Finding Text
Federal Program Information: Federal Pell Grant Program (ALN 84.063), Federal Direct Student Loans (ALN 84.268)
Criteria or Specific Requirement: N. Special Tests and Provisions – Enrollment Reporting – Institutions are required to report enrollment information under the Pell grant and the Direct and Federal Family Education Loan (FFEL) loan programs via the National Student Loan Data System (NSLDS) (OMB No. 1845-0035), although FFEL loans are no longer made or a part of the Student Financial Assistance Cluster, a student may have a FFEL loan from previous years that would require enrollment reporting for that student (Pell, 34 CFR 690.83(b)(2); FFEL, 34 CFR 682.610; Direct Loan, 34 CFR 685.309). The administration of the Title IV programs depends heavily on the accuracy and timeliness of the enrollment information reported by institutions. Institutions must review, update, and verify student enrollment statuses, program information, and effective dates that appear on the Enrollment Reporting Roster file or on the Enrollment Maintenance page of the NSLDS Professional Access (NSLDSFAP) website which the financial aid administrator can access for the auditor. The data on the institution’s Enrollment Reporting Roster, or Enrollment Maintenance page, is what NSLDS has as the most recently certified enrollment information. There are two categories of enrollment information, “Campus Level” and “Program Level,” both of which need to be reported accurately and have separate record types. The NSLDS Enrollment Reporting Guide provides the requirements and guidance for reporting enrollment details using the NSLDS Enrollment Reporting Process.
Campus Level: Institutions are responsible for accurately reporting certain significant data elements under the Campus-Level Record that the U.S. Department of Education considers high risk, including enrollment status, which is the student’s enrollment status as of the reporting date; full-time (F), three-quarter time (Q), half-time (H), less than half-time (L), leave of absence (A), graduated (G), withdrawn (W), deceased (D), never attended (X) and record not found (Z).
Program Level: Institutions are responsible for accurately reporting certain significant data elements under the Program Level Record that the U.S. Department of Education considers high risk, including CIP Code – The Classification of Instructional Programs (CIP) is a set of codes that define fields of study. CIP Codes are maintained by ED's National Center for Education Statistics (NCES). They were most recently updated in 2020 and are usually updated every ten years.
Institutions are responsible for timely reporting, whether they report directly or via a third-party servicer. Institutions must complete and return within 15 days the Enrollment Reporting roster file placed in their Student Aid Internet Gateway (SAIG) (OMB No. 1845-0002) mailboxes sent by ED via NSLDS.
Condition: Campus Level: Certain students’ enrollment status changes were not reported or were reported outside of the required timeframe.
Program Level: Significant data elements were inaccurately reported for certain students.
Cause: Administrative oversight and insufficient internal control.
Effect or Potential Effect: The University was not in compliance with the enrollment reporting requirements.
Questioned Costs: None.
Context: For 5 of 40 campus level records tested, the University did not certify the students’ enrollment data within 60 days.
For 5 of 40 campus level records tested, the University did not notify the Department of a change in the student’s enrollment.
For 25 of 40 program level records tested, the University did not accurately report one or more significant data elements to NSLDS.
Identification as a Repeat Finding: This is a repeat of prior year Finding 2023-002.
Recommendation: We recommend the University enhance its procedures and internal controls over enrollment reporting to ensure students’ enrollment statuses are reported accurately and timely to NSLDS.
Views of Responsible Officials: All instances of this finding occurred during the fall 2023 semester while we were still in the implementation process for joining the National Student Clearinghouse. Since completing implementation, there have been no further instances. See “Status of Finding” for Finding 2023-002.