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BELLEFONTE -- Kris Vancas, the Bellefonte Area School District's Director of Curriculum and Instruction, gave a summarized report on federal grant programs the district will be receiving money from during this week's school board meeting.
His report broke down the grants by title and description before going into numerical values. The first update was on Title I Part A, Improving Basic Programs.
"They are summarized (in the report) as far as the dollar amounts that we will be receiving this year and what we have that money budgeted for this year," said Vancas.
This grant supports early learners in grades K-5 with literacy skills and instruction. Bellefonte Elementary School and Pleasant Gap Elementary School qualify for support through Title I based on their economically disadvantaged student population measured by its Free/Reduced numbers, Vancas wrote in his report.
Funds from this grant were also allotted to St. John Catholic School due to the students who reside in the Bellefonte Elementary and Pleasant Gap Elementary attendance zones who are in need of extra reading support.
The total amount of money received this year will be around $532,381, with the majority of that amount going to salaries and benefits of 3.5 Reading Intervention Teachers. This will cover Language Essentials for Teachers of Reading and Spelling (LETRS) training (substitutes, additional teacher hours, travel, materials), literacy supplies, MAP testing, Aimsweb and Family Engagement.
"The program that we run at Bellefonte Elementary and Pleasant Gap Elementary, we run the same program at Benner Elementary, Marion-Walker Elementary, we just don't use title funds," said Vancas.
Title I Part D, Delinquent Programs will benefit the Centre County Youth Detention Center. Because the center is located within the Bellefonte Area School District, the district is allotted funds through federal programs to provide educational services to the students in the facility. This year, those funds total $42,192.
The funds are split between two costs, the first being literacy/math/enrichment supplies and materials for $22,192 and the second being summer school teacher/staff for $20,000.
From there, Vancas moved on to Title II Part AA, Supporting Effective Instruction. These funds are being used to support professional development for teachers in grades K-3 and the district's Reading Intervention teachers. St John's will also receive funding.
This will allow teachers in these grades across the district to have the opportunity to participate in LETRS training.
This Science of Reading Training will help teachers master reading instruction's fundamentals-phonological awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, comprehension, writing and language. It is a four-day, in-person training with additional online hours required outside the school day. The funds will also support NWEA MAP Assessments and data professional learning, Vancas wrote in his report.
The received $83,879 will be broken down into five parts:
-- BASD-LETRS Training, substitutes, additional teacher hours, travel and materials ($45,000)
-- BASD professional learning supplies ($16,597.44)
-- BASD NWEA MAP ($9,950)
-- BASD NWEA MAP/Data training ($9,000)
-- St. Johns professional learning ($2,731.56)
Title IV, Part A, Student Support and Academic Enrichment funds are used to help provide students access to a well-rounded education. It is also put towards improving school conditions for student learning and technology use to improve academic achievement and digital literacy.
The total funds this year are $37,249, with the funds splitting between the following items, Well-Rounded Education Foreign Language Camp ($7,450), Safe and Healthy Students - School Wide Positive Behavior Interventions and Support ($7,450), Effective Use of Technology - Professional Development in use of Technology ($21,127.23), St. John's Safety Training - Alice ($1,221.77).
"It's nice that the (Foreign Language Camp) is back again. It was really successful again this year. There's a big chunk of that that we use for technology... Some of that money is used to support work that our (Tech Trainers and Tech Coordinators) do and the professional development that's provided in the use of technology," said Vancas.
The final grant discussed was the "Ready to Learn Grant" which is used to help school districts maintain academic performance targets through various strategies. This year, the school will receive $408,961 split between the following items:
-- Full Day Kindergarten salaries and benefits for two kindergarten teachers ($209,608)
-- State Literacy Plan Implementation-Materials and resources to support the K-12 Literacy curriculum. Salaries to support professional learning in K-12 Literacy ($111,353)
-- STEM Education Grades 4-12-Curriculum Resources and Materials ($15,000)
-- Literacy and Math Coaching supplies, materials, professional development for three coaches ($12,000)
-- Professional Development-contracted services, travel, supplies associated with professional development ($46,000)
-- Elementary Science Education materials and resources to support the elementary science curriculum and professional learning, supplies and salaries for STEM Camp ($15,000)
"(These) are the new grants that came through this summer that we recently submitted. The Ready to Learn money has already been accepted and approved. Those other federal program grants hopefully we'll get word on those very quickly. They'll be approved, we just don't know when and they possibly might need a few tweaks, but we've been pretty good in the past with that," said Vancas.