Pupil Membership - Pupil Audit Process - 313-0400-25
Description of Agency
Intermediate school districts (ISDs) and local school districts (local educational authorities [LEAs] and public school academies [PSAs]) receive a substantial amount of their operating revenue from the State through general aid (base foundation allowance and additional allowance for special student populations) and categorical aid of the School Aid Fund. The Michigan Department of Education’s (MDE’s) Office of Financial Management develops and implements policies and procedures pertaining to the accounting, reporting, and auditing of pupil membership. The required policies and procedures are contained in the Pupil Accounting Manual and Pupil Membership Auditing Manual (PMAM), approved and published by MDE annually. MDE determines State School Aid base foundation allowance to school districts based on full-time equated (FTE) pupil membership counts, as reported by the school districts and audited by the pupil membership auditors.
School districts perform pupil counts twice during each school year, once in the fall and once in the spring. Each school district’s fall and spring pupil count must be desk audited by the pupil auditors for each instructional building, with high schools and middle/elementary schools also required to have an additional field audit every 2 and 4 years, respectively. The PMAM and MDE internal procedures also require MDE to perform Quality Control Reviews for each ISD and a sample of local school districts within the ISD on a 3-year cycle.
During fiscal year 2023-24, the base foundation allowance for FTEs was $9,608 per State Aid Membership FTE, for pupils as prescribed by the State School Aid Act of 1979, as amended, and MDE made State aid payments to 56 ISDs, 538 LEAs, and 295 PSAs to educate 1.4 million FTE pupils for fiscal year 2024.
Audit Objectives
- To assess the sufficiency of MDE’s efforts to ensure the accuracy of pupil membership counts used in distributing State school aid funds.
Timing
Estimated Release Date: Early 2026
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