House and Senate members of the General Assembly’s Interim Joint Committee on Education heard from Kentucky’s Auditor of Public Accounts about performance data from a recent Kentucky Department of Education review including finds of a lack of measurable benchmarks.
The 556-page report was the result of a measure adopted during the 2024 legislative session, which called for a full fiscal controls and operational performance review of the KDE, spanning a four-year period from 2020 through 2024.
Auditor Allison Ball told the panel that the report is a product of “immense” work. Investigators looked at department operations, fiscal information, department strategy and partnerships, state board oversight, academic standards and the model curriculum framework, interscholastic athletics, the Kentucky School for the Blind, and preschool.
“It was very, very broad,” she testified. “It needed to be broad because the KDE is big. It does a lot. It’s just very vast, and as far as anyone in the auditor’s office can remember, this is the first time a comprehensive audit like this has ever been done on the KDE,” she said.
Ball noted her staff found the KDE lacks measurable benchmarks. “And this is really, really important, if you’re going to increase proficiency scores. If you’re going to tailor academic assessments for students, you need to have measurables. It’s very common to see language like “improve” or “increase.” And those are great words, but you need to have some measurable benchmarks in order to be able to figure out OK, are you meeting the goals that you need to meet?”
Ball said investigators identified some problems with processes, but not in relation to expenditures themselves.
“We didn’t find glaring problems. There was one area in particular that had to do with grants, that schools had to fill out some paperwork years and years and years ago. It had not been updated for a long period of time. So, we don’t know for certain if they still qualify for those kinds of grants. So, there were some issues like that. We did not find big ticket, glaring problems.”
Responding to the report, Education Commissioner Robbie Fletcher pointed out a potential conflict of interest, as the firm hired by Auditor Ball, Public Consulting Group, already had contracts with the Department of Education, and was bidding on two others, which it did not receive.
As for the review itself, Fletcher stated, “KDE looks forward to utilizing the APA’s final report, as it identifies opportunities for future growth and plans for continued improvement in service to Kentucky’s public school students. KDE welcomes the opportunity to work with the Kentucky General Assembly for legislative changes to accomplish recommendations within the report.”
Ball answered by saying, “Not a single time over the course of this examination did KDE ever inform the APA or PCG of its view of a perceived conflict-of-interest. Instead, KDE decided to raise this issue for the first time now, after it saw the APA’s report.”
The review looked at data and operations between July 1, 2020 and June 30, 2024. Fletcher, took office on July 1, 2024.
