The recent budget cuts in the MCPS district have been a prominent conversation topic among the students and staff; however, it is important that with these conversations we stay informed as to why the cuts are happening and what their effects may be.
One of the main causes for the need to tighten our budget is the lasting effects of COVID. When the COVID outbreak took hold in mid-2020, the federal government started providing funds to schools in order to keep them running during online learning. These funds were called the Elementary Secondary Schools Emergency Relief funds (ESSER) and were first established in early 2021.
ESSER money was provided by the government in order to maintain functioning education systems throughout the country. This money was given on a need-to-need basis to different schools and departments based on which areas were struggling the most. This money had strict qualifications that varied in each of the three funds. They had designated uses such as being required to directly address COVID in some aspect. This could be used for cleaning supplies, masks, desk dividers, ect.
Pat McHugh, the MCPS Executive Director of Business and Operations, provided an in-depth interview explaining how exactly this ESSER money was used and what is to come of these funds in the future.
ESSER I, or what had been referred to as “The Cares Act” began in 2021. Seeing as this was the beginning of COVID, this budget’s main purpose and priority was to provide Sentinel with the funds necessary to stay open and running throughout COVID. Meaning, it was to be used only for the purchase of cleaning and sanitary supplies, additional janitorial services, and anything else that would keep the spread of COVID at bay.
Each individual ESSER fund had a set amount of time by which it was required to be spent, in the case of ESSER I, the deadline was August 30, 2021.
McHugh said that “the main requirement of ESSER [was that] it [responded] to COVID, [prevented] COVID, or [prepared] for COVID.” Because of this, a vast majority of each group of the ESSER money was spent in an attempt to heal the “social and emotional” results of COVID. These results consisted of a loss of social skills, a widespread raise in feelings of hopelessness, and overall loss in face to face interactions.
As the funding requirements changed from preventing COVID to addressing its effects, the school system was able to hire many new kinds of staff. These staff “were described as academic and behavioral interventionists,” with the goal of supporting students through those times, McHugh explained. The district also brought in many permanent substitute teachers at this time in order to manage teacher absences due to COVID.
Because these new staff members were hired during the third and final ESSER group, they were not yet tenured. Tenured staff members have four year contracts with clauses that provide them with job security and protection from being cut prior to the end of their contract. Non tenured staff, on the other hand, have contracts that are only available for one year. With ESSER three’s budget running out at the end of the 2024 school year, anyone who is still untenured is now unable to renew their contracts.
MCPS will then decide who will be chosen to hire back based on factors such as class enrollment, previous reports, and qualifications for the position. Though it was also stated that all teachers who signed on at this point were made fully aware of their non tenure positions and the possible consequences.
The largest concern of the student body is how the end of the ESSER funding would affect the clubs and schools related activities that, for the last three years, have been relying on the ESSER money in order to continue.
Despite the concerns, McHugh reassures that the cuts to be made from these departments are not going to be detrimental to the continuation of the activity. This mindset is also closely supported by Sentinel’s principal Stephanie Thennis who is aiming to turn these cuts into something constructive for the school.
What McHugh clarifies is that the “activity and athletic budgets and their operating budgets” are being altered. Any adjustments are being made in order to maintain the delicate overall budget that Sentinel is made to operate within. The range of this budget is dictated by student enrollment levels, which dropped significantly during COVID but were expected to increase once restrictions were lifted. Because this did not happen, however, the overall budget Sentinel is expected to work with is less than it has been in previous years.
Restricting clubs, activities, or classes is neither the want nor the goal in this layered and complex situation. What must be done is determination of how the available money can most effectively be used; for example, “increasing revenue through rentals” is a priority. Though reductions can be made, McHugh states that they are “made as far away from the students as possible”.
Much of what MCPS is tasked with is comparable to a circus balancing act. They must ensure that all of the departments within the district operate within the designated and approved yearly budget. Administrators must take into consideration class sizes, employment retention, and the effects of learning loss from COVID in order to make the best decisions for the district as a whole.
Despite how many concerns the ESSER funds have raised, SHS administrators had already acknowledged this as the inevitable outcome. McHugh says that “this is not a surprise” and the staff knew that it was going to be a steep drop off in funds (or the “funding cliff”); however, the administrators also recognized that there was truly no other way to keep MCPS running at the time. “We didn’t take the easy path, we didn’t do facility based improvements, we addressed students”.
MCPS continues to push for new grants and budget plans in order to keep as many of the positions originally created for COVID intact as possible as these positions are highly beneficial to the school and all of its students.
As Mchugh commented, “…[ESSER] funds [were used] as they were intended to be used: to support schools [and] to support staff. The real challenge here is those positions that were helping students, helping staff, go away. And they go away because the funding goes away”. This loss of funding will continue to affect MCPS for years to come, but is seen by Pat Mchugh and Stephanie Thennis as an important step for our district towards a well-managed, healthy budget.
