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The Department of Education provides billions of dollars in grants for programs to improve K-12 outcomes. Do they work?

1/31/2019

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The U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) recently released its report on the challenges of assessing grant programs serving K-12 students. Education faces challenges determining whether these programs work. Specifically, problems persist with:
Oversight. For example, some program grant files were missing descriptions of what grantees achieved.
Data quality. Education lacks assurance that some state-submitted data are accurate.
Capacity. A lack of qualified staff has impacted monitoring, and Education hasn’t updated hiring plans in years.
Study design. Measuring long-term outcomes can be difficult.
Click here to read the full report.
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How Auditors Get it Wrong on Risk Assessments for Monitoring

1/20/2019

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By Maribeth Vander Weele
There’s an old saying that To a Hammer, Everything Looks Like a Nail. To an auditor, everything can look like an audit—even when it’s not an audit, but a subrecipient monitoring review.
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​Although there is overlap, auditing and subrecipient monitoring are distinctly different professions governed by different rules. When it comes to risk assessments, this is especially important. That’s because Single Audits—required of agencies accepting federal funds—and other audits routinely find that pass-through entities “violate” risk assessment procedures in determining what organizations to monitor. This results in the dreaded audit finding.
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​​For example, one state’s Single Audit found that the pass-through entity improperly determined that subrecipients were low risk despite negative publicity and significant leadership turnover. Auditors disagreed with the pass-through entity that only subrecipients who distribute grants are high risk.
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​These are valid points for discussion, but there’s a problem: the auditor’s preferred methodology is not prescribed in any authority that governs monitoring. And citing an agency for failing to follow methodologies that the auditor created—even when they might be logical—is patently unfair. It’s the classic conundrum: How can an auditee be cited for failing to follow a rule that doesn’t exist? 

​The proper way to handle what auditors perceive as inadequate risk assessments is to raise the issue, but without creating a finding. Kudos to the Office of the Inspector General for the U.S. Department of the Interior for doing just that. In a December 11, 2018 Audit Report,  auditors noted the importance of formalized and documented risk assessments, but acknowledged that the regulatory language is not explicit in requiring them. Instead, it recommended that the federal agency provide additional program guidance.
How can an agency be cited for failing
​to follow a rule that doesn't exist?
Read more...
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    Our mission is to deliver meaningful oversight solutions for large-scale programs serving vulnerable populations such as children, seniors, people with disabilities,  and crime victims. and more. 

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  • Home
  • What We Do
    • Grant Programs >
      • ESSA
      • Early Intervention
      • Charter Schools
      • Special Education K-12
    • Investigative Services >
      • Inspector General Services
      • Data Analytics
      • Operational Audits
      • Screening
  • What We've Done
  • Who We Are
    • How to Find Us
    • Codes and Certifications
  • Bootcamp
    • Grants Compliance
    • Fraud and Abuse
  • Blog