Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Education Funding topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Department of Education official outlines 192 ASAP awards, monitoring plans and how $30M supplemental funding can be used
Summary
Jeff Norris of the Department of Education told the commission that DOE issued 192 ASAP awards, is conducting site visits and professional learning for providers, and expects the supplemental $30 million to be broadly usable across K–12 out‑of‑school programs; DOE will align reporting categories to track spending.
Jeff Norris, the State Department of Education contact on out‑of‑school time programs, updated the commission on program supports and funding oversight.
Norris said the department awarded 192 ASAP grants this year and is conducting in‑person visits to sites; four virtual professional learning sessions also attracted high participation. “We have 192 ASAP awards that we were able to award this year and ... we're going to try to do all 192 in‑person visits,” Norris said.
He described a plan to provide sample surveys and to help distribute the commission’s survey through ASAP anchor organizations and partner networks. Norris also said the department will scholarship two individuals from each ASAP anchor organization to attend the Alabama Community Education Association conference, scheduled for Nov. 2–4, and that registration support has already prompted significant interest from program staff.
On the $30 million supplemental appropriation targeted to summer and after‑school programming, Norris said the memo author (the new state CSFO) intended the funds to be widely usable across K–12 out‑of‑school programs rather than strictly for K‑5 reading and math camps. He outlined a common set of reporting categories (personnel, professional learning, instructional materials, field trips and similar categories) that DOE hopes to align across funding streams so the department can identify common themes and better compare expenditures.
Norris also said DOE is finalizing a data‑sharing agreement with Harvard University to analyze multi‑year K‑5 summer reading and math camp outcomes and help identify pockets of high performance that could inform the commission’s recommendations.
Commissioners asked how the supplemental differed from prior ASAP funding; Norris said the supplemental was intended to be broad and creative in allowable uses and that districts should first account for more restrictive funds and then layer in supplemental dollars.
