Student Financial Assistance Cluster – Assistance Listing No. Various Recommendation: We recommend the University enhance system controls to ensure disbursements match awards. View of responsible officials: There is no disagreement with the audit finding. Action taken in response to finding: The Fin...
Student Financial Assistance Cluster – Assistance Listing No. Various Recommendation: We recommend the University enhance system controls to ensure disbursements match awards. View of responsible officials: There is no disagreement with the audit finding. Action taken in response to finding: The Financial Aid Office normally attempts to disburse aid within the term for which it is designated. However, unusual workloads brought about by FAFSA disruptions, staffing reductions, and duty changes led to delays in the disbursement of some aid for the 2024-2025 school year. A significant amount of Fall 2024 and Spring 2025 aid was not disbursed until August and September 2025. While this does not fall outside of rules set by the Department of Education, later disbursements caused extra challenges for the Accounting Team and meant a delay in receiving federal funds into the organization. As of September 30, 2025, All Pell Grant and Federal Supplemental Education Opportunity Grant Funds for 2024-2025 were been dispersed — and the matching amounts have been certified by the Department of Education. All federal loans for 2024-2025 have been dispersed, with the exception of 11 students. Nine of the students still have not accepted or declined their loans. They have been given until October 15, or the loans will be rescinded. Two more students had errors that stopped disbursement. This issue is being resolved by the team within the next week. Actions taken to resolve the issue: The Financial Aid team is taking the following actions to ensure that financial aid is disbursed in the term it is awarded. (Note: there are always a few exceptions due to highly unusual circumstances.) • Restructuring the awarding process to disperse funds soon after Census Date, before manually checking each record for anomalies. In 2024-2025, the manual checking process was completed first, which dramatically delayed disbursement. • Restructuring duties to spread out the awarding processing among more than one team member to allow for it to be completed more quickly. • Reviewing and enhancing financial aid policies governing the awarding and disbursing process to ensure that the amounts match at the end of the fiscal year (May 31) for spring and fall terms, and at the end of the award year (August 1) for the summer term. Name(s) of the contact person(s) responsible for corrective action: Tricia Harris, Financial Aid Director Planned completion date for corrective action plan: The Financial Aid Office has already begun implementation of this action plan and will complete implementation before the end of the current school term.