Finding Text
FINDING 2022-005 ? NSLDS Reporting Federal Agency: U.S. Department of Education; Office of Federal Student Aid Pass through Entity: Not applicable Program Name: Federal Direct Student Loan Program ALN and Program Expenditures: 84.268 ($1,119,033) Award Number: P268K223315 Federal Award Year: July 1, 2021 to June 30, 2022 Questioned Costs: $-0- Condition Found: The incorrect enrollment status was reported to the National Student Loan Database System (?NSLDS?) for nine of the forty students selected for testing. Criteria: NSLDS informs loan servicers of changes in a student?s enrollment status that indicate when the repayments or interest accrual begins and ends. The date a student enrolls, withdraws, graduates, or drops below half-time status should be reported accurately. Cause: The University began working with a new third-party servicer in fiscal year 2021. The University was responsible for reporting enrollment status changes to the third-party servicer, and the third-party servicer was responsible for updating NSLDS. This process continued to take longer than anticipated during fiscal year 2022. Possible Asserted Effect: The loan servicers were not aware of the correct deferral, repayment, and interest calculation dates. Repeat Finding: See Finding 2021-003 for a similar finding in the prior year. Statistical Sampling: The sample was not intended to be, and was not, a statistically valid sample. Recommendation: The Student Financial Aid Director should work with the third-party servicer to update the enrollment status of the eleven affected students in NSLDS. In addition, we recommend determining the amount of time the third-party servicer needs to process enrollment status changes. The University should make any necessary changes to their procedures or timeline for reporting enrollment status changes. Management Response: The Student Financial Aid Director corrected the enrollment status and withdrawal date for the students in question in November 2022. Procedures have been improved to ensure the information is communicated timely to the third-party servicer and that third-party servicer reports the changes to NSLDS timely.