Feds to cut $400,000 from rural school grant program in Montana, $5.4 million nationwide
ontana will likely lose $400,000 from a federal program that provides aid to rural schools serving students from low-income families this school year because of changes made by the Department of Education.
The Rural Low-Income Schools program provides money for schools under the broad guideline of improving student achievement. The money comes in addition to Montana's regular funding system.
"Schools would decide, well, we normally couldn't do that on our own, so we'll use these funds to do that," said Montana Rural Education Association director Dennis Parman. The could include things like after-school programs, or extra academic support for students.
A spreadsheet provided to Parman by the National Rural Education Association shows that nationwide the program lost $5.4 million. Some states have modest increases, but most saw less money. Funds are labeled for the 2020 fiscal year, and are distributed on July 1, 2020.
Montana could lose more than half of the $798,000 it got for the 2019 fiscal year, but other states were hit harder; Iowa lost 245% of its funding, about $256,000; Maine lost 264% of its funding, about $1.1 million; New Hampshire lost 770% of its funding, about $642,000.
Regionally, Wyoming and the Dakotas received small increases in funding. However, the program isn't as widely used in those states, which combined for about $324,000 in funding during the 2019 fiscal year.
https://billingsgazette.com/news/local/feds-to-cut-from-rural-school-grant-program-in-montana/article_62020e2d-4b70-50a6-9555-2ab7ad8f269d.html
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