The Department has reallocated $13.6 million in federal funds to be used in school districts with high percentages of students from low-income families.

The “Title I, Part A” federal funds will help bring programs to as many as 400,000 students in traditional public and charter schools, as well as 24,000 students in nonpublic schools.

The surplus funds, which would have gone unspent for the year, will now be reallocated in four targeted areas:

• STEM: To foster science, technology, engineering and math;
• Early learning transitional programs: To give children from preschool to Grade 5 the extra skills they need to succeed as they advance to the next grade;
• Social-emotional learning: To provide students with skills to manage emotions, show empathy, and make responsible decisions; and
• Arts integration: To infuse the arts throughout other subjects.

More than 600 schools operate Title I, Part A schoolwide programs in New Jersey, and those districts can apply for the funds.

“This initiative to reallocate our federal funds is a new approach by the Department to ensure more education dollars get into the classroom, where it belongs,” said Dr. Lamont O. Repollet, Commissioner of Education. “What this means is that our greater focus on leveraging federal funds will improve the education of hundreds of thousands of children.”