General Questions
At this time, those states include Arkansas, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Texas, Utah, and Washington. Many other states have also received reimbursements and purchased goods with EANS funding.
It’s best to check with your individual state Department of Education, starting with the ombudsman.
There are two allocations for the EANS program: EANS I is $2.75 billion allocated to nonpublic elementary and secondary schools as part of the Governor’s Emergency Education Relief (GEER II) fund under the Coronavirus Response and Relief Supplemental Appropriations (CRRSA) Act (Dec 2020). EANS I funding is prioritized to those non-public schools that enroll low-income students and are most impacted by COVID-19. Reimbursements for allowable expenses incurred since March 13, 2020 are permitted. EANS II is a second round of an additional $2.75 allocated as part of the American Rescue Plan (ARP) Act (March 2021). Under EANS II a State Education Agency (SEA) provides services or assistance to non- public schools that enroll a significant percentage of children from low-income families and are most impacted by COVID19. EANS funds may not be used to provide reimbursements for costs incurred by non-public schools.
Watch our webinar, What EANS 2.0 Means for Nonpublic Schools, where we cover EANS 2.0 funding and how schools can make the most of it.
- Distributing information about EANS promptly to nonpublic schools
- Creating an application
- Establishing poverty criteria from generally available sources of poverty data
- Establishing the information a nonpublic school must provide to enable the SEA to prioritize schools most impacted by COVID 19
- Ensuring nonpublic schools provide enrollment of students from low-income families and a description of the emergency services requested from the SEA
- Making an application easily available to nonpublic schools as soon as possible but no later than 30 days after receipt of EANS funds
- Approving/denying each application promptly but no later than 30 days after receipt
- Determining what services or assistance the SEA will provide directly through LEAs, other public entities, or contractors
- Ensuring control of funds and title to materials, equipment, and property are in a public agency
- Ensuring all services or assistance provided is limited to secular, neutral, and nonideological purposes
- Obligating all funds in an expedited and timely manner and not later than 6 months after receiving the funds
What does it mean that funds must be “obligated within 6 months?”
EANS I requires that funds be obligated within 6 months and spent no later than September 30, 2022, with an additional year available if requested by the state (meaning funds can be spent until September 30, 2023). EANS II also requires that funds be obligated within 6 months; they must be spent no later than September 30, 2023, with an additional year available if requested by the state (allowing spending until September 30, 2024).
Obligation of the funds occurs in different ways. If the state or other government entity is providing services (such as direct services to students or professional development to teachers), the funds are obligated when the service is performed. If the state or government entity is entering into a written agreement for services to be delivered at a future date, the obligation occurs when the agreement is made. Many states are entering into written agreements with a third-party entity to administer the program—thereby obligating the funds—and this third party then contracts with service providers to deliver the services.
What happens if the funds are not obligated within 6 months?
If the EANS I or II funds are not obligated within the required 6-month time period, these funds move to the GEER program. The Governor is encouraged (but not required) to use the former EANS funds that are moved to the GEER program for their original purposes.
Application
If you think your state is in violation of the law, you can go to the US Department of Education, though states do have a lot of discretion here.
Contact your state’s private school organizations for information, or email your state ombudsman. The ombudsman position was created in every state under the Every Student Succeeds Act, and those ombudsmen either have responsibility for the EANS program or are very informed on the subject.
- To avoid new or unnecessary data collections from private schools and families, ED provides these potential sources of estimates of students from low-income families:
- Proportionality data: the number of students enrolled in a private school who reside in Title I school attendance areas multiplied by the % of public school students in that same attendance areas who are from low-income families. If private school students reside in multiple attendance areas, multiple calculations will be necessary OR
- Data inputting the number of low-income students based on the American Community Survey (ACS) or the Small Area Income and Poverty Estimates (SAIPE) program by the U.S. Census Bureau.
- Data can be requested by the SEA from multiple sources provided the poverty threshold is the same among private schools.
- Personally identifiable information about students or their families is not allowed.
- Any information the SEA deems reasonable to ensure expedited and timely provision of services or assistance.
- At a minimum:
- Number and percentage of students from low-income families enrolled in the private school in school year 2019 20.
- Information on the impact of COVID 19 on the school.
- A description of the emergency services or assistance being requested.
- Whether the private school received a PPP loan before December 27, 2020, and the amount of such loan.
- An assurance that the private school will not apply for or receive a PPP loan on or after December 27, 2020.
- Low Income Data
- Not prescribed in federal legislation SEA has flexibility.
- SEAs are encouraged to use existing, generally available data to enable reasonable estimates of a school’s low-income status rather than requiring a new data collection.
- Possible data sources might include:
- Available free and reduced-price lunch data.
- Scholarship or financial assistance data.
- E-rate data.
- Other relevant data, such as data that the private school has provided to the state for purposes of state or local programs.
- If complete actual data is unavailable, data may be extrapolated based on a
representative sample.
- ED has released a sample application for an SEA to use to solicit private school applications.
- Sample application can be found at https://oese.ed.gov/offices/education stabilization fund/emergency assistance non-public schools/
- Sample contains all the information that must be included as described above.
- SEA has discretion on what it will request from private schools re: impact of COVID — “any reasonable information.”
- SEA has discretion on what it will accept for poverty data or estimation of poverty within the specifications of the law.
- Emphasis on readily available data and avoiding new or unnecessary data collections.
- If using Census, SEA can request private school list its addresses by Census Tract Number.
- Emphasis on readily available data and avoiding new or unnecessary data collections.
- No statutory deadline for a length of time by which private schools must respond to the application released by the SEA.
- ED strongly encourages the SEA establish and effectively communicate a reasonable deadline for private schools to submit its application.
- SEAs can extend their application period to accommodate private schools without experience in this process.
- SEA must approve or deny application within 30 days of receipt.
- ED has not yet made an EANS II application available for Governors (as of April 22, 2021), and therefore EANS II applications are not yet available to nonpublic schools
- Individual school
- Organization with governing authority over a group of private schools on behalf of member schools.
- Clearly indicate schools it is applying on behalf of
- Provide supporting data and other information requested for any and all schools for which it applies.
- Application must be made available to private schools as soon as possible, but no later than 30 days after the SEA receives EANS funds.
- SEA has flexibility in prioritizing applications.
- Every effort should be made to provide the full range of services.
- Possible options for calculating EANS allocations:
- Divide total funds by total enrollment from applications = PPA.
- Weight student characteristics such as poverty and/or COVID impact.
Eligibility
At this time, it is doubtful that states will allow that information to be used in place of the percentage of a private school’s specific student poverty/low-income percentage rate.
This is not considered a receipt of federal funds, which is why fiscal control remains with the state. Guidance dictates that participating in a state program or a district’s program does not constitute receipt of federal funds. If these are services being provided by the state or by a third party engaged by the state, there’s no risk of being seen as a recipient of federal funds.
An SEA may use one or more of the following sources of data, provided the poverty threshold is consistent around sources:
- Free or reduced-price lunch data
- Data from R-rate program
- Data from different source, such as scholarship or financial assistance data
- Data from a survey developed by SEA
All nonprofit private schools should be eligible for this round of funding, but can only receive PPP Round 2 or EANS I (but not both). Receipt of PPP Round 1 does not impact participation in EANS. As of April 10, 2021 there is no definitive answer from the U.S. Department of Education if receipt of Round 2 PPP impacts participation in EANS II.
No. All nonprofit nonpublic schools should be able to apply.
The U.S. Department of Education issued a ruling that the default poverty threshold for private schools would be 40%, meaning that for a private school to be eligible for EANS II funds, at least 40% of the school’s student population would have to qualify as low-income.
However, the U.S. Department of Education gave governors of each state the opportunity to request a different poverty threshold, provided they offered valid justification for the change.
An eligible private school is an elementary or secondary school that is:
- Nonprofit
- Accredited, licensed, or otherwise operates in accordance with state law
- Was in existence prior to March 13, 2020
- Did not and will not apply for and receive a loan under the Payroll Protection Program (PPP) on or after December 27, 2020
CRSSA EANS: A state education agency (SEA) must prioritize services or assistance to private schools that enroll students from low-income families and are most impacted by the COVID-19 emergency.
ARP EANS: An SEA may only provide services or assistance to private schools that enroll a significant percentage of students from low-income families and are most impacted by the COVID-19 emergency.
We recommend checking your state’s definition of “percentage of low-income” as well as the state’s criteria to determine the “impact of the COVID-19 emergency.”
PPP
Private schools are eligible for either PPP Round 2 or EANS, but not both, under this round of funding — this is in addition to any CARES funding. Receipt of PPP Round 1 does not impact participation in EANS.
It would seem that the intent of the law would be that a school whose employees’ payroll is being protected and is therefore benefiting from that funding is not eligible to receive EANS.
The CARES Act is separate from the 2021 Coronavirus Response and Relief Supplemental Appropriations Act (CRRSA). Participation in a previous round of PPP does not impact your ability to receive funding from CRRSA.
Using Funds
They are only eligible under EANS I, but the licenses would have to be purchased by the state, since the money is being handed to the state to be used on eligible purchases.
No, there is no criteria or limit for remedial services that can be used.
Yes, those are eligible expenditures under EANS I, as long as no construction is required to install or remove these units.
The money can’t be dispersed to a private school to pay teachers. A possible scenario could be to partner with a third-party provider that could hire the teachers to do this work and pay the teachers with the EANS funds.
The EANS program is not necessarily exempt from normal state procurement procedures. This varies state to state, however. The U.S. Department of Education suggests that this is state-level issue in terms of which state procurement rules need to be applied.
While there is no explicit law, the U.S. Department of Education guidance suggests that EANS funding should continue to be used for students in non-public schools
- Services can be provided directly by the SEA or it may contract with an individual, association, agency (e.g. an LEA or ESA), or organization to provide such services or assistance
- Must be independent of the private school receiving the services
- Any contract must be under the control and supervision of the SEA
- Can be the same services being provided under CARES
- Note: A private school whose students and teachers receive services or assistance under the EANS program, even if such services are delivered through reimbursement, is not a “recipient of federal financial assistance.”
Turnaround should happen within the six-month obligation period; however, many states have not met that deadline.
- Support for health and safety:
- Supplies to sanitize, PPE, improved ventilation, physical barriers, CDC recommended supplies and materials, leasing space for social distancing, and expanding capacity for testing.
- Support for education:
- Education technology, reasonable transportation costs, initiating and maintaining education and support services or assistance for remote or hybrid learning, and addressing learning loss.
- Reimbursement (EANS I only):
- Any services or assistance from above list costs incurred on or after 3/13/20, except for: improvements to ventilation systems except for portable, any expenses reimbursed through PPP, PD on minimizing COVID, developing instructional plans, initiating education and support services for remote or hybrid learning or addressing learning loss.
The EANS I spending deadline is September 30, 2023; EANS II deadline is September 30, 2024.
- Equipment and supplies purchased with EANS funds for students and teachers in a nonpublic school may be used for the authorized purposes of the EANS program during the period of performance (i.e., through September 30, 2023) or until the equipment and supplies are no longer needed for the purposes of the EANS program
- In general, once equipment or supplies are no longer needed for purposes of the EANS program, an SEA must remove them from the private school.
- After equipment and supplies are no longer needed for the purposes of the EANS program, the SEA may continue to use the equipment or supplies in the nonpublic school to the extent they are needed for other allowable purposes under another federal education program, such as ESEA or IDEA.
- In that case, the SEA must retain title to, and maintain administrative control over, the equipment and supplies or transfer title and control to another public agency such as an LEA providing equitable services under another federal education program.
Yes—testing and tracing.
This depends on your state. Although it is allowable under EANS I (not allowable under EANS II), it’s not required that states reimburse for these expenditures and it will depend on state law or the comfort level of some states giving money to nonpublic schools.
EANS Prioritization Survey
Catapult Learning has developed this tool to help design your EANS plan. We have a suite of EANS-approved services to provide much-needed support to your students, staff, faculty, and families. Please complete the form below to assist us in developing your school-specific plan.
We look forward to partnering with your school. The survey will take approximately 10 minutes to complete.
Once completed, we will generate a proposal for your school as well as language you can use to complete your application.