A federal watchdog agency warned that billions of dollars in K-12 education funding face increased risks of waste and fraud after the U.S. Department of Education suspended its comprehensive monitoring program.
The Government Accountability Office (GAO) released a report detailing how the pause in oversight leaves states without systematic checks on their compliance with federal requirements. The department halted consolidated monitoring this year, a process that had been fully implemented in 2019 to ensure states followed approved plans under the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA).
Funding at Stake
The ESEA provides nearly $27 billion in funding for 2025. Title I grants, which support schools with high numbers of low-income students, account for approximately two-thirds of that total. States receiving these funds must establish statewide accountability systems and report data on chronic absenteeism.
As of August, the Education Department had not provided a timeline for resuming reviews or details on an alternative compliance strategy. The agency is currently developing a new monitoring approach, but the gap in oversight remains.
“As a result of suspending consolidated monitoring, Education will not be able to systematically assess whether states are complying with ESEA requirements and following their approved state plans,” the GAO report stated.
Data Integrity Issues
The watchdog’s review highlighted significant problems with how some states calculate chronic absenteeism. The federal government defines chronic absenteeism as missing 10% or more of school days. However, mismatched reporting timeframes have led to unreliable data in several jurisdictions.
Some states report enrollment based on a single snapshot date while tracking absences over the entire school year. This discrepancy has produced implausible results, including absenteeism rates exceeding 100% in certain schools.
“Calculating rates using mismatched timeframes has resulted in unreliable and implausible chronic absenteeism rates (e.g., rates over 100 percent),” the GAO said.
The data errors were particularly prevalent in specific school categories. More than 30% of shared-time schools—often those with career and technical education programs—reported implausible chronic absenteeism figures. In contrast, fewer than 2% of other non-shared-time schools showed similar data issues.
State Variations
The GAO analysis found that half of all states remain unmonitored for reporting requirements that apply nationwide. The quality of data varied significantly by state and school type.
In Pennsylvania, 98% of shared-time schools reported implausible chronic absenteeism rates. Conversely, several states showed no such issues in their shared-time schools. Idaho, along with Delaware, Maryland, Missouri, North Carolina, and Rhode Island, had no shared-time schools with implausible rates in the GAO’s analysis.
Schools designated for Comprehensive Support and Improvement also faced higher scrutiny. Nearly 13% of these low-performing schools reported implausible rates over 100%, compared to about 2% of schools not in that category.
Ongoing Absenteeism Concerns
Chronic absenteeism has remained elevated since the COVID-19 pandemic. Recent estimates suggest that one-quarter of K-12 students are chronically absent. Accurate data is essential for states to identify struggling schools and allocate resources effectively, but the current suspension of federal monitoring limits the ability to verify these figures.