East Ramapo Central School District - Textbooks Loaned to Nonpublic School Students (2019M-171)

Issued Date
August 03, 2020

[read complete report - pdf]

Audit Objective

Determine if District officials established eligibility for and maintained an inventory of textbooks loaned to nonpublic school students.

Key Findings

  • The District did not have adequate systems in place to verify that textbooks purchased for and loaned to nonpublic schools were only provided to eligible students. We reviewed 300 nonpublic school student records and found that 114 students were provided with textbooks even though the District's records did not support the students' eligibility to receive textbooks.
  • The District did not have systems in place to account for textbooks purchased for and loaned to nonpublic school students and cannot account for all textbooks purchased and loaned to those students.

Key Recommendations

  • District officials should ensure that only eligible students are provided with textbooks.
  • District officials should maintain and refer to annual textbook inventory records prior to filling textbook orders or ordering new textbooks.
  • The Board should require a District-wide annual inventory, including textbooks on loan to nonpublic school students, and ensure nonpublic school administrators return unneeded and damaged textbooks to the District.

District officials generally agreed with our recommendations and indicated they planned to initiate corrective action. Appendix B includes our comments on issues raised in the District's response letter.