The Guam Department of Education is planning how to best use the $110 million that GDOE will be receiving from the latest stimulus bill from Congress.
GDOE has been continually engaging with school administrators, their private non-profit schools, teachers leaders at their public schools, and their central office since last week on how best to spend the second part of the $110 million of the Education Stabilization Fund.
Jon Fernandez, GDOE Superintendent, said: “What we’re doing is we’re basically in the brainstorming stage of what it is we continue to need so that we can get through the next 6 to 18 months and try to maintain a safe learning environment at all of our schools so we can further reopen our schools to more students. At the same time, we are promoting our online learning and keeping that as an option. We’re really looking ahead and we can see ourselves starting to have more activities at the school level and using the funds to support us in that effort.”
Back in January, the Guam Department of Education was notified that it will receive $143 million in USDOE funding from the latest COVID relief package that was enacted in late December.
$33 million is to go to the governor’s office for educational purposes and the $110 million is going to GDOE for their continued COVID-19 response and recovery efforts.
According to Fernandez, some of the things under discussion are how they are going to establish the new normal, how to procure supplies and equipment that’s going to be needed in schools, what kind of learning options will be provided to students and what kind of interventions are going to be needed to address some of the learning challenges GDOE has faced over the past year.
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