ICYMI: Ranking Member Scott Questions Government Watchdog about FAFSA Missteps

09.24.24

ICYMI: Ranking Member Scott Questions Government Watchdog about FAFSA Missteps

WASHINGTON - Todayat a Higher Education and Workforce Development Subcommittee hearing, Ranking Member Robert C. "Bobby" Scott (VA-03) questioned Government Accountability Office investigators about the Department of Education's implementation of the Simplify FAFSA Act.

Watch Ranking Member Scott's questioning on YouTube.

Ranking Member Robert C. "Bobby" Scott: "I think our witnesses have outlined a total mess and we didn't need to hear that. I think all of us have heard that from our colleges and our districts. But you've also pointed out exactly what the cause of the mess is, so that we can actually take some corrective action.

"Mrs. Cruz Cain, I understood your testimony to say you had a list of deficiencies. Some have been corrected,

some not corrected. Is that right?"

Mrs. Cruz Cain: "That is correct."

Ranking Member Robert C. "Bobby" Scott: "Do you think that list is exhaustive? It is complete that you don't expect to find other problems if we can get those solved we'll be straight."

Mrs. Cruz Cain: "Well they have to solve those problems first. But with each different cycle, the Department intends to include new requirements. So the requirements they did not include in the initial release, and each one of those has to be thoroughly tested. So we do expect them to find a number of defects. You do find defects any time you test. They really need to focus on solving those defects before the functionality is deployed for the students."

Ranking Member Robert C. "Bobby" Scott: "Now they have a contract with IT experts. Do you have confidence that the IT people they've contracted with can actually perform what they're supposed to do?"

Mrs. Cruz Cain: "I think if FSA oversees the contract and follows the best practices for systems development and testing, they could deliver the functionality. But from what we've seen, the oversight, the testing issues, if they keep managing it the way they are, I don't have confidence that they'll be able to deliver the functionality."

Ranking Member Robert C. "Bobby" Scott: "Is that a problem with the contractor or the Department?"

Mrs. Cruz Cain: "We didn't look into that, but the Department did tell us that the contractor did cause the delays. They had delivered the functionality later than expected. But that is something that you should be having [ongoing] discussions with your contractor when you're doing your oversight. So I think there's blame on both parts."

Ranking Member Robert C. "Bobby" Scott: "You mentioned the call centers, several, that's come up sveral times. Has that problem been solved?"

Ms. Melissa Emrey-Arras: "We'll see what happens when the new FAFSA rolls out."

Ranking Member Robert C. "Bobby" Scott: "Translation services were mentioned, have they been fixed?"

Ms. Melissa Emrey-Arras: "Those have not been fixed. I think we'll see what happens on whether they have enough people to answer the phones. The translation services have not been fixed. We have recommendations in that space. Students or their families who do not speak English or Spanish. I have no clear path towards translation services currently with the call center, even though that's the prime venue for getting translation services. At this point in time, there's no call center prompts for that, and the Department's own website incorrectly tells people to press the number seven, which gets them nowhere on the phone system when they call."

Ranking Member Robert C. "Bobby" Scott: "I understand there was a problem for people who reside in Puerto. Did you identify that as a problem?"

Ms. Melissa Emrey-Arras: "There were-I don't know that Puerto Rico specifically came up in our work, but there were problems for many, many, people with many of the technical issues. And we could look into that for the record."

Ranking Member Robert C. "Bobby" Scott: "Notwithstanding all the problems, I understand that students actually did receive more-there was more eligibility for the Pell than before. About 500,000 more students were eligible for Pell. Is that right?"

Ms. Melissa Emrey-Arras: "That was not part of our study. We do anticipate a new study looking at the beneficiaries of the new formula, and we will be looking at that in our new work."

Ranking Member Robert C. "Bobby" Scott: "Is there anything we can do in the formula to increase the number of students who could be eligible for financial aid?"

Ms. Melissa Emrey-Arras: "We'll look into that in our new work."

Ranking Member Robert C. "Bobby" Scott: "That is something you're going to be looking into?"

Ms. Melissa Emrey-Arras: "We do expect to be looking at the effects of the formula and examining what changes, if any, could be made."

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