Finding Text
Finding FA 2023-001: Eligibility: Incorrect Federal Pell Grant Amounts Awarded (Repeat Finding)
Federal Program Information
Assistance Listing Number: ALN 84.063
Federal Program Name: Student Financial Assistance Cluster.
Federal Pell Grant Program
Federal Agency: U.S. Department of Education
Passed Through Entity: N/A
Federal Award Number: P063P200033 (Steve to Confirm)
Federal Award Year: July 1, 2022, to June 30, 2023
Campus: West Los Angeles College
Compliance Requirement: Eligibility
Criteria or Specific Requirement:
Per 34 Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) 690.62 Calculation of a Federal Pell Grant, the amount of a student’s Pell Grant for an academic year is based upon the payment and disbursement schedules published by the Secretary for each award year. The Uniform Guidance Compliance Supplement states that the Department of Education provides institutions with Payment and Disbursement Schedules for determining Pell awards each year. The Payment or
Disbursement Schedule provides the maximum annual amount a student would receive for a full academic year for a given enrollment status, Expected Family Contribution (EFC), and Cost of Attendance (COA). The Payment Schedule is used to determine the annual award for full-time, three-quarter-time, half-time, and less-than-half-time students.
2 CFR section 200.303 requires that non-Federal entities receiving Federal awards establish and maintain internal control over the Federal awards that provide reasonable assurance that the non-Federal entity is managing the Federal awards in compliance with Federal statutes, regulations, and the terms and conditions of the Federal awards.
Identified Condition:
Of the twenty (20) students selected for eligibility test work at West Los Angeles College, we noted the following:
• 1 student had an incorrectly calculated Federal Pell Grant award, which resulted in an understatement of
the disbursement to the student by $773. The student was eligible to receive $1,273 yet received $500 in
Winter 2023.
Cause and Effect:
The institution has reviewed the student’s award and determined that the student was inadvertently disbursed $500 instead of $1,273 which is considered to be an underpayment. Once identified by the auditors, the award has since been corrected and refunded to the student. The Central Financial Aid Systems Unit and the District’s Student Information System (SIS) Information Technology department have reviewed both system controls and
manual intervention, but the cause remains undetermined.
Questioned Costs:
See schedule of findings and questioned costs
The District has a known net understatement of Pell Grant award disbursements of ($773). The projected total net understatement of the Pell Grant award disbursements is $186,345 as follows:
See schedule of findings and questioned costs
This is computed by dividing the error found in the samples per term (Fall/Winter term – net underpayment ($773) and Spring/Summer terms – $0) over the total Pell awards disbursed in the sample size per term (Winter term – $64,577, and Spring/Summer terms – $81,046) multiplied by the total Pell awards disbursed for the identified colleges per term (Fall/Winter term – $15,567,394 and Spring/Summer terms – $14,958,472). The computation is made on a per-term basis on a campus level and not on a district-wide level.
Recommendation:
We recommend that the District make the necessary system modifications to the PeopleSoft SIS to ensure student awards are properly calculated. This will help ensure that Federal Pell grants are properly awarded to students who meet the eligibility requirements.
Views of Responsible Officials and Planned Corrective Actions:
The District believes this error was an isolated incident and the effect is minimal as we performed an extensive
review of all nine campuses’ Pell grant award disbursements for the term and found that this was the only
similar award. The District will monitor disbursements and will perform reconciliation on a monthly basis.
Personnel Responsible for Implementation: FA Office and the Central Financial Aid Unit.
Position of Responsible Personnel: FA Managers
Expected Date of Implementation: Already Implemented