Fed stimulus money used for water park and movies instead of school expenses

Apparently field trips to movies and a water park were seen as essential to education in the Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Schools.

The Winston-Salem Journal attributes that info to the Federal Government Accountability Office. It was supposed to used for the Summer Teaching Enrichment Program:

The audit found that HAWS used some of the stimulus mo­ney to pay for field-trip-related expenses that were “potentially unallowable” under the recovery-act. Those field trips included trips to movie theaters to see Ice Age 2 and Terminator Salvation, and a trip to Wet and Wild Emerald Point water park.

“We had no idea what the funding was,” Dorsey said. “We just knew that the dollars were being made available for a program we already had in place.”

Martha Dorsey, HAWS’ chief financial officer, said that the authority did not know that the money for the enrichment program came from the stimulus act.

A school official is quoted as saying there was no misuse of money.