Our objective was to describe the extent to which the Federal Student Aid office (FSA) identifies individuals who belong to underserved communities and performs outreach to those identified individuals.
We found that FSA provided general outreach to individuals, some of whom were part of underserved communities, and reached such individuals through several FSA offices and through its partnerships with different organizations. Although FSA performed outreach through various methods, its outreach was constrained by its limited ability to identify underserved individuals. Specifically, FSA’s direct outreach was provided to its current customers and the Free Application for Federal Student Aid collected only limited demographic information that could be used to identify applicants as individuals from underserved communities. Consequently, FSA could improve its outreach to underserved communities by evaluating its outreach practices, coordinating outreach efforts amongst its different offices, and utilizing demographic data to identify and conduct outreach to individuals in underserved communities.
We made four recommendations for FSA to: (1) require FSA’s Office of Student Experience and Aid Delivery (SEAD) to periodically evaluate its outreach efforts and make appropriate changes to its’ outreach practices, (2) establish a coordinated effort between the different FSA offices to ensure outreach is provided to all underserved communities appropriately, (3) use the additional demographic data from the 2024-2025 Free Application for Federal Student Aid to make decisions when identifying and conducting outreach to individuals in underserved communities, and (4) require SEAD to coordinate with partners to understand which underserved communities its partners serve.
Data quality and reporting
Read other OIG reports related to Federal Student Aid and underserved communities.