Senate needs to act to help education

The school year is beginning in southern-central Connecticut. Yet classrooms are empty. The global pandemic, and the Trump administration’s failed response, have forced students to start the year online. We all hope schools can reopen soon. But, in the U.S. House of Representatives, we are saying that hope alone will not keep our children and families safe. Our students, teachers and staff need action. They need the Heroes Act.

Education is a priority of mine. I chair the subcommittee in the U.S. House of Representatives that provides federal funding for public schools. I have hosted hearings and briefings with health and education experts. We know that for the well-being of our children, we need to defeat the virus: with robust testing, with contact tracing, and with quality and affordable treatment.

Because even children are not immune from COVID-19. Guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has acknowledged they can spread the virus. Sadly, a 6-year-old in Florida even died of COVID-19. Then there are the teachers and staff. As many 1.5 million teachers have a higher risk of serious illness due to a pre-existing health condition, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation. That is one in four.

As we have been actively helping to defeat virus, the U.S. Congress must help schools safely reopen. Hoping is not enough.

One obstacle schools face is keeping their teachers employed and teaching. The coronavirus outbreak has upended the way schools are operating, and the pain could continue in the next school year when tax revenue losses will likely bring sharp cuts in education funding. The American Federation of Teachers estimated that 1.4 million jobs in our public schools could be lost, including nearly 6,000 in Connecticut.

Another is that schools need to take large and expensive steps for safety. The CDC has released very thoughtful guidelines that reopening schools in person for five days is the highest-risk scenario. So, schools need to buy personal protective equipment, soap and hand sanitizer, cleaning and sanitizing services. In fact, as many as one in five school districts need to replace their heating and cooling systems to be COVID-ready, according to a recent report from the nonpartisan Government Accountability Office.

Adding it all up, the average school district will need an additional $1.8 million to safely reopen, according to the Superintendents Association. But communities are hurting financially. Budget shortfalls nationwide are expected to reach $500 billion.

So, on May 15, the U.S. House of Representatives passed the Heroes Act, with nearly $58 billion for K-12 public education. It is to help schools cover unexpected costs necessary to reopen safely: for purchasing PPE, for cleaning and sanitizing classrooms, for making special accommodations for high-risk students and educators, for buying educational technology such as hot-spot devices, for training and professional development, for maintaining school personnel employment, for special education, and for reducing achievement gaps. The Heroes Act also provides nearly $1 trillion in state and local funding to fill unprecedented budget shortfalls that could lead to teacher layoffs like those we saw after the Great Recession.

That was more than 100 days ago. In the months since, one school year has ended. Another school year has started. And still, the U.S. Senate, taking its cues from the White House, has not acted for our children, not to defeat the virus, not to help schools safely reopen. Instead, they introduced a bill to allow corporations to write off business lunches. It is unconscionable.

We cannot, as a country, fail to do all we can for our children’s future. We must act and act with everything in our grasp. On a bipartisan basis, the Congress has passed and enacted four relief bills to deal with the virus. Now, we must rescue our children and their education. We must pass the Heroes Act, and build on it, to help schools safely reopen, to keep teachers teaching, to keep students learning, and to make schools safe enough for in-person learning to resume.

Here in Connecticut, the classrooms are dark. To flip the switch, we are calling on the U.S. Senate to join us and to act. Let us pass the Heroes Act and keep children’s future bright.