A public hearing is scheduled for the July Greene County School Board meeting to address using federal funds to mitigate COVID-19.
The school district has received over $1 million in the federal Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER) funds. A proposed list of how to spend those funds have been presented to the school board, and Superintendent Tim Christensen says there are limited ways they can use that money.
“The restrictions on the money are very significant. Again COVID mitigation is one of them, and that’s where we’ve talked previously. We’re looking at updating HVAC systems, is one thing. And then the other thing that again, it’s very strict in terms of doing things to address learning gap that students have had from COVID and everything that we’ve gone through. We’ve talked previously about math interventionists in order to work with students that are lagging behind, and doing some of those things.”
Christensen points out another requirement before the district can use ESSER funds is providing a way for the community to make comments. He adds one method is by having a public hearing to receive public input. The public hearing is scheduled for 5:15pm on July 21st from the boardroom at the middle school. You can see the proposed list below.
Proposed ESSER List:
- New carpet in elementary school lunch room with tile
- Summer school
- Mental Health First Aid staff training
- Family/school liaison for remote learning
- Middle school controls – office, locker rooms and auditorium
- HVAC upgrade in locker rooms
- HVAC upgrade in former office area
- HVAC upgrade in middle school auditorium
- Elementary school gym heat pump
- Three elementary school classroom heat pumps
- Student chromebooks
- Elementary school Clevertouch displays and carts
- Teacher chromebooks