Manchester Schools Part Of State Virus 'Disengagement' Program

MANCHESTER, CT — Manchester is part of a new state program aimed at engaging students in kindergarten through high school who have struggled with absenteeism and "disengagement" during the 2020-21 school year as a result of the coronavirus pandemic.

Gov. Ned Lamont announced the program's launch this week.

The initiative, known as the Learner Engagement and Attendance Program, or LEAP, will include a partnership between the Connecticut State Department of Education and the six state Regional Education Service Centers that will target 15 school districts throughout the state.

According to Lamont, funds "will go to increasing people power who will be deployed to homes to directly engage with families and students to provide support."

Connecticut's RESCs will coordinate this work with school district officials, local community organizations, and other state service providers, and will be deployed to homes to engage with families and provide support, he added.

Lamont said the goal of LEAP is to achieve three important outcomes:

• Bridge students back to their school communities for the final months of the school year.
• Support student enrollment in upcoming summer camps and summer learning programs.
• Facilitate for families in need a seamless transition back into their school communities for the 2021-2022 school year.

Engaging families through home visits will also enable officials to address other critical needs of students that are identified, such as behavioral and mental health services, housing stability, access to childcare, technology and internet connectivity, transportation, and additional educational support services, he said.

The initiative will be funded with $10.7 million of Connecticut’s federal coronavirus recovery funding provided through the Governor's Education Emergency Relief Fund.

"Over the past year, our state has made significant progress in closing digital divides in K-12 education," Lamont said. "However, the pandemic has continued to create challenges around student attendance and engagement. It is clear that technology and broadband are necessary, but not sufficient, to ensuring our children have the resources they need to succeed during this challenging period. As such, Connecticut is taking another critical step forward with LEAP in keeping our promise of offering a high-quality education to all students."

Much of the work of LEAP is possible due what Lamont termed "the nationally recognized strategies and data collection efforts on student absenteeism led by CSDE."

Lamont’s office and CSDE used the absenteeism data, along with other district and student data collected by CSDE, to allocate LEAP dollars to support the districts with the greatest need. CSDE will also partner with Attendance Works, a national organization that promotes better policy and practice around student attendance, to support the initiative.

The 15 participating districts will include:

• Bridgeport
• The Capitol Region Education Council
• Danbury
• East Hartford
• Hartford
• Manchester
• Meriden
• New Britain
• New Haven
• New London
• Norwich
• Stamford
• Torrington
• Waterbury
• Windham

"This new federal funding will turbocharge Governor Lamont’s LEAP program, helping ensure students recover from pandemic learning losses, finish the school year strong, and have resources to catch up during the summer," U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal said. "An additional surge of federal funding – $1.1 billion to be distributed within weeks – is also coming to Connecticut right now to help school districts with learning loss, adding to this important down payment by the governor today. But the achievement gap existed before the pandemic and will exist after. The federal government needs to step up on a permanent basis with a reliable flow of funding to truly guarantee equal education opportunity for all students."