Short for Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief, ESSER is the term school administrators use for each round of federal grants for COVID-19 relief funding provided over the last two years. Each of the three rounds represents a different stage in COVID-19 response and recovery.
ESSER I funds came out of a $13.2 billion appropriation within the $2 trillion stimulus bill enacted in spring 2020 by the Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security Act. Known as CARES, the goal of this legislation was to blunt the economic downturn from shutdowns brought on by the global pandemic.
Local school districts used ESSER I funds mostly to purchase technology for remote instruction and cleaning supplies for stepped-up sanitation efforts to slow the spread of the virus.
That was followed in December 2020 by the Coronavirus Response and Relief Supplemental Appropriations Act which allocated $53.4 billion in ESSER II funds to school systems nationwide. The goal of that round was to help schools cope with the challenge of a hybrid model that alternated in-person classroom instruction with remote lessons.
Finally, on March 11, 2021, the federal government enacted the American Rescue Plan Act that provided Pennsylvania with $4.5 billion in direct emergency funding to public and charter schools to support the long-term work of economic recovery. This became ESSER III — the most recent round of relief funds.
As with prior rounds, the Pennsylvania Department of Education posted guidelines on its website specifying possible uses of ESSER III funds. There were also workshops and seminars hosted by such groups as the Capital Area Intermediate Unit and the Pennsylvania Association of School Business Officials.
Not only did it involve more money, ESSER III had a broader scope than ESSER I and ESSER II. That added complexity to the planning procedure.
CARLISLE SCHOOLS
"It had to be a well thought-out process," said Jenna Kinsler, business manager for the Carlisle Area School District. "It was not something that could be rushed."
Months of preparation by a team of administrators went into the application that the district submitted in March to the Department of Education.
"It was very detailed, very thorough," Kinsler said. "We had to give an exact plan on how we're going to manage such a large pot of money in a short amount of time."
For Carlisle, the challenge involved the use of $6.8 million in federal grants by September 2024. Numerous questions had to be answered.
"How are we going to address learning loss?" Kinsler said. "What salaries will be included? What account codes?"
The thought process involved regular meetings with central office and building-level administrators to figure out the academic and facility needs of the district.
One plan that emerged is to use ESSER III funds to offset the one-time costs of such facility upgrades as replacement chillers and revamped HVAC systems. That way, the district can preserve its capital reserve fund for other projects, Kinsler said.
Districts are required to set aside a portion of ESSER III funds for learning loss, so staff could be hired to provide additional support to students.
"But that's where districts have to be careful of the long-term impact to finances," Kinsler said. "They have to plan it so the general fund can absorb the expense of salaries once the grant ends."
SOUTH MIDDLETON SCHOOLS
South Middleton School District has a different take on how it will leverage ESSER III funds to pay for high-priority building projects.
Rather than rely on a bond issue that would drive up long-term debt, South Middleton wants to phase in its building projects over a couple years by using ESSER III money to pay the salaries and benefits of math interventionists and English-as-a-Second Language teachers.
The idea is to free up money in the general fund budget to augment what is transferred each year to the capital reserve account. In recent years, South Middleton has been trying to shore up its capital reserve through an annual transfer of money.
"In normal circumstances, school districts would not want to use funds like ESSER for recurring costs," Superintendent James Estep said. "But we have a game plan on how to reintroduce those positions to the general fund over time.
"It's what we have to do for public education," Estep said, referring to how districts often struggle to balance revenues with expenditures. "The pie tends not to get bigger — at least by any substance — but the things that we are mandated to do get bigger," he said. "All you're doing is rearranging the thickness of the slivers of the pie."
Like Carlisle, the first step in the South Middleton thought process was to closely examine the ESSER III guidelines, recalled Tina Darchicourt, director of business and operations. "We were trying to find a way to pay for the roof at the Yellow Breeches Middle School."
While some building projects qualify for ESSER III funding, the roof restoration was such a gray area that it made more sense for the district to use relief money to pay for something that clearly falls within the guidelines, Darchicourt said. "It's taking the money out of one bucket and putting the money into a different bucket for two years. We have to put it back in the first bucket after the ESSER money goes away."
This strategy came out of meetings among the leadership team that included input from Kevin O'Donnell, the incoming assistant to the superintendent.
"We discussed where our core needs were," Estep said. "We also discussed the reality that our existing budget was not in tremendously good shape. You are allowed to use your ESSER funds to maintain existing positions. That's why you are allowed to supplant."
CUMBERLAND VALLEY SCHOOLS
At Cumberland Valley School District, the focus of ESSER spending has been on one-time purchases as much as possible, Superintendent David Christopher said. "You want to use the funds in such a way that they don't have a budgetary impact. You have to be really careful not to put ESSER funds into staff or programs that are ongoing because then you have to figure out funding when the money goes away."
At first, there was a misunderstanding within the district that ESSER funds are a mass infusion of money that could bring about systematic change, Christopher said. In reality, even the ESSER III allocation for Cumberland Valley is relatively small compared to the overall size of the annual district budget.
On a positive note, ESSER funds have given district administrators greater flexibility in building the last two general fund budgets along with the current fiscal plan for 2022-23, Christopher said. ESSER funds have been a game-changer in a number of other ways, he said.
Prior to the onset of COVID-19, Cumberland Valley did not have a one-to-one system in place where each student, depending on the grade, had access to either an iPad or a laptop computer as a learning aide. The shutdown of schools in spring 2020 forced the district to turn to remote instruction while the ESSER funds provided the "lift" Cumberland Valley needed to implement a districtwide one-to-one system that is now part of the annual budget cycle, Christopher said.
"We also plan to spend a good chunk of ESSER funds on a reading program at our elementary schools," he said. "It's pretty obvious after COVID that we need to improve overall instruction in reading. ESSER funds are one way that we can do that. It has built-in opportunities for kids through remediation."
To develop the program, the district assembled a team of teachers, administrators, school board members and community volunteers, Christopher said. "They were trying to identify how we would move forward and support kids in reading."
The result has been a multiyear process that included pilot projects and the use of ESSER funds to help with the research and development. The Cumberland Valley School Board approved the reading program in February and the first teacher training session was held in March.
With a focus on the science of reading, the new program will use brain research on how children process sound to understand words in print, Christopher said.
BIG SPRING SCHOOLS
Big Spring School District has used part of its ESSER III allocation to upgrade its summer school program into more of a summer camp with extended hours, enhanced academics and increased opportunities for students to interact and socialize, Superintendent Kevin Roberts said. First offered last summer, the program will be offered again this year and in 2023.
A key component in the upgrade was the ability of Big Spring to offer district students bus transportation to the camp, Roberts said. This has greatly increased the level of participation by providing better access for families throughout the 197 square miles of the rural district serving much of western Cumberland County, he said.
Past summer school programs were not as well attended because of transportation issues, Roberts said. The idea of the summer camp is to offer students impacted by learning loss from COVID the opportunity for refresher and remediation.
Big Spring also plans to use ESSER III funds to offset the increased costs of substitute teachers brought in to cover classroom teachers who are out because of COVID-19 or because they had to quarantine following contact tracing, Roberts said.
©2022 The Sentinel (Carlisle, Pa.). Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
