DOE Travel: $4 Million, 8,000 Journeys And Few Details On Educational Worth

For the third 12 months in a row, the Department of Education has failed to offer lawmakers with clear information on the way it spent virtually $4 million on greater than 8,000 journeys in 2025. 

Last month, the division submitted greater than 200 pages of journey information courting from January to November 2025. But of the 13 items of data lawmakers require companies to submit for every journey, DOE solely crammed out 5 — the final packages related to the journey, the beginning and finish date of the journeys and the full value. 

Not included have been the place numbers or job titles of the attendees, DOE’s justification for the journey and whether or not the journey concerned conferences or coaching classes. The division additionally didn’t specify whether or not the journeys have been coated by state {dollars} or different funding sources. 

Employee bills ranged from $2 for a single day of journey to $10,000 for a visit spanning eight days in May, though the report didn’t specify what the bills coated or the place workers and college students went. Some bills have been the per diem charges workers obtain for neighbor island journey, DOE Assistant Superintendent Brian Hallett mentioned in an interview with Civil Beat.  

The lack of element has drawn the ire of lawmakers, who requested the identical information from different state companies showing earlier than the finances committees final month. In a 12 months the place the state is going through important federal funding cuts, the division must account for each greenback it’s spending, lawmakers mentioned. 

“They don’t have the information at their fingertips, they’re not keeping records,” Senate Education Chair Donna Kim mentioned. “That seems to be a common thread.”

DOE requires its directors to trace and approve worker journeys however doesn’t have a simple technique to compile journey information within the method the Legislature requested, Hallett advised Civil Beat. While DOE additionally struggled to offer journey particulars to the Legislature in previous years, he mentioned, lawmakers by no means raised issues concerning the record-keeping course of till January. 

But some lawmakers and authorities transparency advocates say the division’s lacking journey knowledge factors to bigger issues with record-keeping and monetary accountability in colleges. The division not too long ago got here underneath fireplace from the auditor’s workplace for failing to trace its pricey efforts to chill college campuses and struggled to justify the rising prices of college meals to lawmakers final 12 months. 

The division is predicted to face extra scrutiny round its funds this 12 months amid current management modifications on the Senate Education Committee and rising budgetary issues about federal funding cuts.

“When the work-related travel accumulates to almost $4 million, it’s important,” Sen. Samantha DeCorte mentioned within the listening to final month. “We’re going to take it serious.”

Key Spending Details Missing

DOE’s reporting challenges stem from the truth that completely different supervisors and superintendents are accountable for journey requests, Hallett mentioned, and journey agendas and receipts are submitted in prolonged paperwork, relatively than spreadsheets, which makes it onerous for the division to rapidly pull particulars for the Legislature. 

Leading as much as the January finances briefings, Hallett mentioned, the division hadn’t anticipated that lawmakers would ask for companies’ journey paperwork and had lower than two weeks to tug collectively the information. However, the Legislature has requested journey stories from state companies yearly for the reason that 2024 session. 

“It’s not that we don’t have all this information, it’s just not readily transferable into the formats that they want,” Hallett mentioned, including that DOE continues to be engaged on offering extra particulars to lawmakers.

The purpose for journeys can vary from fulfilling upkeep requests at neighbor island colleges to skilled improvement and studying alternatives for college kids and employees on the mainland, Hallett mentioned. Some of the journey bills used federal Covid-relief funds, relatively than state {dollars}.

But lawmakers wouldn’t know these particulars just by wanting on the DOE’s report, DeCorte mentioned in the course of the listening to, including that nearly $4 million is a major quantity for colleges to spend when the state is going through finances constraints. Earlier this 12 months, the governor’s proposed finances did not fund DOE requests for meals prices and English Learner packages. 

Already, the general public’s belief in authorities establishments is low, and DOE’s lack of transparency could solely exacerbate individuals’s issues about how state companies are spending taxpayer cash, mentioned Camron Hurt, director of Common Cause Hawaiʻi. While it’s not shocking that such a big company like DOE would spend practically $4 million on journey, he mentioned, individuals are nonetheless entitled to understand how this cash is being spent. 

Other companies — some with bigger journey budgets than DOE —  offered the extent of spending element lawmakers requested main as much as the finances briefings final month. For instance, the University of Hawaiʻi submitted virtually 460 pages of journey information totaling roughly $20 million.

While UH’s report included the explanation for worker journey, the job titles of the attendees and the supply of funding, lawmakers additionally pushed directors for extra particulars about the place workers have been going and the worth of those journeys.

Lawmakers Seek To Scale Back Travel

Kim and different lawmakers are actually seeking to curb how a lot state workers are spending on journey. One bill launched final week would set a two-year moratorium on worker journey funded by the state. Exceptions would come with journey required for courtroom appearances, federal compliance and administrative conferences. 

The moratorium would nonetheless permit employees to journey for skilled improvement and coaching, however companies would want to verify {that a} digital possibility isn’t possible earlier than signing off on the journey. Agencies would even be required by legislation to submit an annual report back to the Legislature detailing the aim and site of their journeys, the full prices and the way the journey benefited the state.

“At the end of the day, we want to save the taxpayers’ money,” Kim mentioned, including that the price of journey from some state companies like UH has skyrocketed. “People have gotten very lax with these approvals.” 

Kim mentioned she hopes the detailed reporting necessities within the invoice additionally present extra readability on how companies are monitoring their journey bills. In some circumstances, she mentioned, it’s unclear how DOE is calculating how a lot their journeys value.  

Since summer time 2023, DOE has taken college directors and college students on greater than a dozen journeys to South Korea, which has used roughly $750,000 in state and federal funds, Kim mentioned. But the division’s breakdown of the journeys’ prices had some evident discrepancies, she mentioned.

For instance, Kim mentioned, the division initially mentioned the price of airfare was greater than $2,600 per traveler for one in every of its South Korea journeys however corrected the quantity to $900 when her workplace questioned why the flights have been so costly. While the division mentioned the journeys performed an necessary function in instructing college students and directors about agriculture know-how and innovation, the statewide advantages are nonetheless unclear, Kim mentioned, including that not all campuses have agriculture packages. 

The division combined up the estimated prices per traveler with the prices of airfare throughout 4 journeys to South Korea in its report back to Kim and corrected the numbers later that day, mentioned DOE Communications Director Nanea Ching in an emailed assertion. The journeys knowledgeable DOE’s profession preparation packages targeted on agriculture and meals manufacturing, she mentioned, and confirmed lecturers the right way to incorporate completely different strategies of farming into their lessons.

But the dearth of element in colleges’ journey paperwork factors to bigger challenges with DOE’s record-keeping system, mentioned Joe Kent, government vice chairman of the Grassroot Institute of Hawaiʻi. Last 12 months, the state auditor’s workplace mentioned it was unable to trace down information and contracts monitoring DOE’s warmth abatement efforts, stopping the state from totally assessing how college leaders spent $100 million on air con programs.

“Paradoxically, the more information that we were able to gather from DOE and its contractors, the less clarity there was about how much was spent, where it was spent, and what it was spent on,” the auditor’s office said. 

Lawmakers additionally pushed DOE for extra particulars on college meals final session after college leaders mentioned it prices practically $9 to provide pupil lunches. In response, DOE released a report in December breaking down the prices of manufacturing college meals, however solely offered the numbers for broad spending classes like labor and meals bills on the statewide degree and shared little element about why the bills have been so excessive lately. 

Members of the general public have additionally confronted roadblocks when requesting and receiving knowledge about their native colleges. Last fall, the division mentioned it might take over 4,000 hours and value greater than $83,000 to reply to a dad or mum’s public information request searching for details about sports activities groups’ budgets and paperwork associated to athletics funding at her daughter’s college. 

“When a department doesn’t provide diligent transparency,” Kent mentioned, “it’s a sign that the department’s taking the public’s money for granted.” 

Civil Beat’s training reporting is supported by a grant from Chamberlin Family Philanthropy.