Category: Federal Government Actions

USDA to Eliminate School Meal ā€˜Junk Feesā€™ for Low-income Families

On November 1, 2024, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) announced that, starting in the 2027-28 school year, schools will be prohibited from charging junk fees to low-income families for meals served through the School Breakfast Program and the National School Lunch Program.

The new policy will only apply to students who are eligible for free and reduced-price school meals, but the USDA wants to eventually expand the ban on school meal junk fees for more students.

For more from K-12 Dive, click here.

As GAO Report Looked at Effectiveness of ESSER, PA Reports Appropriate Funds Usage (October 30, 2024)

According to a U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) report released October, 23, 2024, school districts prioritized spending of COVID-19 emergency (ESSER) funds based on community input, financial need, state policies and other influences. It also found that the effectiveness of the ESSER money for COVID-19 recovery efforts is difficult to determine because school districts were involved in many activities during the pandemic. Additionally, long-term improvements are unknown because not enough time has passed since initial positive effects were noted.

Republican members of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee had asked GAO to examine school district ESSER spending. Some conservative lawmakers at the federal level have questioned the proper use of the money. A statement posted on the Senate HELP Committee GOP page on X said that the report “found it difficult to determine what uses were effective. More research is needed from the field,ā€ read a statement posted Wednesday on the Senate HELP Committee GOP page on X.

In addition, AASA, The School Superintendents Association released a September report on spending practices from ESSERā€™s allocations from the American Rescue Plan and found most districts directed money toward expanded learning time, including summer programming and after-school activities. But because districts had various fiscal priorities and approaches for investing the money in different phases, it was difficult to generalize the best practice approaches for the emergency funds.

GAOā€™s report said education officials from varying states sometimes differed on what they considered was an allowable expense for district-level use of federal COVID-19 emergency funds for schools. Directives from state legislatures also influenced spending practices. Pennsylvania officials told GAO researchers that proposals to renovate or upgrade athletic fields, stadiums or tracks were denied because school districts could not justify that those improvements were necessary to respond to the pandemic.

For more from K-12 Dive, click here.

CDC: A Decline in Routine Vaccinations and Increase Exemption Rates can Lead to Outbreaks (October 29, 2024)

Fewer kindergartners are getting routine vaccinations compared to pre-pandemic times, dipping from 95% in the 2019-20 school year to less than 93% in 2023-24, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Meanwhile, the vaccination exemption rate for this group rose from 2.5% in 2019-20 to 3.3.% ā€” the highest level ever reported ā€” last year. Exemptions increased in 41 states and territories, and surpassed 5% in 14 of them. That amounts to more than 126,000 kindergartners with an exemption from at least one vaccination for the 2023-24 school year.

The combined decrease in routine shots and increase in exemptions ā€œjeopardizeā€ the 95% kindergartner vaccination rate goal for measles, mumps and rubella by 2030 set by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. It also “set[s] the stage for accumulation of clusters of undervaccinated children, which can lead to outbreaks.ā€

For more from K-12 Dive, click here.

GAO Report Looked at Effectiveness of ESSER (October 28, 2024)

According to a U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) report released October, 23, 2024, school districts prioritized spending of COVID-19 emergency (ESSER) funds based on community input, financial need, state policies and other influences. It also found that the effectiveness of the ESSER money for COVID-19 recovery efforts is difficult to determine because school districts were involved in many activities during the pandemic. Additionally, long-term improvements are unknown because not enough time has passed since initial positive effects were noted.

Republican members of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee had asked GAO to examine school district ESSER spending. Some conservative lawmakers at the federal level have questioned the proper use of the money. A statement posted on the Senate HELP Committee GOP page on X said that the report “found it difficult to determine what uses were effective. More research is needed from the field.ā€

In addition, AASA, The School Superintendents Association released a September report on spending practices from ESSERā€™s allocations from the American Rescue Plan and found most districts directed money toward expanded learning time, including summer programming and after-school activities. But because districts had various fiscal priorities and approaches for investing the money in different phases, it was difficult to generalize the best practice approaches for the emergency funds.

GAOā€™s report said education officials from varying states sometimes differed on what they considered was an allowable expense for district-level use of federal COVID-19 emergency funds for schools. Directives from state legislatures also influenced spending practices. Pennsylvania officials told GAO researchers that proposals to renovate or upgrade athletic fields, stadiums or tracks were denied because school districts could not justify that those improvements were necessary to respond to the pandemic.

For more from K-12 Dive, click here.

USDE Releases AI toolkit for K-12 Schools (October 28, 2024)

On October 24, 2024, prompted by a Biden administration October 2023 executive order and as a result of U.S. Department of Education (USDE) public listening sessions held with 90 educators as well as 12 roundtable discussions with education leaders between December 2023 and March 2024, USDE’s Office of Educational Technology released a highly anticipated guidance to help K-12 leaders integrate artificial intelligence (AI) into their school districts. The 74-page toolkit includes strategies for mitigating risks and developing AI use policies and comes as more K-12 school districts look to use the technology in their classrooms or for business operations.

Titled Empowering Education Leaders: A Toolkit for Safe, Ethical, and Equitable AI Integration, the toolkit contains three sections. They are:
–Mitigating risks while safeguarding studentsā€™ privacy, security and civil rights.
–Building a strategy for integrating the use of AI tools that best fits studentsā€™ needs.
–Guiding the effective use of AI to boost teaching and learning.

Click here to access the toolkit.

Source K-12 Dive