NEXT
 
Schools across the country have now received three rounds of funding to help address the effects of the COVID 19 pandemic that has gripped our country for the past two years. O'Neill Public School's initial CARES Act ESSER I funding was in the amount of $143,165. Those funds were shared with St. Mary's, but the following two allocations were for O'Neill Public only, as St. Mary's received their funds from another entity. The second CRRSA ESSER II funding for the district was in the amount of $523,447 and the third round of funding, American Rescue Plan ARP ESSERS III, was in the amount of $1,176,409. The district took public comment both through an online survey and during public comment at a public hearing. The first round of CARES Act funds have been expended. They were spent in the following ways: to purchase PPE for both O'Neill Public Schools and St. Mary's Catholic School, thermometers and cleaning supplies for both districts, high MERV air filters for O'Neill Public's HVAC system, MacBook Airs, Dells and Chromebooks for St. Mary's, and JUNO Amplification devices for O'Neill Public. CARES funds were also used to pay for a Licensed Mental Health Therapist one day a week to address the social-emotional mental health needs brought on by the pandemic. The CRRSA funds have been expended in the following ways: to purchase additional PPE, cleaning supplies, and high MERV air filters, to purchase a variety of online programs to assist students in making up any learning loss they may have experienced in the core areas of reading and math during the pandemic and strengthen their basic skills to be ready to move to the next grade level, to purchase other intervention materials to be used during the school day, to provide extra practice to those students who experienced learning loss, to purchase the DESSA to assess students mental health needs, to pay for a year of our MacBook lease for the Jr./Sr. High School to ensure students can connect from home if quarantined or isolated, to purchase software to allow remote parent-teacher conference scheduling and attendance, to purchase new high quality English/Language Arts curriculum for grades 6-12, to continue to provide one day a week services from a licensed mental health therapist, to provide staff development activities for staff to ensure high quality instruction for all students, to pay for teachers and materials for summer school during the summer of 2021, to purchase upgraded SMART Boards at each building to provide high quality instruction to all students impacted by the pandemic, and to pay the salary and benefits of two Elementary teachers to reduce class sizes in 5th and 6th grades and two additional periods of English at the Jr./Sr. High School. We have $11,799.84 left in these funds to spend. The ARP funds are just beginning to be expended. Thus far we have used these funds in the following ways: continue to purchase cleaning supplies and high MERV filters, to pay for a new Ford Transit van to allow for further social distancing, and to purchase additional bottle filling stations to avoid water fountain germ sharing and ensure student hydration. We have $1,080,995.83 left in ARP funds to continue to expend. We will continue to pay our additional staff, make computer payments, provide summer school services for students needing them, provide high quality instructional materials and teacher staff development, as well as other items that may be needed to provide high quality educational continuity for all students in our district.
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