Congress approves $82B in relief for schools
January 11, 2021
On Dec. 21, Congress approved a $900 billion pandemic emergency response bill titled the Coronavirus Response and Relief Supplemental Appropriations Act. The long-awaited emergency bill provides $82 billion for K-12 schools and postsecondary institutions to be distributed, with some important modifications, through three education emergency programs established by the CARES Act in March.
ACSA’s federal advocates at Foresight Law + Policy have prepared a summary of the legislation (available at content.acsa.org), which outlines some of the differences to the CARES Act, including key changes such as new allowable uses for funds.
The Response and Relief Act uses the CARES Act’s Education Stabilization Fund, with modifications, as the mechanism for distributing $82 billion in new emergency funding. As with CARES, the new law provides discretionary education resources to governors through the GEER fund, sends money to state departments of education and school districts through the ESSER fund, and directs money to higher education institutions through the HEER fund.
