Which School Districts Will Be Hardest Hit By Education Department’s Withholding Of Funds?
From Forbes.com
July 1 was the day U.S. schools were supposed to receive federal grant money. Instead, states received an unsigned email from the Department of Education stating that the government would not be distributing funds for five grant programs: Title I, Part C (funding for migrant education),Title II, Part A (grants for educator development), Title III, Part A (funds for English learners), Title IV, Part A (money for student support and enrichment programs), and Title IV, Part B (funding for before- and after-school programs).
That’s a total of $6.2 billion dollars that districts will not receive. The money had been budgeted and the programs approved by Congress, but the Trump administration declared that “decisions have not been made concerning submissions and awards” for the coming year.
At New America, Zahava Stadler and Jordan Abbott have broken down the impact on individual districts. Their findings represent real funding concerns for districts this fall.
Districts will lose an average of $220,289. Many will lose several million, and a handful will lose tens of millions. Of the top 100 districts that will lose the most, more than half are in four states-- California (20), West Virginia (15), Florida (12), and Georgia (10).
High poverty districts are the biggest losers; the study concludes that high-poverty districts will lose over five times as much funding as low-poverty districts. Districts will high populations of English language learners are losing all the federal money meant to support those students. Districts with a majority enrollment of students of color are being hit with 50 percent bigger cuts than majority-white schools.