Finding 548647 (2024-001)

FINDING 2024-001 Federal Program Information: Federal Pell Grant Program (ALN #84.063), Federal Direct Student Loans (ALN# 84.268) Criteria or Specific Requirement (Including Statutory, Regulatory or Other Citation): 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 Program via the National Student Loan Data System (the “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). 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. 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. Condition: Certain students’ campus-level enrollment data was not accurately reported. Cause: In both instances, the graduate submission schedules were reported to the registrar timely. Subsequent to that date, both students were qualified to graduate, however, updated student statuses were not reported to the NSLDS. Effect or Potential Effect: The University was not in compliance with the enrollment reporting requirements. Questioned Costs: None. Context: For 2 of 40 campus level records tested, the students’ enrollment statuses were incorrectly reported as withdrawn instead of graduated. Identification as a Repeat Finding: There was no similar finding identified in the prior year. Recommendation: We recommend the University enhance its procedures over enrollment reporting to ensure that campus level enrollment data is timely and accurately reported to NSLDS. Views of Responsible Officials: Certain students’ campus level enrollment data was not accurately reported. The Registrar’s Office will determine why certain students falling outside of normal graduate submission schedules are not being captured in DegreeVerify files submitted to the National Student Clearinghouse. Manual submissions for these non-standard graduates will be performed until a reporting solution is identified.