Tag: pandemic

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Pandemic relief funds spent by school districts

Pandemic relief funds spent by school districts

Over the past two years, the state of Mississippi has received $2.5 billion in pandemic relief funds to improve education and help reduce COVID-related learning loss. 

The Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER) Fund was created initially by the Coronavirus Aid Relief and Economic Security (CARES) Act and then subsequently replenished in two other pieces of federal legislation, creating three separate pots of money for the state and districts to spend. 

All three sets of funds require that 90{e4f787673fbda589a16c4acddca5ba6fa1cbf0bc0eb53f36e5f8309f6ee846cf} of the money go directly to school districts. There are a wide variety of allowable expenses under the ESSER guidelines, but the U.S. Department of Education instructs school districts to prioritize efforts to “safely reopen schools for full-time instruction for all students, maintain safe in-person operations, advance educational equity, and build capacity.”

The remaining 10{e4f787673fbda589a16c4acddca5ba6fa1cbf0bc0eb53f36e5f8309f6ee846cf} goes to the state Department of Education, which has broad discretion to use the money for any emergency needs from the pandemic. No more than half a percent of the total amount in each ESSER fund can be used on administrative expenses. 

Thus far, the Department of Education has spent 29{e4f787673fbda589a16c4acddca5ba6fa1cbf0bc0eb53f36e5f8309f6ee846cf} of its ESSER I monies, primarily on updating the Mississippi Student Information System (MSIS), digital literacy coaches, a school nurse program, career and technical education equipment, and Pre-K funding. Only 1{e4f787673fbda589a16c4acddca5ba6fa1cbf0bc0eb53f36e5f8309f6ee846cf} of ESSER II money has been spent at the state level, primarily on MSIS updates and digital content subscriptions. 

Districts spent their money in nine major categories, which are described below. 

  • Employee salaries: salaries for teachers, professional personnel, instructional aides, and substitute teachers; overtime pay, performance-based salary incentives, and COVID-19 incentive payments
  • Employee benefits: health insurance, life insurance, retirement contributions, unemployment compensation
  • Professional and technical services: educational consultants, counseling services, lawyers, architects, accountants, nurses, data processing services
  • Property services: water and sewer, electricity, communication, custodial, lawn care, construction services, maintenance services
  • Other purchased services: student transportation services, insurance (other than employee benefits), postal services, advertising, 
  • Supplies: software, gasoline, transportation supplies, food, books, periodicals
  • Property: land, buildings/building improvements, computer equipment, furniture, connectivity equipment, cars, buses 
  • Other objects: dues and fees, interest, debt, payments to state agencies
  • Other uses: summer food, indirect costs

View the charts below to learn more about how this money has been budgeted and district-level spending for each pot.

ESSER I

Created By: Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act

Available through: Sept. 30, 2022

Total to Mississippi: $169,883,002  

Reserved for statewide programming: $16,988,300

ESSER II

Created By: Coronavirus Response and Relief Supplemental Appropriations Act

Available through: Sept. 30, 2023

Total to Mississippi: $724,532,847 

Reserved for statewide programming: $72,453,285

ESSER III

Created By: American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA)

Available through: Sept. 30, 2024

Total to Mississippi: $1,628,366,137  

Reserved for statewide programming: $162,836,614 

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The association of resilience with depression, anxiety, stress and physical activity during the COVID-19 pandemic | BMC Public Health

The association of resilience with depression, anxiety, stress and physical activity during the COVID-19 pandemic | BMC Public Health

Research design and contributors

On the net surveys have been executed to collect both of those longitudinal and cross-sectional details at a few time details. The 1st study was performed early on through the COVID-19 pandemic from 9th to 19th April 2020 the second from 30th July to 16th August 2020 and the third concerning 1st and 25th December 2020. Throughout the initially time position, Australian point out governments had adopted remarkable actions to reduce the rates of infection which includes social distancing, lockdowns, and travel constraints. During the second time stage, all Australian states except Victoria experienced peaceful constraints because of to minimal case numbers of the an infection. At the time of the 3rd study, most COVID-19 limits were being lifted in all States and Territories as the premiums of infection were being mostly below command [21, 22].

At each and every study, participants (together with new contributors recruited for survey 2) were requested if they would like to take part in foreseeable future data selection chances. Individuals completing at minimum two surveys turned section of a longitudinal cohort while all those who elected to entire only one survey formed the cross-sectional cohort. The surveys ended up anonymous and hosted on the Qualtrics survey system. Australian older people aged 18 years and above have been invited to complete the surveys using paid Facebook advertising, social media (e.g., Twitter) and institutional sources such as electronic mail lists. On line educated consent was provided by all members just after they experienced read the data sheet that outlined the mother nature of their participation, the challenges and gains of participation, and how the knowledge would be utilised. Ethical approval was granted by Central Queensland University’s Human Investigate Ethics Committee (Acceptance range 22332).

Actions

Demographic qualities provided age (several years), gender, several years of education, weekly household profits (< 1000 AUD, 1000 - < 2000 AUD, or ≥ 2000 AUD), and marital status (in a relationship or not). Chronic disease status (Yes/No) was identified using the question “Have you ever been told by a doctor that you have any chronic health problems?”. These included one or a combination of heart disease, high blood pressure, stroke, cancer, depressive disorder, anxiety disorder, psychotic illness, bipolar disorder, diabetes, arthritis, chronic back/neck pain, asthma, COPD, and chronic kidney/renal diseases [23].

Resilience was assessed using the six-item Brief Resilience Scale (BRS). The BRS measures an individuals’ ability to bounce back from an adverse event and focuses on the ability to recover [24]. The BRS is a reliable measure of resilience, with Cronbach’s alpha ranging from 0.80 to 0.91 and a 1 month test-retest reliability (ICC) of 0.69 [24]. The BRS is comprised of six items with three positively worded items (1, 3, and 5) and negatively worded items (2, 4, and 6). For example, a positive item states “I tend to bounce back quickly after hard times” while a negative item states “I have a hard time making it through stressful events”. Responses were provided on a 5-point Likert scale with anchors at 1 (strongly disagree) and 5 (strongly agree). The scale was scored by reverse coding the negative items and then averaging the total score for the six items. Final scores range from 1.0–5.0 with a score of 3.0–4.3 considered a normal level of resilience [25].

Psychological distress was measured using the 21-item Depression, Anxiety and Stress Scale (DASS-21) [26]. The DASS-21 has shown acceptable construct validity and high reliability (Cronbach’s alphas were 0.88, 0.82 and 0.90 for depression, anxiety and stress respectively) in a non-clinical adult population [27]. Each domain has seven items scored on a 4-point Likert scale between 0 (did not apply to me at all) and 3 (applied to me very much, or most of the time). Example items were “I was aware of dryness of my mouth” or “I found myself getting agitated”. A score was calculated for each domain by adding the scores for the relevant items and multiplying by two. Standard cut-points were used to determine whether participants had symptom severity above normal for depression (≥10 points), anxiety (≥8 points), and stress (≥15 points) [26].

Physical activity was assessed using the Active Australia Survey (AAS), which comprises eight items identifying the duration and frequency of walking, and moderate and vigorous (MVPA) physical activities, over the past 7 days. For example, questions about walking are “In the last week, how many times have you walked continuously, for at least 10 minutes, for recreation, exercise or to get to or from places?” and “What do you estimate was the total time that you spent walking in this way in the last week?”. The AAS guidelines were used to calculate total physical activity by summing minutes of walking, minutes of moderate activity, and minutes of vigorous activity (multiplied by 2). Participants were then categorised as meeting the physical activity guidelines (≥150 min of moderate – vigorous (MVPA) per week) or not (< 150 min MVPA per week) [28]. The AAS criterion validity has been found to be acceptable for use in self-administered format, with correlations between self-reported physical activity and weekly pedometer steps, and accelerometry being 0.43 and 0.52 respectively [29].

Analyses

Statistical analysis was undertaken using SAS software v9.4. Two datasets, longitudinal and repeated cross-sectional, were analysed separately. Participants completing at least two surveys were included in the longitudinal dataset. The repeated cross-sectional dataset excluded those in the longitudinal dataset and therefore included only those completing one survey. Descriptive statistics (mean, standard deviation, and percentages) were calculated and are presented for each time point. Changes in resilience scores were examined using general linear mixed models for the longitudinal data, and general linear models for cross-sectional data. In addition to bivariate analyses, estimated changes in resilience scores were also adjusted for age, gender, years of education, weekly household income, relationship status, and chronic disease status. Multiple comparison correction was applied using the simulation option in PROC GLIMMIX.

Associations between resilience scores with physical activity and depression, anxiety, and stress were also examined using general linear mixed models for the longitudinal data and general linear models for the cross-sectional data. Three models were run for both datasets. Model 1 included resilience scores, time and either physical activity, depression, anxiety, or stress. Model 2 included the additional covariates: age, gender, years of education, weekly household income, relationship status, and chronic disease status. To examine whether the observed associations were independent, physical activity, depression, anxiety, and stress were also included in Model 3 together with time and all other covariates.

Due to missing values for the household income variable being higher than 10{e4f787673fbda589a16c4acddca5ba6fa1cbf0bc0eb53f36e5f8309f6ee846cf}, analyses were conducted with and without household income as a covariate. As the results between these two analyses did not change the findings, only models including household income are presented. Crude and adjusted differences in resilience scores with 95{e4f787673fbda589a16c4acddca5ba6fa1cbf0bc0eb53f36e5f8309f6ee846cf} confidence intervals are reported. All p-values were two sided and considered significant if < 0.05.

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One silver lining in the cloud of pandemic schooling: support for school choice is soaring, by Cynthia M. Allen | Columnists

One silver lining in the cloud of pandemic schooling: support for school choice is soaring, by Cynthia M. Allen | Columnists

If you have compensated any awareness to the incredibly community, really divisive debates above faculty administration, plan, curricula and academic outcomes — in Fort Value, Southlake and quite a few other areas of the place — you know that we have but to expertise all of the aftershocks from two several years of pandemic studying.

There has been remarkable dismay with educational content — from CRT to sexual schooling to what publications are occupying university library cabinets.

There has been disappointment with lousy academic benefits, so substantially so that university districts can barely muster sufficient guidance to pass bonds for significantly required upgrades on academic amenities.

And there has been exasperation with masking and quarantining procedures that have held healthy youngsters out of college for months, demoralized workers and prompted immeasurable hurt to pupils.

Fortunately, mothers and fathers are trying to get to make modifications.

Sometimes, it’s through protests and activism. Other occasions, it’s bigger voter engagement.

Individuals are also reading…

But as survey just after study indicates, though they’re pursuing modify inside of public school management and institutions, mom and dad are also searching for much more and much better instructional possibilities for their children.

And this may well be the shiniest silver lining of pandemic understanding nonetheless.

A new poll produced by the American Federation for Children and Invest in Training, and noted by Nationwide Evaluation, displays broad and developing support for college decision. And importantly, it is throughout all racial demographics and political teams.

The survey uncovered that majorities of Democrats, Republicans and independents concurred with the sentiment that “parents must be in demand of decisions regarding their child’s education.”

(Why moms and dads would ever disagree, but specifically following the final two decades, is a mystery to me.)

Support was even larger among the Black and Hispanic respondents, whose small children are much more likely to be trapped in badly carrying out public institutions.

With regard to useful answers, the poll also identified large amounts of support for instruction-personal savings accounts and for the federal tax-credit scholarship system proposed in the Education Independence Scholarship Act and at present right before Congress. It would allow people today and businesses to get a tax credit for donating to nonprofit scholarships that let parents to deliver small children to the faculty of their preference.

The research is hardly an outlier in publish-pandemic instances.

Previously this yr, RealClear Feeling Study study identified related fees of guidance for more educational alternatives for moms and dads and students, with only 18 p.c of respondents indicating they do not again school option — considerably lower than pre-pandemic stages.

In the Nationwide School Alternative 7 days group’s study, more than 50 percent of mom and dad explained that they were taking into consideration shifting a child’s college or had viewed as accomplishing so in the previous 12 months.

The major concerns were, no surprise, faculty good quality and COVID-19 disruptions.

Meanwhile, moms and dads who selected this calendar year to property-faculty their children or send out them to personal college are twice as probably to be “very satisfied” with their children’s activities as opposed to dad and mom who ship their children to district universities.

Charters also have high levels of parental satisfaction.

And household-college and private-school moms and dads report appreciably far more tutorial, psychological and social development in their small children than mom and dad of general public-faculty youngsters.

All of this makes ideal feeling offered what the past two years have exposed about the state of general public schooling.

But options these types of as non-public, constitution and household educational institutions are not accessible to many mother and father.

Even with North Texas’ strong constitution faculty community, the best accomplishing charters have prolonged waitlists.

And non-public or property universities are not monetarily possible for quite a few, particularly one mothers and fathers or individuals who are economically deprived, as about 80 {e4f787673fbda589a16c4acddca5ba6fa1cbf0bc0eb53f36e5f8309f6ee846cf} of Fort Really worth ISD learners are — at least not without policy variations these kinds of as discounts accounts or tax credits.

These reforms are probable, specifically mainly because aid for more alternatives transcends what usually divides us.

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Pandemic sees California homeschool application numbers soar

Pandemic sees California homeschool application numbers soar

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Influence of Forced Online Distance Education During the COVID-19 Pandemic on the Perceived Stress of Postsecondary Students: Cross-sectional Study

Influence of Forced Online Distance Education During the COVID-19 Pandemic on the Perceived Stress of Postsecondary Students: Cross-sectional Study

History: Just one of the most significant changes in the bulk of postsecondary academic institutions was the closure of those institutions and the change of academic actions to on-line length mastering formats as a end result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Closure merged with forced on the web distance education and learning (FODE) was a heal with quite a few aspect results, 1 of them remaining the outcome on students’ psychological overall health and, far more particularly, degrees of pressure. Because of to the novelty of the situation, there have been no studies so considerably built to hyperlink fulfillment with on the internet analyze, inner thoughts toward the study obligations, and tension amongst students.

Aim: The intention of the review is to assess the perceived pressure of Slovenian postsecondary learners in order to establish the on-line study–related components influencing or acting as a covariate through the COVID-19 lockdown.

Techniques: Data selection was carried out by a self-noted study as portion of a huge cross-sectional analyze based on knowledge collected from postsecondary learners from a quantity of higher educational establishments. The random sample consisted of 4455 men and women. The Perceived Anxiety Scale (PSS-4), Pleasure with On the internet Study Scale (SAT-5), and Inner thoughts Toward Examine Obligations Scale (FETSOS) ended up made use of to assess the constructs and the relations observed in just the review.

Effects: The success reveal that much more than 50 {e4f787673fbda589a16c4acddca5ba6fa1cbf0bc0eb53f36e5f8309f6ee846cf} of all respondents reported large levels of tension. The variation in the reported levels of perceived tension between genders have been statistically considerable (N=4454, F2=56.719, P<.001, Cohen d=0.35). Overall, the results suggest that a decline in the motivation to study, the quality of internet and mobile connections, and the presence of distracting factors in the study space were the 3 main factors related to the students’ negative emotions as associated with the timeliness, performance, and quality of the study obligations. Furthermore, the results show that the level of satisfaction with online study affected stress such that the higher the satisfaction, the lower the stress. Moreover, the more positive feelings connected with the timeliness, performance, and quality of the study obligations that the students felt, the more satisfaction they reported with online study and, thus indirectly, lower stress and less negative feelings.

Conclusions: The findings of this study call for implementing structures and measures targeted at stress reduction, working conditions, and pedagogy with regard to FODE.

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In NEK elementary school, worries about kids falling behind as pandemic enters year three

In NEK elementary school, worries about kids falling behind as pandemic enters year three

In a collection airing all week, independent producer Erica Heilman talks with academics, administrators and team in the Northeast Kingdom about their struggles soon after two years of the COVID-19 pandemic. These days, Erica talks with teachers and staff at Newport Metropolis Elementary University about gaps they’re noticing in improvement and studying between their college students. She starts with principal Elaine Collins.

Elaine Collins: “If you have any baby who is battling in any way in a information area, and you have a number of years of inconsistent instruction, just due to the fact of the circumstance of the pandemic, it is really definitely, genuinely difficult to recapture and near the educational gap. It can be just about unachievable when you have numerous a long time in a row.

“So it normally takes actually intentional and deliberate instruction in buy to convey kids… type of near the educational gap. What that usually means in practicality is that you have, let us say, a 3rd quality class, and you may possibly have several young children who are truly at possibly a kindergarten- or initially-quality degree, in terms of their educational degree. So you have a third grade instructor who is used to teaching 3rd quality curricula, who is utilised to dealing with third quality pupils who have a specified maturity degree and capability to obtain details. And then you can find this mismatch of young ones who are emotionally, socially, academically at a significantly young age. So this veteran 3rd quality teacher is utilized to instructing 3rd quality material states, ‘What the heck is this? I don’t know what to do with this.’

“Additionally, they also have in that classroom, lots of young children who had fantastic obtain during distant studying or who are just by natural means academically tuned in, and they are accomplishing very properly. So you have far more and much more, we are looking at these seriously substantial educational gaps.”

Here’s literacy interventionist Sherry Montminy.

Sherry Montminy: “I imply, no 1 needs us to say it, but young children are at the rear of. They are. They are going to be if they are not listed here, and if they don’t have households who can assist them. And we have, we dwell in a position where by there is certainly a lot of households who, they can barely get via a working day by themselves. By no means mind, check out, you know… they’ve obtained to determine out, ‘Does my child go to school today, since he is bought the sniffles, I have bought a job… do I stay residence and reduce my position? Am I going to get paid if I will not go to perform?’ I mean, I wouldn’t want to be a guardian correct now — of tiny little ones.”

“No just one wants us to say it, but children are behind. They are.”

Sherry Montminy, literacy interventionist at Newport City Elementary Faculty

Here’s social emotional learning coach Christina Malanga.

Christina Malanga: “So I am just thinking, like, a kindergarten classroom that I usually go to. Now, kindergarteners are 5 and 6 decades previous. So we don’t, it can be not like they know how to fix all their have problems and regulate all their thoughts. But if you assume about them, as relatively than currently being 5 or 6, that they are truly additional like performing like they’re 3 or 4 a long time aged, then you will find this, the stage of ability that they have, they genuinely haven’t been in faculty.

“So young ones in kindergarten really have not experienced any normal school working experience at all. You know, just a really small matters are a important function. So like, you know, your shoe is untied, it truly is just like, appears like the conclusion of the globe. Youngsters haven’t had a ton of encounter in the earlier two a long time, acquiring social teams or actively playing with every single other.

“And so what we are observing is like, children that you know, really don’t necessarily, they are hoping their greatest, but probably not have the exact same expertise that they would have had pre-pandemic in terms of like, obtaining that knowledge with interacting with a further and probably being in a position to clear up like very simple, you know, straightforward issues or problems.”

More from VPR: Go inside this Island Pond elementary school as it attempts to keep on prime of COVID protocols

Again, here’s principal Elaine Collins.

Elaine Collins: “The other compounding variable is during this college calendar year, for us has been the amount of instances in our school. We’ve experienced hundreds of cases this university 12 months. So let’s say you have received a course of 15 kids or 18 young ones. And on any provided week, you could possibly only have half of your course, but the demographic of the course retains shifting. So you may possibly have only half the course but not the exact 50 percent. The future 7 days, it’s going to be different. And you might be trying to get as a result of, you know, let us say a device on fractions, and you happen to be in fifth quality. And which is your vital function of the grade. And if kids will not get fractions, they cannot shift on to increased level math. And a 3rd of the class has missed the 1st portion of the unit, a 3rd has missed the center element. And a 3rd has missed the ending aspect, you can find likely to be some little ones that have missed the full point. How do you — how do you get all those kids caught up? How do you?

“And then how do you shift on? Simply because there are some kids in the class who received the complete detail, and they’re completely ready to transfer on. It’s put a lot of anxiety on instructors in conditions of their capability to differentiate. We’re used to differentiating for youngsters. We have normally experienced children who are on different ranges. Not all young ones are the very same, we know that we are heading to have to differentiate.

“But the level of differentiation is distinct. And then you aspect in all of all those disregulation things, and educating right now is pretty, pretty complicated.”

“We have constantly experienced kids who are on unique degrees. Not all young ones are the similar, we know that we are going to have to differentiate. But the amount of differentiation is different.”

Elaine Collins, Newport City Elementary University principal

Here’s fourth grade trainer Tara Wiggins.

Erica: “You know the product, and you know the materials you might be supposed to get by way of, is there nevertheless like a pressure about ‘Oh, I can see the calendar, and I am seeking at wherever we are?’ Is there stress that goes with this?”

Tara Wiggins: “Yes, I’ve experienced several times exactly where out of my class of 12 children, I have 5. I can’t train a model new lesson when I have five youngsters three times in a row. I would just have to reteach it when they came in for the other youngsters, and then leave all those other little ones form of hanging.”

Erica: “That’s a form of Tetris complexity that I don’t even know why you do that. It feels like you need to truly feel like a sub in your have classroom every working day.”

Here’s fourth grade trainer Mike Pettengill.

Mike Pettengill: “Often I can construction some of my classes to concentrate on specially how, you know, ‘You a few missed the four times that we talked about decimals.’ And I can pull individuals 4 college students. We have an interventionist that can come and work with some other college students in the course of that exact same time, and kids can be reasonably unbiased.

“So yeah, I just have to obtain, which are my children that can definitely work independently. And legitimately do the job independently, and type of do their possess difficulty resolving. And which are the little ones that just seriously will need me to tutorial them. And some kids just have to have you sitting beside them. Which is all it requires, just sit beside them and set your arm on the back again of their chair. And they can do the job.”

Yet again, here’s Elaine Collins.

Elaine Collins: “Instructors are quite properly-intentioned and tricky-operating, and they want to do what’s ideal by their young ones. So they have this notion in their minds about where by their young ones ought to be. They place a lot of force on themselves if youngsters aren’t there. And right now kids are not there. And it’s not teachers’ fault and it is not kids’ fault. Teachers are working the most difficult they’ve ever labored in their overall lives for fewer results than they’re employed to, and which is the component that is really aggravating.

“And I believe that little ones are receiving what they need from us, but we’re not capable to see the similar amount of result that we’re made use of to. And we’re obtaining to measure results in significantly lesser actions. It’s just a brain shift. We’re made use of to youngsters, by leaps and bounds, coming ahead in their academics, and that is just not happening right now. It is just the mother nature of where we are in the pandemic, and the interrupted understanding cycle that we’re in.”

Have questions, opinions or ideas? Send out us a message or tweet us @vprnet.