Nevada Education Department cites cascading 2025 disruptions as drivers of FY26 subaward delays

Amber (Grants Management Unit supervisor, Nevada Department of Education) opened the quarterly subrecipient meeting by describing 2025 as an unusually disruptive year for NDE and laying out how those events affected the department's ability to approve and pay subawards for FY26.

The most immediate operational impacts stemmed from a major state payment processing upgrade that lengthened steps for drawing federal funds and constrained the department's ability to pay large RFRs without controller office notifications; missing grant award notices (GANs) on July 1 that left 109 subaward agreements at risk (89 of those had previously been approved); and a cybersecurity attack on Aug. 24 that intermittently locked staff out of devices and network resources. "When we don't have the money from the feds, you also don't have the money," Amber said, explaining the cash‑flow risk to subrecipients when GANs are delayed.

NDE staff stressed those problems layered on routine workload peaks. The department said it starts the FY26 rollout planning in…