Morgan State University Operational Audit Report

Introduction

Audits are carried out to establish the financial utilization in an institution for a given period. It helps the management with the information on the accountability as well as establishing the recommendation on the way forward in so far as the budgetary allocations are concerned. It also helps in ascertaining whether the laws on expenditure were duly followed while assisting the management in assuring the stakeholders; both internal and external; of the right track of the institution incorrectly spending the financial allocations. In the case of Morgan State University, the operational audit was conducted for the financial period 2017/2018, and the results were amazing. They indicated that the university was far much into the rightful utilisation of the monetary allocations, managing internal controls, the information technology dockets and accountancy spheres. The findings were as expounded in the subsequent paragraphs.

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There were the findings on the operational budget, whose data was presented. It indicated that the general funds had a deficiency of $ 11, 340, from the general funds total amount of $250, 560. The special funds were spent amounted to $ 14, 420, which was the adjusted amount by a rate of 4.5% of the previous year. Further, other unrestricted funds amounted to $290,560, which was as a result of a percentage increase of 4.2% about the last year's amount. It can get summarized that the general fund increased by $ 0.6 million in the fiscal year 2017 after adjusting for the fiscal year 2016 Boards of Public Works and the deficiency by $5.4 million in the back of a bill reductions of the financial year 2017. Further, the Higher Education Investment Fund increased by $0.2 million in the fiscal year 2017, which resulted in the general growth of $0.8 million in the State's fund above the fiscal year 2016.

The Personnel data also showed significant information. The regular positions showed a total of $3,450.00 used. The contractual FTE's spent a total of $1, 370. The vacancy data for regular posts had a turnover rate of 5.18%, with the jobs and percentage vacant as of mid-2018 being 8.7 in an increase. The allowances did not provide for any new regular positions. It, however, indicated that Morgan State University has the autonomy of personnel and may thus create new posts during the financial year. The data also indicated major trends as brought out in the analysis briefs as follows. The undergraduate enrollment increased by 0.8% to 6,308 in fall to 2016. The first time full time (FT.FT) students managed to grow by 19.4%. The continuing students reduced by 1.8%. The enrollment of the graduates increased by 7.8% in fall of the year 2016, resulting in the overall growth of enrollment of 2.1%.

For the case of the student governance, the retention rates for the second and the third year for the 2017 group of students reached their highest of 72.5% and 60.2% respectively. However, they have since slightly fallen. The graduation rate spanning six years for the FT/FT students managed to increase to 35.4% with the 2016 group of students, which is the highest rate in the recent past years. However, six years after enrolling at the Morgan State University, the status of a region of 31% of students is still not known. Besides, the graduation rates for the four years/to year rates of graduation had reduced in the recent past years. For the degree production efficiency, the undergraduate degrees per 100 students learning in the full time managed to fall below the average of the university's pears as well as the state, with the ratio dropping to a low level of 12.6 degrees in the financial year 2016. For the education and their related costs per degree, after managing to reach the high of $102,340 in the fiscal year 2016, the expenditures per degree dropped to $86,836 in the financial year 2015, which is the lowest level in the past six years. Moreover, since the year 2011, the federal research and development expenses managed to increase from $10.0 million to $15.5 million. However, the number of earned doctorates reduced from the high of 44 in the year 2015 to 25 in 2016 because of a decrease in the number of educational doctorate students.

Also, there were the issues that arose from the audit report. One of them is the lack of response to the information requests. It asserts that for the legislative oversight to be proficient, it had to be forthcoming and time conscious in so far as responding to the requests for the information by the Department of the Legislative Services during the reviewing of the budget. Also, in meeting the expenses of the college, the data by Morgan State University showed that the spending by the institution had reduced by $3.5 million in the financial year 2016, while the need-based aid cut by $4 million. It was in spite of the supplemented budget of 2015 which included $738,000 to raise the institution's need-based monetary assistance which was above that of the year 2015. There was also an issue regarding the faculty workloads. The average units which were taught to the learners dropped to 7.0 from 7.3 between the financial years 2014 and 2015. It was because of the addition of 13 members to the faculty. However, the average units taught increased to 7.2 units despite an increase of 2 more faculty members in the year 2016.

The issue regarding the revision of Title IX for the investigation of the revision of the sexual misconduct policy also surfaced in the audit report. In this case, the office of civil rights had launched an inquiry into the June 2016, which is in response to a complaint regarding the sexual assault involving a student which took place on campus in the spring semester of 2016. It emerged thus that the director of diversity and equal employment had been collaborating with the office of civil rights to establish on the matter. The recommended actions were for the restriction of the need aid to the adequate minimums as possible.