Finding Text
2023-001 – Enrollment Status Reporting
Federal Agency: U.S. Department of Education
Federal Program Title: Student Financial Assistance Cluster
Assistance Listing Number: 84.268 – Federal Direct Student Loans
84.063 – Federal Pell Grant Program
Award Period: July 1, 2022 to June 30, 2023
Type of Finding: Significant Deficiency in Internal Control Over Compliance
Criteria:
The Code of Federal Regulations 34 CFR 682.610 states that institutions must report accurately the enrollment status of all students regardless if they receive aid from the institution. This includes the enrollment effective date and related enrollment status, which must be reported for both the Campus- Level and the Program-Level. Enrollment status changes for students must be reported to National Student Loan Data System (NSLDS) within 30 days or within 60 days if the student with the status change will be reported on a scheduled transmission within 60 days of the change in status. In addition, at a minimum, schools are required to certify enrollment every 60 days.
Condition:
During our testing of students with enrollment status changes, we noted two total errors out of 40 students tested. For one of the students tested, the enrollment effective date reported on the college and program levels did not match the enrollment effective date per the College’s records. For one of the students tested, the change in status was not reported on the program level.
Questioned costs: None
Cause:
The College continues to report data to the National Clearing House while making direct withdrawals reports to NSLDS. Due to issues encountered accessing the National Student Loan Data System, we were unable to maintain accurate and timely manual updates.
Effect: The College did not comply with U.S. Department of Education regulations for reporting student enrollment status changes accurately.
Repeat Finding: Yes
Recommendation:
We recommend that the College review its procedures to ensure enrollment status changes are reported to NSLDS accurately, as required by regulations.
Management’s Response:
The College of DuPage has reviewed and agrees with the enrollment reporting finding. The College has already taken multiple steps to resolve all issues ensuring complete, accurate and timely reporting. However, all those steps have not fully resolved the issue with enrollment reporting. As such, we will be working on a long-term system improvement with the goal of limiting issues and future audit findings. The Financial Aid Office and the Registrar’s Office will work closely with the Information Technology department to automate a process of capturing unofficial withdrawal information, using the NSLDS template and then uploading that report directly to NSLDS on a weekly basis. The College will continue
to send records to the National Student Clearinghouse and use this new report to supplement reporting and resolve the issues with reporting unofficial withdrawals. The goal is to implement this new report by June 30, 2024.