Payback Provisions of the Personnel Development to Improve Services and Results for Children with Disabilities Program

Our audit found the Personnel Development to Improve Services and Results for Children with Disabilities Program (PDP) results reported by the Department’s Office of Special Education Programs to be encouraging; however, data limitations and quality issues limited stakeholders’ ability to assess PDP effectiveness. Specifically, only slightly more than half of the PDP scholars in our review who had graduated or otherwise exited their respective program had either completed or were working toward completing their service obligation; the rest had not yet begun work or were still within the program’s 5-year grace period. As a result, it was too early in the process to adequately assess program effectiveness. In addition, although related Government Performance and Results Act measures provided some insight into program effectiveness, we identified certain limitations and quality issues with information on PDP scholars that the Office of Special Education Programs and its former contractor used in compiling some performance data, including issues related to the total number of scholars served and the reported service obligation data. The Department also had limited involvement in monitoring the program’s payback requirement, including not monitoring its contractor’s oversight of the payback requirement as diligently and effectively as it could have. We also identified problems with the methodology used to calculate results that limited stakeholders’ ability to draw reliable conclusions on program effectiveness.