School leaders: Lamont’s funding not enough to help students after COVID
Harding High School music teacher Sheena Graham expects a lot to be different when all of her students come back fulltime as the COVID pandemic wanes.
Harding and other schools in Bridgeport are going to need more staff to help teachers get students caught up — as well as school counselors, she said.
“It’s having all the social-emotional skills, and having additional people in that area, because coming back is going to be challenging, depending on how your family has suffered through the pandemic,” she said. “We may need more counselors on hand to deal with all of the needs, even for the adults.”
School districts across the state, especially those in Connecticut’s cities, expect they will need huge increases in staffing to get students caught up after the COVID pandemic broadly interrupted learning. Gov. Ned Lamont has proposed sending schools more than $440 million in federal aid — but, at the same time, pausing promised increases in state aid.
Even though the federal funding is a bigger increase than districts would have seen if state aid had been increased, many districts
say the plan will leave them short. Their needs, they say, far exceed what the federal money can provide — and after two years, when the federal funds dry up, they’ll be back to where they started, underfunded and struggling to give students the support they need.
For example, Bridgeport is receiving $40.5 million in federal funds to spend over the next two years, but Superintendent Michael Testani said that with the “masses of kids” that could potentially take advantage of learning loss recovery and summer programs, that is not going to be enough. The district could go through the money
quickly this summer and the next.
“We obviously can’t add additional employees, because we know in two years that money’s going to dry up, and those people and those services would be gone,” Testani said.
“It would be nice to be able to have a little flexibility, possibly to either stretch the money out or to know that when this money is gone, that new money would be coming in.”
Lamont’s budget proposal pauses the state’s schoolfunding formula by skipping the $117 million increase in state aid that was scheduled over the next two fiscal years. Stalling the increases in the ECS grants will help Lamont close the state’s deficit, which tops $2 billion over the next two fiscal years. The proposal does nothing to satisfy the growing chorus of those who want the state to fully fund seven years’ worth of Education Cost Sharing grant increases by fiscal year 2022, or those who just wanted the state to increase annual funding.
Instead of increasing state aid, Lamont is relying on the $443.2 million the state was required to funnel directly to districts to meet their needs. Districts were told on Feb. 1 how much they will receive over the next two school years.
The state Department of Education released guidance and priorities for how federal relief funding should be used, which includes paying for staff development and protective equipment to keep schools safe during the pandemic as well as to provide extended days, more tutoring and summer school for those who have fallen behind during the pandemic.
“Gov. Lamont’s proposed budget leverages over $440 million in federal funding that is available to school districts across Connecticut including the state’s Alliance and Urban districts,” the governor’s spokesman, Max Reiss, said in an email. “These funds can and should be used for school leaders to provide the resources necessary to address the needs of the districts and focus on learning loss and recovery as well as continued safe reopening. Districts were also held harmless from ECS reductions, protecting them from the impact of COVID related enrollment fluctuations.”
But for a district like Bridgeport, schools have struggled for years with the ever-increasing cost of operation. The district has shed 24 school counseling staff and social workers since the 2010-2011 school year.
Bridgeport spends just $15,000 per student, compared to $19,000 spent per student in neighboring Fairfield.
“Bridgeport has been the most underfunded when you look at it, compared to New Haven and Hartford and Waterbury,” Testani said. “So we’ve lost a lot of critical services to kids over the last decade, and I think it just makes it much more challenging. People are taking on more and more and more.”
If districts received the full increases in Education Cost Sharing funds now, Bridgeport would have received an additional $15 million on top of $20.28 million in federal relief heading to the district this year.
“The situation here in Bridgeport prior to the pandemic was not ideal,” Testani said. “Coming out of the pandemic, it’s even more amplified to the point where we need to hit the ground running immediately to be able to provide students with support and services. And we need funds to be able to sustain that — not just for a year or two, but long term.”
Other districts see the same problems
Other district leaders have expressed the same concerns as Testani, saying the federal relief funding is not enough for them to address the needs exacerbated by the pandemic.
In New Haven, the district’s chief financial officer told board members on Monday that the governor’s proposal to freeze the ECS funding will have a “devastating” impact on the district, according to the New Haven Independent.
Hartford Superintendent Leslie Torres-Rodriguez explained that if the school year, or school days, are extended to help address learning loss, it could cost more money than the district is getting.
“I’m not saying that that’s going to be the approach, but I have to start somewhere, so that we can know what exactly are we looking at from a resource perspective, because of sustainability,” she said, adding that teachers have told her that they need additional time to support students.
“We know that this is not a one-year, one-shot recovery and rebuilding effort. This is a multi-year approach, and that’s just as it relates to the instructional support.”
Lawyers for several school districts and the organization that oversees high school sports in Connecticut went before a federal judge Friday seeking the dismissal of a lawsuit that would prevent transgender girls in the state from competing in girls’ sports.
The lawsuit was filed a year ago by several cisgender runners who argue they have been deprived of wins, state titles and athletic opportunities by a state policy that allowed two transgender sprinters to compete against them.
The Connecticut Interscholastic Athletic Council has said its policy is designed to comply with a state law that requires all high school students be treated according to their gender identity.
“I loved running in high school, and I loved my teammates on the girls’ team,“Andraya
Yearwood, one of the two transgender runners at the center of the case, said in a statement after the hearing. “If I had not been able to run on the girls’ team, I would not have been able to run at all and it would have been so devastating if one of the best part of my high school experience had been taken away.”
The arguments conducted during a video conference hearing Friday centered around Title IX, the federal law that requires equal opportunities for women and girls in education, including sports.
Defense attorney Joshua Block argued the CIAC policy doesn’t deny any girl a meaningful opportunity to participate in sports, but that overturning it would violate the Title IX rights of transgender girls.
“No court, no agency has ever defined a participation opportunity as winning an equal number of trophies,” he argued. “The plaintiffs in this case are accomplished athletes who have gained a great deal from the athletic opportunities offered them and they’ve won national acclaim from that, but there’s room enough on the podium for everyone. And accommodating the interests of these particular athletes doesn’t require schools to shove aside girls who are transgender and deny them participation opportunities too.”
The plaintiffs argue that the rights of cisgender girls under Title IX are being violated in Connecticut by being forced to compete against what they term “biological males.”
Plaintiff attorney Roger Brooks, from the conservative Alliance Defending Freedom, argued that the law guarantees girls “equal quality” of competition, which he said is denied by having to race people with what he described as inherent physiological advantages.
“Participation isn’t enough. Meaningful experience isn’t enough,” he said. “Title IX guarantees our daughters equal chances to be champions.”
Brooks argued that the transgender sprinters improperly won 15 championship races between 2017 and 2020 and cost cisgender girls the opportunity to advance to other races 85 times.
Sprinter Chelsea Mitchell, a plaintiff who now runs collegiately at William & Mary, spoke after the hearing and described what she called the demoralizing effects of the CIAC policy. She said losing races to trans runners cost her awards, including several state championships.
“No girl should have to settle into her starting blocks knowing that no matter how hard you work, you don’t have a fair shot at victory,” she said.
The Trump administration’s Justice Department and the Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights had sided with the plaintiffs. But the Biden administration withdrew that support earlier this week.
The Trump administration’s intervention in the case last year came as state legislatures around the country debated restricting transgender athletes’ participation to their gender assigned at birth. Seventeen states considered such legislation, and Idaho passed a law. The Republicancontrolled Mississippi Senate overwhelmingly approved a similar bill earlier this month, which is now awaiting action in the House.
On his first day in office, President Joe Biden signed an executive order prohibiting discrimination based on gender identity in school sports and elsewhere.
“It was very heartbreaking for me to hear about President Biden’s executive order and that the Equality Act passed in the House,“said Selina Soule, the named plaintiff in the lawsuit, who now runs at the College of Charleston. ”I know that what I am fighting for is right and I will continue fighting for fairness in women’s sports as long as it takes.“
U.S. District Judge Robert Chatigny said he expects to issue a ruling on a motion to dismiss the Connecticut lawsuit in two or three weeks.
As President Joe Biden’s proposed $1.9 trillion coronavirusrelief package advances through Congress, U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal heard Friday from Connecticut retailers who spoke of the struggles their businesses are still facing nearly a year since the pandemic hit in the state.
Additional federal assistance is needed more than ever, business owners said during the online forum co-hosted by the Connecticut Retail Merchants Association. Nearly 22,700 small businesses around the state have been approved for nearly $2 billion in forgivable loans through the latest round of the federal Paycheck Protection Program, but many merchants are still suffering.
“The membership of our association has also been hit dramatically by COVID,” said Connecticut Retail Merchants Association President Tim Phelan. “Those are the small independent retailers that make up the backbone of Connecticut’s economy, and they’ve been hurting with COVID and the restrictions in place. In most cases, they’ve been resilient and phenomenal in the way they’ve had to shift gears almost on the fly.”
Retail is one of the industries that has endured the most job losses during the pandemic. Last December, about 164,000 people worked in retail positions in Connecticut, comprising 10 percent of the state’s total workforce, according to the state Department of Labor. But the number of retail jobs was down 8,300, or 5 percent, from a year earlier.
The industry’s employment decline reflects dwindling foot traffic in downtowns across the state.
“I really don’t think that the PPP is the answer,” said Jody Morneault, owner of the Stackpole Moore Tryon clothing store in downtown Hartford. “If I bring back an employee for eight to 24 weeks, and then I can’t keep them on the payroll because there’s not enough foot traffic in downtown Hartford because all these companies are closed, how will I ever be able to keep them on the payroll eight to 24 weeks later when there’s not a human on the street?”
Blumenthal responded that PPP’s loan terms have become more flexible in its second round, but that Morneault’s story underscored the need for more help. The Biden-backed relief package, known as the American Rescue Plan, includes additional funding for small businesses.
“Your question really speaks to the absolute urgency of moving forward in a big and decisive way,” Blumenthal said. “You can aid those (small) businesses through PPP, but you can’t see small businesses in isolation. They are part of an economy that needs a shot in the arm. Just like we’re giving vaccines, if you stop with one dose, you’re not going to be as effective as two doses.”
The second-term Democratic senator also touted the American Rescue Plan’s stimulus payments, which would send $1,400-perperson checks to households across the country. Those would “put money into people’s pockets, and they’re going into retail stores to buy stuff,” Blumenthal said.
In a sign that the $600 checks included in the $900 billion COVID-19 relief legislation passed last December have bolstered customer confidence, U.S. consumer spending grew by 2.4 percent in January — the largest increase in seven months.
At the same time, other types of service providers are also struggling.
“We were one of the groups that was really hit hard and continues to be hit hard,” said David Humphrey, CEO of a Connecticutbased company that owns 32 Planet Fitness gyms, with more than 400 employees in Connecticut. “Obviously, people have been reluctant to come back to gyms. We’re doing much better now, but January, which is normally a big month for us in the gym industry, was an OK month for us this year. We’re still kind of clinging to life support.”
Humphrey asked whether Blumenthal would support Senate legislation that would accompany a House of Representatives gymrelief bill. Blumenthal said that the “pattern is to incorporate these separate bills (into broader relief packages)… and I can guarantee you I will support it.”
Abby Jewett, the CRMA’s board chairwoman and a regional vice president of external and legislative affairs at AT&T, cited retailers’ growing data-security concerns as they rely more on e-commerce during the pandemic.
“One of the things that we’re seeing is a state-by-state online data-privacy push,” Jewett said. “I think what the retailers would very much appreciate is a holistic federal approach to data privacy. It’s obviously incredibly important for our customers and building trust between retailers and customers.”
Blumenthal, the chairman of a Senate subcommittee on consumer protection, product safety and data security, said he wanted to take action.
“What we need is a federal standard that protects privacy, so that we recognize the data that you submit — and it’s principally on the internet — is your data,” Blumenthal said. “It belongs to you. This information is yours. When it’s shared or sold, you have some consent, some rights over it.”