Finding Text
Title I Grants to Local Educational Agencies Title I Grants to Local Educational Agencies Federal Assistance Listing No. 84.010 2024-007: Eligibility of Schools and Allocations to Schools Compliance Requirement: Eligibility Type of Finding: Compliance and Material Weakness in Internal Control Over Compliance Criteria or Specific Requirement: Grantees must determine which schools or school attendance areas are eligible to participate in the program. When determining eligibility, grantees must select a poverty measure from among one of the allowable data sources. Grantees must serve eligible schools or attendance areas in rank order according to their percentage of poverty. Grantees must also provide equitable services to eligible private school students and homeless students prior to allocating funds to eligible public schools using similar allowable data sources. Condition: The City was required to determine which schools or school attendance areas, including private school students and homeless students, were eligible to participate in the grant program. The City was also required to ensure that eligible schools or school attendance areas were served in rank order in accordance with their percentage of poverty. Supporting documentation that would demonstrate the City’s compliance with determinations of eligibility was not available upon request and was not provided in a timely manner. Context: The City did not provide documentation that would demonstrate the compliance of its eligibility determinations or allocations to schools in a timely manner. Cause: Management has not established guidelines and procedures to ensure that documentation regarding eligibility determinations and allocations is retained and filed in an organized manner that is made readily available for inspection during the audit. Effect: The City has not complied with the grant requirements, which could result in improper spending of grant funding.. Questioned Costs: None reported. Repeat finding: This matter was reported as a finding in the previous year as finding 2023-004. Recommendation: The City should implement internal control procedures to ensure compliance with all grant requirements including the completion and retention of all documentation regarding eligibility determinations and allocations to schools. The documentation should be filed in an organized manner and should be readily available for inspection during the audit. Views of Responsible Officials: See Corrective Action Plan. U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION Passed through Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education