PCC faces new federal review of aid practices

Pima Community College is facing renewed federal scrutiny over its financial aid practices after a consultant found the school has awarded aid for years to students who don’t qualify.

The college, already struggling financially because of lost enrollment and state funding cuts, may end up having to reimburse the federal government for aid dispensed in error, the consultant’s findings show. The total dollar value of the aid errors has yet to be calculated, officials say.

PCC distributes millions in federal student aid each year. In 2014 for example, the most recent year for which federal data are available online, the college distributed a total of nearly $13 million in federal grants and Pell grants to about 1,500 first-time college students.

The consultant’s findings raise questions about the thoroughness of a recent federal review in which the U.S. Department of Education gave PCC a clean bill of health for its financial aid practices.

Education Department press secretary Dorie Nolt said the agency is sending a specialist to Tucson next month to determine whether another federal review should be done.

PCC hired Attain, a Virginia-based consulting firm, in July to run its financial aid department. The school’s last financial aid director left in June after about a year in the job.

Attain found PCC hasn’t been following some of the federal government’s most basic rules for ensuring that student aid dollars are well-spent. For example:

• Federal aid is only supposed to cover courses that are part of a program that leads to a degree or credential. PCC lacks a system to prevent payments from being made when that standard isn’t met.

“The institution has disbursed (federal) aid to students for the past several years without assessing whether their courses were required for and applicable to their programs,” a consultant’s report said.

• PCC has lower academic achievement standards for financial aid recipients than for non-recipients.

The consultant compared two groups of students with 20 credits each. PCC’s public catalog says students need a minimum 2.0 grade point average to stay in good academic standing, but federal aid recipients only need a 1.5 GPA under an internal PCC policy that dates back about a decade, the consultant found.

• In “several” recent cases, PCC gave federal Pell grants to students who likely were ineligible because they already had bachelor’s degrees from universities.

That may have occurred because the college does little to sort out conflicting information in student files, as is required by federal rules, the consultant said.

Back to homepage

Subscriber Login

Keep reading with a digital access subscription.

Subscribe now

For example, when new students give the college copies of their high school diplomas — they aren’t required to, but many do — PCC officials put them aside in boxes without looking at them.

• The college has ignored the “150 percent rule,” which makes students ineligible for federal aid once it becomes mathematically impossible for them to graduate within 150 percent of normal program time. Those studying for two-year degrees, for example, must be able to complete them within three years but PCC failed to keep track of the requirement.

The PCC administration has not disclosed the consultant’s reports to the public nor to members of the college’s Governing Board.

The Arizona Daily Star recently received copies from a source. They are posted online with this story on Tucson.com

College spokeswoman Libby Howell said board members have received verbal summaries of the consultant’s findings at public study sessions and in closed-door meetings with the college’s legal counsel.

At a Nov. 2 board presentation on financial aid, college administrators made no mention of the consultant’s findings.

Howell said PCC notified the U.S. Department of Education in September and is working with the agency on long-term solutions.

To prevent more aid from being improperly dispensed, PCC examined the files of more than 5,000 aid recipients now enrolled and made close to 800 changes.

Nolt, the Education Department’s press secretary, said the recent federal review that cleared PCC of financial aid problems was based on examinations of the files of 30 aid recipients chosen at random.

The 30 files revealed eight shortcomings, which the college fixed, but they were different than the problems the consultant recently identified, she said.

Attain’s consulting services have cost the public about $17,000 a month since August and the total tab is expected to reach about $125,000 Howell said.

Board approval, required for contracts greater than $100,000, has not yet been sought. Howell said college administration intends to seek approval from the board before the consultant’s tab reaches $100,000.

Howell said the college hopes to hire a financial aid director by the end of March.