Former TCU employee gets 5 years for stealing from the Upward Bound Program
A former employee of Texas Christian University was sentenced to five years in federal prison on Monday for stealing money from the school’s Upward Bound Program, according to court documents.
Margaret Faust, 69, pleaded guilty in a plea deal last August to theft from a federal student assistance program.
Upward Bound provides federal grants to projects that are designed to “generate the skills and motivation necessary for program participants to complete a program of secondary education,” documents say.
Specifically, money from the program serves high school students from low-income families and families in which neither parent has a four-year degree, as well as low-income, first-generation military veterans.
Officials said that because of Faust, the TCU program was terminated.
Faust, who served as the assistant director of the program for 18 years, admitted taking $1,600 in February 2017, but investigators believe she has taken more.
According to court documents, Faust routinely pocketed cash from funds awarded to the university by the Department of Education. She stored the money – allotted for Upward Bound participant stipends – in a locked drawer inside her desk before depositing it in her personal checking account.
As part of her scheme, Faust instituted a program that allowed her to withhold the stipend money in $7 increments — about the cost of students’ bus fare, one former Upward Bound participant testified in court, said U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Texas Erin Nealy Cox.
As part of her plea deal, Faust must pay $210,899.41 in restitution to the U.S. Department of Education, documents say.
This story was originally published December 4, 2018 at 11:11 AM.
