The Affordable Care Act (and What It Means to Your College)

While the Affordable Care Act (ACA) was designed to increase access to quality, affordable healthcare, the regulatory ramifications have sent a shock wave through Human Resources departments across the nation. By redefining what it means to be a "full-time employee"—and therefore eligible for health benefits—employers everywhere are forced to reexamine the way they do business. These mandates—with their complex forms and reporting requirements—are challenging enough to implement at organizations that employ only full-time workers, but it’s especially complicated at community colleges, where much of the workforce is made up of "non-traditional" employees.

 

The ACA defines a "full-time employee" as one who averages 30 or more hours of service per week. At first glance, that seems simple enough. But consider adjunct faculty. At many institutions, they are employed as independent contractors who aren’t eligible for healthcare benefits. In the eyes of the ACA, however, they could now be considered full-time employees, depending on how many hours they work. Under the new rules, their hours of service aren’t limited to the time they spend in the classroom teaching; you must also account for the time they spend holding office hours, grading papers, counseling students, and developing the syllabus. 

 

And that’s just adjunct faculty. What about teaching assistants, graduate researchers, temps, on-call staff, non-federal student workers, and all of the other variable-hour workers your institution employs? The rules vary for each.

 

While it’s difficult enough for institutions to make sense of their workforce from an ACA perspective, your Human Resources Information System (HRIS) must be able to make sense of it too. Most institutions’ current systems are not set up to track hours this way. This means that colleges must not only understand the complex nuances of the law, they must also update their business processes and procedures to ensure that they are collecting the right data, from the right places, and reporting it in the right way.  

 

Of course, in order to collect and report the right data, you must begin with clean data. When institutions begin looking into the data they’ve been capturing, they are often surprised to find inaccuracies and inconsistencies, especially related to their non-traditional labor pool. For example, many institutions identify adjunct faculty members as "active" even if they have not been paid in years. In this case, a new code is needed in order to properly capture and report on these workers. 

 

Complying with the ACA poses a big challenge for community colleges, one that can have substantial financial penalties if not implemented correctly. However, the complexities of the regulations and requirements can make it difficult to even know where to begin. 

 

At CampusWorks, we help institutions implement ACA requirements by conducting Business Process Reviews, HRIS optimizations, and data cleanups. Our team of senior optimization specialists and technologists have a rich background in higher education and human resources. They not only understand and appreciate the nuances of the community college environment, but they also have a firm grasp on the complexities of the new regulations. They know how to effectively and efficiently implement the necessary changes in order to achieve compliance so institutions can focus on the most important business of all: student success.

Byline:

Liz Murphy is the CEO of CampusWorks, a strategic consultant dedicated to helping higher education institutions overcome the business and technological challenges that stand in the way of student success.