Finding Text
COVID-19 ? Education Stabilization Fund, Assistance Listing No. 84.425 U.S. Department of Education Award Year 2021-2022 Criteria or specific requirement ? Activities Allowed or Unallowed? CARES Act Section 18004(c); CRRSAA section 314(c)(3) and ARP section 2003 Condition ? The institution applied emergency grants to students and applied amounts to students? outstanding account balances without obtaining explicit authorization from students. Questioned costs ? ALN 84.425E ? $10,645 ? Questioned costs include amounts applied to students? outstanding account balances for students who requested a cash grant. Context ? Out of a population of 1,028 grants to students, 25 student grants were selected for testing. Our sampling method was not, and was not intended to be, statistically valid. Of the transactions tested, 4 were applied to students? outstanding account balances without obtaining explicit authorization for applying the amount to the outstanding balances. Three of the students request both to have the funds assist with tuition and other institutional charges and to have a cash grant, and one student only selected to get a cash grant. There was no documentation of clarification with the student how much they needed as a cash grant and how much they wanted to apply to tuition or institutional charges. Effect ? The University reduced outstanding accounts receivable balances rather than distributing emergency grants to students. Cause ? The University?s controls did not ensure that the amounts applied to students? outstanding account balances were only applied with authorization from the students. Identification as a repeat finding, if applicable ? N/A Recommendation ? Management should review procedures around expenditures of federal awards to ensure that controls are properly designed to ensure expenditures on allowable activities. Views of responsible officials and planned corrective actions ? Belhaven University personnel are verifying 100 percent of CARES grant applications to be sure the University awarded CARES grant monies consistently and based on explicit authorization from students.