FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
DFER President Shavar Jeffries on the “Supplement Not Supplant” Requirement in ESSA
Washington, DC – Following last week’s debate during the Senate HELP Committee on Every Student Succeeds Act’s (ESSA) spending provision, known as the “Supplement Not Supplant” requirement, Democrats for Education Reform’s (DFER) National President Shavar Jeffries released the following statement:
“Title I’s overriding purpose is to provide additional federal funds to ensure educational equity for poor children and children of color. Secretary King’s ‘Supplement Not Supplant’ rules are designed to ensure that states and districts use federal funds to expand educational opportunity for kids, not to fill funding gaps caused by under-funding at the local level. While we are unsurprised that some conservatives who like federal money, but dislike federal expectations for the effective use of federal money, would oppose Secretary King’s common-sense effort to ensure Title I money flows to the most disadvantaged kids, we are disappointed that the American Federation of Teachers would seek to block progress for low-income families. We stand proudly with the Obama Administration and the civil-rights community—and in opposition to teachers unions and right-wing Republicans—in supporting this critical effort to direct federal resources to those kids who need them most.”
Read more about DFER’s support for Supplement Not Supplant in the letter we co-signed with the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, the NAACP, NCLR, and others urging USDOE here.
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Contact: press@dfer.org