Summary

Summary of Attestation Examination

Except for material noncompliance involving students reported in Career Education 9-12 on-the-job training (OJT), as discussed below, the Washington County School Program (WCSP) at Eckerd complied, in all material respects, with State requirements regarding the determination and reporting of full-time equivalent (FTE) students under the Florida Education Finance Program (FEFP) for the fiscal year ended June 30, 2007.

• Fourteen of the 20 students in our sample for Career Education 9-12 (OJT) sample had reporting errors or records that were not properly and accurately prepared or were missing and could not be located.

Noncompliance related to FTE resulted in five findings.  The resulting audit adjustments to WCSP at Eckerd’s reported, unweighted FTE totaled to a negative 3.9601, but have a potential impact on the District's weighted FTE of a negative 4.5898.

Weighted FTE adjustments are presented in our report for illustrative purposes only.  They do not take special program caps and allocation factors into account and are not intended to indicate the weighted FTE used to compute the dollar value of audit adjustments, which is the responsibility of the Department of Education (DOE).   However, the gross dollar effect of our FTE audit adjustments may be estimated by multiplying the net weighted FTE audit adjustment by the base student allocation amount.  For the WCSP at Eckerd, the estimated gross dollar effect of our FTE audit adjustments is a negative $18,275 (negative 4.5898 times $3,981.61).

The ultimate resolution of our FTE and the computation of their financial impact is the responsibility of DOE.

Washington County School Program (WCSP) at Eckerd

WCSP at Eckerd operates an alternative educational facility for youthful offenders under a grant agreement between the Washington County School Board and the Florida Department of Education. This facility, the Eckerd Youth Development Center in Okeechobee, Florida, is part of the state system of public education under the general direction and control of the State Board of Education. The Center was formerly known as the Okeechobee School for Boys.  For the fiscal year ended June 30, 2007, WCSP at Eckerd reported 154.70 unweighted FTE, and received approximately $3.7 million in State funding for those FTE.  The primary sources of funding for the WCSP at Eckerd are funds from FEFP and Federal grants and donations.

Florida Education Finance Program (FEFP)

Florida school districts and certain other educational entities such as WCSP at Eckerd receive State funding through FEFP, which was established by the Florida Legislature in 1973.  It is the intent of the law "to guarantee to each student in the Florida public school system the availability of programs and services appropriate to his educational needs which are substantially equal to those available to any similar student notwithstanding geographic differences and varying local economic factors."  To provide equalization of educational opportunity in Florida, the FEFP formula recognizes (1) varying local property tax bases, (2) varying program cost factors, (3) district cost differentials, and (4) differences in per student cost for equivalent educational programs due to sparsity and dispersion of student population.  The funding provided by FEFP is based upon the numbers of individual students participating in particular educational programs.  A numerical value is assigned to each student according to the student's hours and days of attendance in those programs.  The individual student thus becomes equated to a numerical value known as an unweighted FTE (full-time equivalent student).  For example, one student would be reported as one FTE if the student was enrolled in six classes per day at 50 minutes per class for the full 180-day school year (i.e., six classes at 50 minutes each per day is five hours of class a day or 25 hours per week, which equals one FTE). 

The Superintendent's written response to the audit findings is included in the audit report.