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With students learning remotely for a portion of the school year, then using one of many learning platforms last year, the School District of Lee County put its CARES Act dollars to use by adding additional resources to help with learning loss.
Grants and Program Development Director Teri Cannady shared a detailed timeline of funds the district received under CARES Act K-12 during a briefing meeting Monday afternoon. She explained that when they received ESSER I funds it was more than $21 million with only a few weeks to determine a plan, with the allocation providing a two-year cycle.
Cannady said that ESSER I was pretty much geared towards learning gaps, as all the assurances were tied to that. The seven allocations included high quality curriculum for reading; GEERS (Governors Education Emergency Relief); ESSER I, Coronavirus Prevention & Response; civics literacy; data informed supports application and instructional continuity plan.
In December 2020, ESSER II became another allocation the district would receive in the amount of $84,144,214.
"In July DOE notified us that they we were going to do a budget narrative and break the $84 million into four allocations. Four different grants that are specific, each have requirements for them," Cannady said. "When ESSER II came about we only had a few weeks and that is when we said, OK we need to gather and create our teams. We brought every division together to say here is the funding, here are the assurances and what are we going to do with this money."
The four proposed Florida Department of Education allocations tied to these funds include non-enrollment assistance; ($3,365,769) academic assistance ($16,828,843); technology assistance ($4,207,211) and lump sum ($59,742,391).
Cannady also shared information about the American Relief Plan, ESSER III, which amounts $174,189,163. She said with this one requiring public input, they are in the process of working with the communication department to create a survey and developing a website to show how the allocations are going to be used.
"We do not have direction of when funds will come. We have assurances from USDOE on how money can be spent. Again FLDOE has additional requirements," Cannady said.
An overview of classroom success, utilizing these funds, was shared with the board Monday afternoon.
Teaching and Learning Director Candace Allevato provided an update regarding Back on Track, a high school credit recovery program. She said it provides flexibility for students who are losing credit for one reason or another. The district uses Edgenuity, which schools have the ability to utilize in any manner that works best for them.
This program offers Monday through Saturday services for any ninth through 12th grade student in need of credit retrieval. Allevato said one of the high schools offers Saturday, while another does Zoom late hours from 8 to 9:30 p.m. for those athletes, or working students that need additional help.
"Our students have recovered 528 courses," Allevato said, which is important because of graduation requirements. "We are excited to be able to continue utilizing ESSER dollars."
ESSER funds also help with SAT and ACT resources and assessments for 11th and 12th grade students that have not had the opportunity to meet their graduation requirements in English language arts. They purchased ACT and SAT resources, so those tools are directly in front of the students providing test taking strategies, as well as taking the SAT for nonreportable scores.
"All of our 11th graders were provided with SAT reportable (scores) to colleges. It helps mitigate some of the learning loss as well," Allevato said.
ESSER funds also helped in starting Connect with LEE, live educational expert support through Zoom, which is provided to every student through daytime and evening hours. As of Sept. 24, 2,880 students and families have been served collectively.
Teaching and Learning Director Dr. Bethany Quisenberry said they were blessed last year with a reading grant that helped in implementing a primary literacy coach in every elementary school. She said although there are six grade levels at an elementary school, there are only three tested grades.
"Primary is our spot where we had the largest learning loss," Quisenberry said.
Due to this, the district was able to, through ESSER funding, advertise and hire primary coaches for math, English Language Arts and science.
ESSER funding also enabled the district to purchase iReady for English Language Arts and Math. Quisenberry said all elementary and middle schools are now using iReady.
She said the program is used as a resource for progress monitoring, as well as a tool for teachers to create individualized learning path. The program also provides a toolbox for teachers as it provides small group differentiated lesson plans, growth monitoring and mastery assessments.
Increased student learning time is another topic that has begun discussion again. Chief Academic Officer Dr. Jeff Spiro said the increased learning time has to be bargained and brought to the table with both TALC and SPALC. The two topics up for discussion are an extra 30 minutes across the board for staff and students for the school day, as well as moving to a seven period day instead of block scheduling.
"We are embarking on this funding because we have the opportunity through a particular grant to support increased student learning time. There is a process this has to go through. If this works, then we would look at increased staff and student learning time," Spiro said by reallocating funds to support something timely inside the organization. "It is very early."
The presentation was further broken down into sections of support, school development, student services and curriculum and instruction.
School Development
School Development Executive Director Shanna Flecha said in May they became proactive, as the third quarter progress monitoring provided some alarming data that showcased missed learning. She said they revisited what they did for the 23 D schools and took some proactive actions with resources and put them into place at the differentiated accountability schools.
The proactive school support included a leader; full time school nurse; full time social worker; dean; SEL resource teacher and an English language arts, science and math coach.
Spiro said those are resources they are going to be using with their tier three schools. He said they want to engage with families in a more meaningful way and having coaches allows a deeper impact on student achievement.
"We have targeted schools and students. We are hoping to see an increase in learning gains and student achievements," he said.
Board member Gwyn Gittens asked if there is any data, or ways to track how the funding is actually affecting the achievement gap monetarily.
Cannady said one of the requirements is to have a pre and post test decided by DOE, which has not been approved yet. She said they are hoping it is iReady, as that is what the district is currently using.
Gittens asked if they are looking at have a proportionate number of counselors and staff members based on needs.
The district looks at absentee rates, the number of COVID cases, as well as the number of students involuntary hospitalized under the Bakers Act by school. Resources are assigned based on those data points on a school-by- school basis, as well as if there are any tier three schools.
Student Services
Student Services Executive Director Jessica Duncan said with the increase in needs because of the pandemic, they have increased services in mental health, social and emotional programming, attendance, discipline and graduation.
Last fall, she said Golisano Children’s Hospital saw a 66 percent increase in pediatric emergency room patients that were Baker Acted.
"We know students need support. The first thing we did was look at staff," Duncan said.
She explained that they put separate items in the ESSER proposal related to discipline, attendance and mental health.
One of those tools is the Meebie Play Therapy Doll, which will be used primarily in elementary school, as students still struggle with verbalizing how they are feeling. Those students feeling high anxiety can use the different moveable facial features to help verbalize their emotions.
TEACH is another tool the district is using to build relationships with students while deescalating a situation. There is also a physical intervention component if needed.
"All schools have to have a team with trained personnel," Duncan said.
Duncan said they are also utilizing attendance training in collaboration with Attendance Works. There are five social worker positions that locate student whose whereabouts are unknown, or have been chronically absent.
She said it is an expectation for teachers to call their student if they see a pattern with not attending school. With that said, they are also proactive through student services as staff is out at schools to provide support onsite.
Board member Betsy Vaughn said the bottom line is “we are killing our teachers,” and they have to find a way to take a little bit off their plate.
Superintendent Dr. Ken Savage said they would look deeper into finding ways to take extra burdens off the teachers.