Another big change from the Department of Education late last month has sent some Michigan school districts reeling.
Schools across Michigan are poised to lose roughly $42 million in COVID-19 pandemic relief funds to improve safety, health, and air quality in 27 Michigan school districts, says MDE in a press release.
The change comes after the Department of Education took back its agreement to allow schools to finish spending the COVID-19 pandemic money they were originally given.
The Department says the deadline to use the money is now over, although the funds were slated to be available to use until March 2026. School districts knew the deadline to use the funds was approaching, and had appropriated the funds as they were told to do.
Read more: What Michigan Parents Should Know About Administration’s Changes to the Department of Education
In a letter to state education agencies on March 28, 2025, Secretary Linda McMahon alerted education leaders the money would be taken away. McMahon said the funds are unnecessary now that the pandemic has ended. School leaders across the country disagree.
Those funds included Coronavirus Response and Relief Supplemental Appropriations and American Rescue Plan dollars. That funding was set to be spent on projects like heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) systems, boilers, and windows, says MDE in a press release.
The Department will consider extensions to use the funds on a case-by-case basis, but district’s must explain how the funding will “mitigate the effects of COVID on American students’ education.”
McMahon’s abrupt change to school funding is already facing a legal challenge from sixteen states.
Read on for a list of Michigan schools being affected by the funding cut.
Which Michigan schools will lose COVID-19 funds?
American Rescue Plan funding cuts:
- Battle Creek Public Schools $3,389,571.43
- Benton Harbor Area Schools $4,579,396.00
- Bridgeport-Spaulding Schools $543,527.85
- Brighton Area Schools $1,190,714.15
- Chandler Park Academy $1,017,396.45
- Flint City School District $15,603,029.05
- Hamtramck School District $7,248,920.00
- Lincoln Park School District $1,394,178.42
- Pontiac School District $3,294,052.23
- Port Huron Area Schools $497,205.00
- Reed City Area Schools $58,469.00
- Woodhaven-Brownstown Schools $1,253,299.63
Coronavirus Response and Relief Supplemental Appropriations cuts:
- Adrian Public Schools $7,281.00
- Carman-Ainsworth Comm. Schools $234,818.00
- Grandville Public Schools $24,545.11
- Greenville Public Schools $24,022.00
- Insight School of Michigan $33,363.00
- Marquette Area Public Schools $9,912.14
- Marysville Public Schools $367,159.00
- Michigan Great Lakes Virtual Academy $79,928.00
- Northville Public Schools $62,650.00
- River Rouge, City School District $28,772.00
- Royal Oak Schools $44,398.00
- Van Buren Public Schools $90,000.00
- Wayland Union Schools $66,135.00
- West Bloomfield School District $734,015.00
- Whiteford Agricultural School District $98,143.00
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