Reducing class size, especially for those students most at risk and most impacted by the pandemic, is a primary focus for the use of these funds, as it will provide students with more direct instruction, allow them to build better and more intimate relationships with both fellow students and staff, and receive more personalized and differentiated instruction to help close the gaps created by learning loss encountered during the pandemic. It will also help them receive the social-emotional learning supports needed as they return to a more normal school setting.

We are also looking to provide additional/supplemental after-school and summer school learning opportunities to help affected students mitigate the effects of learning loss and succeed academically, and also provide additional social-emotional support through a behavior interventionist and a bilingual liaison who will work directly with affected students and at-risk student populations.

Finally, we will also help address indoor air quality and technology needs, as allowed by the grant, to help mitigate the impact of the pandemic on our school learning environment.

These funds will be used in conjunction with other local, state and federal funding sources to respond to the pandemic in the most efficient and effective way possible.

The vast majority of these funds, well over the 20% minimum threshold, are being used to address learning loss through the hiring of additional staff to reduce class size and to address the social-emotional needs of our students, and the purchase of supplemental curricular and learning materials to support those efforts, and only a small portion is being used for infrastructure, learning environment, or technology related needs.     

The school district initially sought input in 2020 and 2021 from all affected parties through surveys; user group meetings; public comments at Board meetings; public hearings at Board meetings; input received through our website comments and questions pages, PTO meetings, BPAC meetings, Title I meetings, IEP meetings and a variety of other events and meetings where different constituency groups and interested parties were meeting, often times virtually.

Additionally, Woodridge 68 held one-on-one meetings (both in person and virtually) with each family in the fall of 2020 and the fall of 2021 to determine individual student needs and family concerns, and better understand the impact of the pandemic on our student population.

Outside agencies were also surveyed to see what the greater community impact was and how we could help address those needs and concerns.

During the past two years, in 2022 and 2023, we have continued to solicit feedback and comments through the public comments portion of all Board meetings, the comments and questions portion of our website, ongoing dialogue and interaction between the schools and their constituency groups, and recurring school district meetings where different affected or interested groups are gathering.

All feedback has been very positive and supportive of our use of these funds, as well as the other local, state and federal funds being used to supplement these EESER funds, to combat the effects of the pandemic and assist our students in addressing any related learning loss and deal with any remaining academic, social-emotional and mental health needs.

We will continue to use these, and any other, avenues identified to seek input regarding the use of these funds into the 2023-2024 school year (the last year of the grant). All of this information has been tracked and evaluated by the district's teaching and learning department and was critical to the development of our ESSER spending plans (for all three phases of ESSER grants) over the past three years.