Letter to the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (January 17, 2023)

Summary

This is a letter dated January 17, 2023 from the United States Department of Education to Jeff Riley, Commissioner of Education at the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE). The letter states that the Department received DESE's written plan for a reasonable level of tolerance when calculating whether Massachusetts met State maintenance of equity requirements under the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 for a subset of its local educational agencies. It describes DESE's proposal of two tolerance levels, a 50% reduction in per-pupil funding for extraordinarily small LEAs and a 7% reduction for very small LEAs with between six and 200 students. It states that the Department determined the approach includes reasonable levels of tolerance for those LEAs.

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                          UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION



                                             January 17, 2023

The Honorable Jeff Riley
Commissioner of Education
Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education
75 Pleasant Street
Malden, MA 02148-4906

Dear Commissioner Riley:

The U.S. Department of Education (Department) received your written plan for a reasonable level of
tolerance when calculating whether the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary
Education (DESE) has met State maintenance of equity requirements under the American Rescue Plan
Act of 2021 (ARP Act). This written plan applies only to a subset of Massachusetts’ local educational
agencies (LEAs).

The ARP Act State maintenance of equity requirements help ensure that State funding supports the
students in LEAs with high concentrations of poverty who have often been subject to longstanding
opportunity gaps in our education system and have also experienced the greatest impact from the
COVID-19 pandemic. Moreover, the ARP Act State maintenance of equity requirements are vital for
ensuring that States maintain funding to address the impact of the pandemic on students’ education, and
for protecting students in high-poverty LEAs from disproportionate cuts if reductions in State effort do
occur.

The Department determined that it is consistent with the State maintenance of equity requirements to
allow a State educational agency (SEA) to calculate whether it has maintained equity with respect to its
very small high-need and highest-poverty LEAs within a reasonable “tolerance level.” The
Department’s determination is based on the possibility of significant volatility in the calculated per-pupil
funding amounts for very small LEAs caused by small changes in student enrollment, which may be
unrelated to whether an SEA has achieved the intent to maintain equity in funding. (See Frequently
Asked Questions, American Rescue Plan Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Program,
Maintenance of Equity Requirements, July 26, 2022, Question 21(a).)

According to Massachusetts’ plan, DESE considers:
   • LEAs with enrollments of fewer than five students to be “extraordinarily small LEAs,” with one
      LEA falling in this category.
   • LEAs with enrollments between six and 200 students to be “very small LEAs,” with six high-
      need LEAs falling in this category.
DESE asserts that: 1. the calculated per-pupil funding amounts for these three tiers of LEAs are
significantly affected by small changes in student enrollment; and 2. the resulting data are unreliable
indicators of whether the SEA has achieved the intent of maintaining equity in funding across LEAs.
Accordingly, DESE proposes two tolerance levels:
    1) Tier 1: For “extraordinarily small LEAs” that have five or fewer students, DESE proposes to
        tolerate a 50% reduction in per-pupil funding from year to year.
    2) Tier 2: For “very small LEAs” that have between six and 200 students, DESE proposes to
        tolerate a 7% reduction in per-pupil funding from year to year.

After reviewing DESE’s tolerance proposal, including the data submitted, the unique circumstances in
the State, and our further State-specific analysis, I have determined that the proposed approach for
extraordinarily small and very small LEAs includes reasonable levels of tolerance when calculating
whether Massachusetts has maintained equity with respect to those LEAs.

With FY 2022 closed, if DESE did not maintain equity for any highest-poverty and high-need LEA not
covered by this tolerance approval, it may address this violation by making additional appropriations in
FY 2023 to fully address FY 2022 shortfalls for impacted LEAs. Such additional funds must be separate
from funds necessary to comply with the maintenance of equity requirements in FY 2023. Please advise
the Department when these additional payments have been made.

We appreciate your diligence in developing this proposal. If you have any questions, please contact your
program officer at: Massachusetts.OESE@ed.gov.

                                                   Sincerely,

                                                   Laura Jimenez

                                                   Laura Jimenez
                                                   Director, Office of State and Grantee Relations
                                                   Office of Elementary and Secondary Education
                                                   United States Department of Education


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