Northwestern Michigan College
State Performance Audit Fact Sheet

The entire report may be downloaded from the Michigan Office of the Auditor General:
www.audgen.michigan.gov/comprpt/docs/r3231003.pdf (686 KB)

State Audit Objective 1

To assess the effectiveness of the College's admissions and monitoring practices to help students successfully complete their classes and programs.

• Conclusion
  The College's admissions and monitoring practices were generally effective in helping students successfully complete their classes and programs.
• Noteworthy Accomplishments
  NMC is the first community college to provide an associate degree in nursing on-line, a program which started in fall 2003.
• Finding 1
  The College needs to improve its management control for enforcing its placement testing and college-level course enrollment requirements.
• NMC Response
  In January 2004, NMC discontinued telephone registration; online registration has been improved to include better checking for college-level course requirements.

State Audit Objective 2

To assess the effectiveness of the College's efforts to evaluate the quality of its educational programs.

• Conclusion
  The college was effective in its efforts to evaluate the quality of its educational programs.
• Noteworthy Accomplishments
  In July 2001 NMC implemented a Web-based application that provides enrollment information to college executives and disciplines to support effective decision-making and utilization of resources.
• NMC Response
  There were no findings. No response required.

State Audit Objective 3

To assess the effectiveness and efficiency of the College's use of educational program resources.

• Conclusion
  The College was generally effective and efficient in its use of educational program resources.
• Finding 2
  NMC should develop a formal minimum class enrollment policy and update its break-even analysis used to evaluate holding low-enrollment classes.
• NMC Response
  In fall 2000, NMC implemented a process that monitored enrollment efficiency, of which minimum class size was one factor, to provide flexibility for students to complete programs in a timely way. This process has been formally documented to respond to State Audit concerns.
• Finding 3
  The College did not assess classroom utilization as required by the Department of Management and Budget's Office of the State Budget.
• NMC Response
  In 2003, the College purchased and began implementing the CollegeNET R25 and S25 Scheduling Software system to enhance assessment of classroom utilization to enable reporting the DMB.

State Audit Objective 4

To assess the effectiveness of the College's methods for allocation of operating and service costs to and for receipt of revenues collected from self-liquidating auxiliary activities and programs.

• Conclusion
  NMC was generally effective in its methods for allocation of operating and service costs/revenues from auxiliary activities and programs.
• Finding 4
  NMC does not allocate all appropriate operational and institutional support costs to auxiliary services.
• NMC Response
  NMC has been allocating the majority of support costs to auxiliary activities and is implementing improvements in documentation.
• Finding 5
  The College had not developed written policies and procedures for receipting revenues collected from auxiliary activities/programs.
• NMC Response
  Procedures were in place prior to the audit and have now been documented.