Annual federal Title I dollars subject to cuts

Jul. 17—A bill is before the U.S. House of Representatives that would, if signed into law in its current form, greatly reduce grant moneys for schools across the region.

Referred to as the Labor, Health & Human Services and Education Subcommittee Fiscal Year 2024 Appropriations Bill, it contains broad reductions affecting Title I of the Elementary and Secondary Schools Education Act of 1965. The decrease is worth about $15 billion. By comparison, in FY 2021, Congress funded Title I grants for $16.5 billion. The amount funded since then has increased, so the reduction would be about 80% from previous highs.

"That's a big deal," said Chris Healy, who has been a rural Northwest Missouri school superintendent for three years. "It's tough to see what it's going to, what would happen if they cut the federal funding as far as the Title program is concerned, but it would definitely make an impact."

The bill is sponsored by U.S. Rep. Robert Aderholt, an Alabama Republican who chairs the subcommittee. Aderholt said on Friday that the bill is not perfect, adding he is aware that it will reduce funds for rural school districts in some cases. However, Aderholt said, Title I funding primarily benefits urban school districts, and in his stated opinion, those districts should not depend on federal taxpayers for support.

"We cannot continue to make constituents pay for our reckless DC beltway spending," Aderholt said. At some point we must stop out of control spending, this spree that we've seen and that we have experienced in this nation."

The program is distributed based on need and demographics, school district by school district. Healy, the leader of Worth County R-III, said about $80,000 comes his way via Title I each year. That pays outright for three teachers, out of a total educator workforce of about 30. Loss of funding would not mean those people are laid off right away, as the district could pursue state or local funding sources, but it would be a serious challenge, Healy said.

"The Title funding's been pretty consistent in the past, and we've used it to fund supplemental education, so that would be a hurt if it fell," he said.

A school becomes eligible for Title I once 40% or more of its enrolled students are at or below 185% of the poverty line in terms of their household income — $51,338 per year for a family of four, or $42,606 for a family of three. Once the 40% of total students threshold is reached, in a tally that is updated each summer, the eligible schools are determined. During the 2022-2023 academic year, the St. Joseph School District had nine Title I-eligible schools: Carden Park, Edison, Lindbergh, Hosea, Robidoux, Coleman, Truman, Mark Twain and Parkway.

The St. Joseph School District submitted its Title I data on June 30, and will soon learn which schools are eligible for the 2023-2024 year. The first day is Aug. 21. The money expected to be available is more than $4 million. It is used in various ways, notably to pay for math and science interventionists within the schools that receive Title I funds. Academic challenges in such subjects are more common in student bodies that tend to be drawn from neighborhoods where household income levels are low.

"A reduction of that funding would be significant for all our students," said Dlo DuVall, director of special programs. "We would have to still find a way to service those students, because the needs would still be there."

The offices of congressmen Sam Graves and Emanuel Cleaver, the Republican and Democrat (respectively) who represent northern Missouri and Kansas City, Missouri, did not respond to a request for comment.

Marcus Clem can be reached at marcus.clem@newspressnow.com. Follow him on Twitter: @NPNowClem