ED’s Internal Watchdog Outlines Areas of Focus, Including Transition to Repayment for Borrowers and Use of Professional Judgement
NASFAA
Owen Daugherty
November 16, 2021
In its annual report released this week, the Department of Education’s (ED) internal watchdog detailed its plan to provide oversight on the department over the course of the upcoming year, as well as new areas of focus for its oversight of the Office of Federal Student Aid (FSA).
Specifically, OIG said new areas of focus would include oversight of proprietary institutions and how those schools are following the 90/10 rule, FSA’s oversight of contractor’s acceptability review process for proprietary school annual audits, FSA’s outreach to underserved communities, and ED’s reporting on its experiential sites initiative.
Several areas of continuing focus for OIG were also outlined in the report. Notably, OIG said it would continue to prioritize evaluating financial aid offices’ compliance with professional judgment (PJ) requirements.
The report stated that OIG will “determine whether selected schools applied, documented, and reported their use of dependency override and professional judgment” as outlined in the Higher Education Act (HEA).