Mid-Year Review of Federal Grant Funds

Check-ups are important! They keep us on track. The middle of the school year is a good time to check up on your federal grant funds by conducting a mid-year review. The purpose of the mid-year review is to give you an opportunity to see if you are still on track to expend your federal funds as planned in the grant. You will monitor the plans that were made prior to submitting the grant application to see if they have been implemented. In addition, has anything changed that could impact the use of grant funds? Lastly, make sure your charter is still on track with grant compliance requirements in time to make corrections and amend the grant if needed.

Who should be involved in the mid-year review?

Depending on the size of your charter, you would want to include the federal grant manager, business manager, charter superintendent, human resources director, campus administrator, and any other staff as needed.

If your charter does not have the staff positions listed, that’s okay, you can complete the mid-year review with the staff you have available.  You want to make sure that your team is made up of those who can best help with answering the question: Are we still on track with what we planned, or do adjustments need to be made?

What documents do we need?

Once you are ready to work on the mid-year review, you’ll need to gather the documents that will help answer the questions that arise during this process.  Below is a list of the documents that you will need for reference during the review:

• A current copy of the specific Federal grant application including all schedules:
  • ESSA Consolidated Federal Grant Application
  • Special Education Consolidated Grant Application (Federal)
  • ESSER III, TCLAS, or any other federal grants
• A copy of the CNA, CIP, and DIP as well as any new and relevant student data
• Any working papers that your team utilized when determining how the funds would be budgeted. These can be paper or electronic.
• A copy of the budget.
• A list of staff paid from the Federal grant.
• A copy of the expenditure reports for the grants being reviewed.

If you don’t have a copy of the grant application readily available, you can log into TEAL from the TEA website.  Once logged into TEAL, you will need to choose the eGrants application and then click on the link for the document library.  Once in the document library, you can print (in PDF format) any of the grant applications that you’ve submitted through eGrants.

As the year winds down, the CSS team will be communicating with clients about their mid-year review to complete amendments and ensure compliance.

What’s next?

Now that you’ve assembled your team, and you have the documentation needed, you’re ready to begin the mid-year review process.

Basically, during the mid-year review process your goal is to determine if the funds have been spent in accordance with how they were planned and if any errors have been made in spending funds.

One way to determine if the funds have been spent according to plan is by reviewing your expenditure report and comparing it to your grant application budget summary, your working papers, and your CIP/DIP. Utilizing these documents, the team will be able to determine if the activities that were originally planned have taken place or if they need to be revised.

Unforeseen events can cause the well laid out plans that were made during the spring/summer to drastically change. New student needs may have surfaced as the year progressed, but there is still time to take action. These are the critical questions to ask during a mid-year review:

• If there has been a change of plans, has the CIP/DIP been updated to reflect any new objectives or strategies?
• Have new problem statements been identified in your CNA?
• Were any errors found in allowable expenditures or budget coding that need to be corrected (including paying the correct positions?
• Are the remaining funds in the correct object code so that draw downs can occur?
• Is an amendment to the grant application needed to fund the rest of the expenditures for this year? Refer to TEA’s “When to Amend the Application” for assistance.

If your plans have not changed, and funds are being spent according to plan, then you will want to continue monitoring and ensuring the remaining funds are spent as soon as possible so that student impact can be felt.

Need help?

Please contact Charter School Success:

Dr. Sheila K. Sherman ssherman@charterschoolsuccess.com

Have questions?

Ask questions, get answers, and discuss this topic on the Charter School Community Roundtable now.