Audit Report On The Monitoring And Tracking Of Special Education Services For Elementary School Students By The Department Of Education

This audit determined whether the New York City Department of Education (DOE) adequately monitors, tracks, and documents the services provided to mainstreamed elementary school special education students. DOE is mandated by the federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Act to ensure that all children with disabilities have available to them a free appropriate public education that emphasizes special education and related services. Special education is specially designed individualized or group instruction, special services, or programs provided at no cost to the parent to meet the unique needs of students with disabilities.

Audit Findings and Conclusions

DOE maintained complete and current documentation for each of the 89 students in the audit sample with regard to the justification for the performance of an evaluation and the recommendation of special education services. However, DOE is not monitoring, tracking, or documenting the provision of these services in an effective manner, as shown by documentation that is incomplete, inaccurate, or lacking altogether. The records for all of the 89 students in our sample who were mandated to receive services during the 2004-2005 School Year had some type of deficiency, including no attendance forms (all student records lacked at least one form) and missed sessions with no make-ups (87 percent of the sampled student records requiring make-up sessions). In addition, the review of the special education attendance records that DOE was able to provide found incomplete information and conflicts with general education attendance records. Due to these deficient records, DOE could not demonstrate the extent to which services were provided as prescribed by the students’ Individualized Education Programs (IEPs). DOE should ensure that all students mandated to receive special education services are receiving the prescribed services, and that all necessary documentation is maintained as evidence that such services are being provided.

Audit Recommendations

Based on our findings, we make nine recommendations, five of which are listed below. DOE should:

• Develop and enforce written formal policies and procedures to ensure that services are provided according to the provisions of each student’s IEP.
• Develop policies to ensure that all attendance forms and summaries are maintained as evidence of services provided.
• Ensure that providers fill in all required information on the special education attendance forms and sign the forms as certification of the delivery of services.
• Ensure that supervisory review of attendance records is performed and documented.
• Institute a control (e.g., periodically reconcile special education attendance forms with general education attendance forms) to help ensure that the days that services are provided are accurately recorded.

DOE Response

In their response, DOE officials agreed with six of the nine audit recommendations. However, the DOE officials’ response, which is lengthy, included objections to our methodology and findings. We strongly disagree with the DOE officials’ arguments about our methodology, which appear to be self serving and correspondingly misleading. Our audits–including this one–are conducted in accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards (GAGAS). GAGAS §7.30 states “Ultimately, the benefits of audit work occur when officials of the audited entity take meaningful and effective corrective action in response to the auditors’ findings and recommendations.” In agreeing with six of our recommendations, DOE officials confirm the benefit of this audit and their desire to improve the delivery of special education services to their students.

A detailed discussion of the DOE response is included as an appendix to this report and the full text of the DOE response follows the appendix as an addendum.