More review in place at DPI after audit finds errors in reporting pandemic money

North Carolina education leaders says they now have more oversight for reporting federal dollars.

That’s after a state audit found errors in reporting how much money some schools spent in federal pandemic relief dollars during the 2021-22 school year.

The Department of Public Instruction reported the wrong amount for at least 20 schools, misreporting $69 million. The department also did not have complete information for at least 29 schools. Those findings came out of a sample of 60 schools.

The department has made numerous changes to oversight and staffing because of audit findings from 2020-21 and 2021-22 that showed information wasn’t reported correctly. Auditors haven’t issued any findings of errors from the 2022-23 school year.

In response to the 2021-22 findings, the department created a cross-divisional team to report data and started an internal data quality review system to check data before it’s reported.

The state’s schools received more than $6 billion in federal pandemic relief, which the department was tasked with distributing. Schools report back what their expenditures were.