E.D. Seeks To Improve Student-Aid Oversight

By Meg Sommerfeld

Washington

Recent Senate hearings on fraud and abuse in the Pell Grant program will only raise the stakes for the Education Department's ongoing efforts to improve oversight of the troubled federal student-aid system.

Last month's hearings of the Senate Governmental Affairs Subcommittee on Investigations revealed that more than 4,000 individuals had illegally received Pell Grants for 11 years or more, and that 21 non-degree-granting Judaic-studies schools had received an estimated $60 million in Pell aid, despite being ineligible to participate in the program. (See Education...