied before the cutoff date,” she said.

Spring awards also could be sliced because of state budget cuts, she said. “This could conceivably lead to a double impact on the MAP recipients.”

NIU Financial Aid Director Jerry Augsburger said, “It is mindboggling to think of a scenario that would call for a $700 cut in spring awards.”

Augsburger said the cuts would be catastrophic, but NIU students receiving the MAP award probably could increase the size of their Stafford loans.