Replying to one's own post can get ya shot, but I figured it out and wanted
to quickly share (incase there's any out there that search and raise
questions on this later).

Used the INDEX function instead of IF and it looks something like this:

{=INDEX('[ITC Student Database v1.xls]Formulas'!$C$8:$C$55,MATCH($B$1,'[ITC
Student Database v1.xls]Formulas'!$A$8:$A$55,0))}

Basically stating the array I want to pull from first. Then used the MATCH
function to compare the date with the array of dates on the student database
and then the 0 specifies an exact match.

Bingo!

Thanks all,

Sage