Compact with Texans

The Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board owns and operates www.THECB.state.tx.us, www.arpatp.com, and www.CollegeForTexans.com.

Agency Name:

Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board

Brief Description of Services Offered:

The Coordinating Board's responsibilities fall into three major areas:

• Coordination:
  The Coordinating Board works with the Legislature, Governor, and colleges and universities to coordinate Texas higher education and expand access, improve equality and promote efficiency through actions like the following:
  • Develops higher education plan
  • Reviews and approves degree programs and construction of major facilities
• Information:
  Provides information on higher education to state policy makers and citizens
• Administration:
  Administers state and federal programs such as:
  • Advanced Research Program and Advanced Technology Program
  • Hinson-Hazlewood College Student Loan Program
  • Carl D. Perkins Technical Vocational Funds

Statement of Customer Service Principles:

The Coordinating Board is committed to meeting the highest customer service standards. In this Compact with Texans, we reaffirm the Coordinating Board's commitment to professional service, responsiveness, effective communication and follow-through with each of our customers. Our customers can expect Coordinating Board employees to be courteous, knowledgeable, and efficient when providing services. The Coordinating Board is dedicated to the continual improvement of service delivery, using customer comments to help improve services and minimize response times.

Standard response times for agency services, not related to financial aid, are as follows:

• General information requests not requiring research and analysis are acknowledged and answered within one day.
• Information requests requiring research are processed within 10 working days.
• Universities and health-related institutions' non-doctoral proposals submitted in complete form and received before a quarterly board meeting are considered no later than the third quarterly meeting following the proposal submission. Doctoral proposals are considered within four quarterly meetings following the first meeting after they are submitted. The majority of proposals are acted upon sooner.
• Community and technical college degree program proposals are acknowledged within 10 working days, complete proposals are acted upon within 30 days.
• Facilities projects requests requiring the Commissioner's approval are processed within 10 working days. All other facilities requests are processed within 90 days.

Response times for financial aid services are as follows:

• Responses to the majority of phone calls to the Division of Student Services are made in less than two minutes.
• During peak periods, expected response times are from 8 to 15 minutes to reach a loan representative.
• Requests for loan deferments and correspondence regarding loan accounts are processed within seven working days.
• Loan applications are processed within 20 working days.
• Grant applications are processed within 10 working days.
• Payments are applied to accounts within five working days.

Information requests:

The Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board can be accessed through its web site at http://www.thecb.state.tx.us.

For information concerning financial aid services, contact the Division of Student Services at 1-800-242-3062.

For general public information, contact the Office of Governmental Relations and Public Information.

Office of External Relations
Lora Weber, Director
Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board
P.O. Box 12788
Austin, Texas 78711
Telephone: (512) 427-6111
Fax: (512) 427-6127
lora.weber@THECB.state.tx.us

Customer Service Contact:

To file a complaint related to Coordinating Board activities and matters within the Coordinating Board's authority, or to inquire about the agency's customer service policies, contact:

Linda Battles, Senior Advisor and Director
Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board
P.O. Box 12788
Austin, Texas 78711
Telephone: (512) 427-6101
Fax: (512)427-6127
Linda.Battles@THECB.state.tx.us

Complaint procedure:

The customer service contact refers complaints and inquiries to the appropriate agency personnel for resolution and maintains a tracking system. When complaints are not resolved within 10 working days, the customer service contact intervenes to facilitate resolution, referring the matter to the appropriate assistant commissioner if necessary. Matters not able to be resolved by an assistant commissioner are forwarded to the Commissioner for resolution. For quality control, the customer service contact may follow up on complaints that have been resolved by a division.