Princeton Elementary School District anticipates COVID-19 aid relief grant worth more than $1 million

PRINCETON — The Princeton Elementary School District is projected to receive $1,051,924 in COVID-19 aid relief.

Superintendent Tim Smith told the PES Board Monday night he is still waiting to see the funds in grant form.

“I haven’t seen it in an actual grant form, so I won’t be comfortable until I see it on the Illinois State Board website, where we go in to complete our grants and it’s there,” Smith said. “I don’t know how soon that will happen. It may happen tomorrow. Or it may happen in three weeks. The minute I see it we can start preparing that grant.”

All expenditures must be directly related to COVID relief and have to be approved, Smith said.

The grant would be ideal to provide for after-school instruction and summer school for those kids, Smith said, who may have some learning gaps from remote learning.

“Most kids will go on to the next grade level. That doesn’t necessarily mean they don’t have some learning gaps,” Smith said.

Smith said this program would be an “exciting opportunity” for the students and likely offer transportation and some food services.

“It wouldn’t look like it did in the past where the parents would drop the kids off for 90 minutes of instruction. I think it’s going to be much more extensive, half-day program,” Smith said. “But, anything we put together we’re going to plan with our teachers and then we’ll bring it before the board for approval. This being a federal grant for COVID relief, it must go through the board for final approval.”

Board member Judd Lusher said he likes the idea of summer school.

“If you ask any parent who thinks their child might be behind, they would support that. We all want the best for our children,” he said.

The COVID stimulus relief could also be used to purchase hands free equipment, cleaning equipment, summer school costs, web-based learning and to update laptops, Smith said.

PES previously received $311,000 in COVID-19 stimulus relief which was used for expenses to get its remote learning up to speed, Smith said.

Return to learn update

J.D. Orwig, PES superintendent-in-waiting and current Jefferson School principal, reported the district now has 84% students back with in-person learning with 16% in remote. The youngest age students (pre-K at Douglas School) stand at 88% in-person with the oldest age group (Logan Junior High) at 80%.

When school started in August, PES had 30% students in remote.

Board member Elizabeth Arkels and Lusher praised the administration and staff for getting so many kids back to in-person learning.

“It shows everybody is very confident and very comfortable with the way things are working,” Arkels said.

Superintendent’s report

In his financial report, Smith said the overall revenue received stands at 76.67% compared to 77.29% a year ago with the working cash transfer not occurring yet. On the expense side, PES is 47.67% expended in all funds as opposed to 48.25% a year ago.

For all funds, PES has on deposit, at the end of December, $7,676,240 compared to $7,068,392 a year ago, an improvement of about $600,000.

“The major portion of that is in the (education) fund. It’s encouraging that the ed fund is as healthy as it is. And we like that,” Smith said. “One thing J.D. and I talked about going through this pandemic, it’s good to have reserves, because the state and federal government will probably start looking how to slow revenue to local entities, local taxing bodies, in the next two to five years.”

In other action:

Board president Steve Bouslog acknowledged the retirement of longtime PES bus driver Charlie Waca, who is a retired teacher for the school district.

Bouslog also encouraged all board members to attend the I.A.S.B. Starved Rock Division Meeting in March, which will be virtual.

The following personnel moves were approved: Maternity leave for Amanda Nord, the hiring of Stacey Harper and Nicole Nyman as kindergarten teachers, Sean Barron moving from part-time IT director to full-time, Lisa Saletzki as district bookkeeper and the resignations of Heather Ziegler as Lincoln School paraprofessional and Hailey Harris as a preschool paraprofessional.

The board also approved the I.S.A.B. Press Plus Policy Agreement, the textbook/technology fee for FY22 to remain at $90 a year, Family First Coronavirus Relief Act and Seniority Lists for FY21. The review of the 2021-22 calendar was tabled to the February meeting.