VDOE has provided me a concise and clear description of the Governor’s initiative to provide tutoring and special education services to struggling Virginia school kids.
The program seems both on point and appropriately careful.
The input describes the sources of the money, where it was originally targeted, where some of it is being re-targeted for tutoring and special ed services, how soon it will be spent and the services made available to parents, who will receive vouchers variable by household income to purchase them.
The plan for this initiative spends $30 million out of a total of $68 million available.
That money is available because:
- the schools to which it was originally targeted with Emergency Assistance for Non-Public Schools (EANS I & EANS II) funding were not able to use it all within guidelines; and
- it reverted to a more broadly usable fund, Governor’s Emergency Education Relief (GEER).
The supply of tutoring and special education service providers nationwide and in Virginia who are qualified under federal guidelines for expenditure of the money under GEER has fallen far short of demand.
This program is making a major attempt to organize supply at the state level.
If this attempt proves successful, and additional qualified suppliers become available, demand will exceed what $30 million will buy. If that happens, I expect the allocation of funds to be quickly increased.
But it remains difficult to provide such services legally, efficiently and effectively. All of it is tax money, or borrowed money that taxpayers will have to repay.
We want value for the money and for the students. Continue reading