Education division journey: $4 Million, 8,000 journeys and few particulars on academic 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 nearly $4 million on greater than 8,000 journeys in 2025.

Last month, the division submitted greater than 200 pages of journey information relationship from January to November 2025. But of the 13 items of knowledge lawmakers require companies to submit for every journey, DOE solely crammed out 5 — the overall applications related to the journey, the beginning and finish date of the journeys and the whole price.

Not included had 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 periods. The division additionally didn’t specify whether or not the journeys had 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 staff and college students went. Some bills had been the per diem charges staff obtain for neighbor island journey, DOE Assistant Superintendent Brian Hallett stated 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 stated.

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

DOE requires its directors to trace and approve worker journeys however doesn’t have a simple method 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 stated, lawmakers by no means raised considerations in regards to 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 faculties. The division not too long ago got here beneath hearth from the auditor’s workplace for failing to trace its pricey efforts to chill faculty campuses and struggled to justify the rising costs of school meals to lawmakers final 12 months.

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

“When the work-related travel accumulates to almost $4 million, it’s important,” Sen. Samantha DeCorte stated 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 totally different supervisors and superintendents are chargeable for journey requests, Hallett stated, and journey agendas and receipts are submitted in prolonged paperwork, fairly 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 stated, the division hadn’t anticipated that lawmakers would ask for companies’ journey paperwork and had lower than two weeks to drag 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 stated, including that DOE continues to be engaged on offering extra particulars to lawmakers.

The motive for journeys can vary from fulfilling upkeep requests at neighbor island faculties to skilled growth and studying alternatives for college kids and workers on the mainland, Hallett stated. Some of the journey bills used federal Covid-relief funds, fairly than state {dollars}.

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

Already, the general public’s belief in authorities establishments is low, and DOE’s lack of transparency could solely exacerbate folks’s considerations about how state companies are spending taxpayer cash, stated Camron Hurt, director of Common Cause Hawaiʻi. While it’s not stunning that such a big company like DOE would spend almost $4 million on journey, he stated, persons 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 nearly 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 staff had been going and the worth of those journeys.

Lawmakers Seek To Scale Back Travel

Kim and different lawmakers at the moment are seeking to curb how a lot state staff 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 court docket appearances, federal compliance and administrative conferences.

The moratorium would nonetheless permit staff to journey for skilled growth 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 whole prices and the way the journey benefited the state.

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

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

Since summer season 2023, DOE has taken faculty 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 stated. But the division’s breakdown of the journeys’ prices had some evident discrepancies, she stated.

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

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, stated DOE Communications Director Nanea Ching in an emailed assertion. The journeys knowledgeable DOE’s profession preparation applications centered on agriculture and meals manufacturing, she stated, and confirmed lecturers easy methods to incorporate totally different strategies of farming into their courses.

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

“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 faculty meals final session after faculty leaders stated it prices almost $9 to supply scholar lunches. In response, DOE released a report in December breaking down the prices of manufacturing faculty meals, however solely offered the numbers for broad spending classes like labor and meals bills on the statewide stage and shared little element about why the bills had been so excessive in recent times.

Members of the general public have additionally confronted roadblocks when requesting and receiving knowledge about their native faculties. Last fall, the division stated it might take over 4,000 hours and price greater than $83,000 to answer a father or mother’s public information request looking for details about sports activities groups’ budgets and paperwork associated to athletics funding at her daughter’s faculty.

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

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

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This story was initially printed by Honolulu Civil Beat and distributed via a partnership with The Associated Press.