Schools could get more time to spend shorted federal dollars

Two Indiana congressmen want the U.S. Department of Education to give schools that were initially shorted federal dollars for teaching disadvantaged students more time to use those funds.

Schools that were affected by the Indiana Department of Education’s miscalculation began receiving additional funding for the 2015-16 school year this spring.

School leaders say the federal poverty aid sent in March was welcome, but because the dollars came so late, it was difficult to find uses for the money. Adding to the problem, schools are limited in the amount of the federal aid, known as Title I funds, they can carry over to a new school year.

Indiana schools: Restoration of poverty funding is too little, too late

The state Department of Education asked in May that schools be given additional time to use leftover funds, saying they address achievement gaps, according to a letter released to IndyStar.

U.S. Reps. Luke Messer and Todd Rokita renewed the request Wednesday in a letter to U.S. Education Secretary John King. The letter argued that the timeline was “functionally too late for schools to use the funds for their intended and best use. If schools are not allowed to carry over these funds, student learning will suffer.”

Like the Department of Education, they’re asking that schools be allowed to use the funds during the next school year. Many of the schools most deeply affected were charter schools, with some schools shortchanged as much as $500,000, according to state records.

Scott Bess, president of Goodwill Education Initiatives, which runs Indianapolis Metropolitan High School, said “schools found it impossible” to spend the corrected amount of federal dollars they received before the end of the year. If additional time isn’t granted, schools could lose out on some of the money they were due, Bess said.

“You just can’t find out in March you had the additional funds allocated to you. There is no way to actually spend that. ISTEP was already on top of us,” Bess said.

Carey Dahncke, the chief academic officer for Christel House, said he remains confident the federal government will respond.

“We know low-income students need the assistance, and it was an awful situation that many charter schools found themselves in last year because of the (Indiana Department of Education’s) mistakes,” Dahncke said in an email to IndyStar. “Now, with the funding restored, to prevent those funds from supporting the intended students would simply be unjust.”

U.S. education agency probes Indiana charter funding

The U.S. Department of Education began looking into the schools’ complaints in September. At the time, school officials said the state didn’t correctly apply a formula designed to ensure a charter school’s funding doesn’t decline drastically from the previous year.

State Department of Education officials have argued that the problem with the calculation dates back to before Indiana Superintendent of Public Instruction Glenda Ritz took office in 2013. Five years of Title I calculations are being reviewed by the federal government, and final results should be released soon, said Samantha Hart, a Ritz spokeswoman.

“In the meantime, the department has taken proactive steps to ensure that local schools do not experience any negative effects due to these changes,” Hart said in a statement.

Meanwhile, some of Indiana’s most urban school districts, including Indianapolis Public Schools and Gary Community School Corp., were notified they received too much money. School leaders say they’ve spent those dollars and have yet to learn how the Department of Education plans to respond.

IPS was notified in March it received nearly $3 million more in federal poverty aid than it should have for the 2015-16 school year. IPS Superintendent Lewis Ferebee said state education officials advised that the district might need to return those dollars, but there have been no further conversations.

“They’ve told us that they would likely request the $3 million back from us, but we don’t have $3 million to give,” Ferebee said, “because we don’t wait until March to spend our dollars.”

Federal education officials didn’t immediately respond Wednesday to a request for comment.

Chalkbeat Indiana, a nonprofit news website that covers education, contributed to this story.

Call IndyStar reporter Chelsea Schneider at (317) 444-6077. Follow her on Twitter: @IndyStarChelsea.