The Application for State School Aid (ASSA) is the data collection used to gather the resident and nonresident pupil counts required to calculate a school district’s state aid entitlement.
For a school district to receive state aid for a pupil, the student must be enrolled on October 15th in a program that will meet for at least 180 days during the school year.
A district is required to report the number of pupils enrolled full-time or shared-time in each school by grade or special education category. In addition, a district must also report the number of pupils that are sent and received and the number of pupils enrolled as follows on October 15:
• LEP pupils (ELL)
• Low income pupils (pupils eligible for free meals/free milk or reduced
meals)
• Shared-time county vocational school district pupils
• County special services school district pupils
• Regional day school pupils
• Pupils in certain State-operated programs
• Accredited adult high school pupils
• Pupils in approved private schools for the disabled
In addition, regional school districts must report total enrollment by town. This count is used in the formula that determines each town’s percentage share of tax levy for the next school year.
Authorized school district personnel can access the ASSA through the NJDOE Homeroom.
The ASSA contains preloaded data gathered from the District’s October 15th NJSMART submission. Districts must verify that information, modify if necessary, and create workpapers for audit as described in this manual.
Each year, the NJDOE releases a technical manual for the preparation of the ASSA. That manual, as well as sample workpapers, can be found on the NJDOE website on the school Finance page.