- Columbus City Schools
- Strategies & Outcomes
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INTENDED STRATEGIES AND OUTCOMES OF ESSER INVESTMENTS
The pandemic exposed the social and emotional needs of students in collaboration with maintaining grade-level curriculum. Investing in staff and the technical support to connect students to opportunities and resources is key to ensure equitable outcomes for all current and future students. Columbus City Schools cannot return to instructional methods prior to the pandemic but will look to maximize technical resources for transformational educational opportunities for students, teachers, and staff.
Overarching Goals: High-level outcomes for ESSER investments
- Safely reopen schools for all students.
- Address pre- and post-pandemic unfinished learning.
- Build lasting, equitable systems of teaching and learning.
Emerging High-Level Strategies For Achieving These Goals:
- Attend to the immediate health and safety requirements as well as the social, emotional, and mental health needs of students and adults.
- Ensure grade-level, standards-aligned instruction with just-in-time academic and social-emotional support.
- Invest in staff capacity and lasting infrastructure that closes the opportunity, resource, and digital divides and ensures equitable outcomes for all current and future students
ESSER Funds Feedback Form: Provided to CCS community in May 2021 with over 80% community approval of established priorities.
Finance and Appropriations Committee Meeting - December 14, 2022
ESSER Roundtable Discussions: A Podcast Series
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Episode 1 - Communications
Host: Tracie Helmbrecht
Guests: Letrece Griffin, Chief of Communications and Jacqueline Bryant, Interim Executive Director of Communications
This first of four episodes looks into how the CCS Communications Department handled the COVID-19 school closure and what systems and structures needed to be put in place to ensure that all students, families, staff and stakeholders received timely and current information. Latrece and Jacqueline take us back to the very beginning of the worldwide closure and how the district pivoted from remote teaching and learning to hybrid and finally to socially distant in person teaching and learning. They also discuss some of the lessons learned and some of the changes made out of necessity that have become a permanent fixture in how Communications reaches our community.
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Episode 2 - Buildings & Grounds and Safety & Security
Host: Tracie Helmbrecht
Guests: Jeff Row, Director of Buildings & Grounds, and Chris Baker, Director of Safety & Security
This second episode of the CCS ESSER Roundtable Discussion delves into how Buildings & Grounds and Safety & Security operated throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. In this discussion, Jeff and Chris take us back to the initial closure and how the two departments were forced to restructure the scope of the work. Jeff and Chris help stakeholders understand the response, preparations that needed to be made while also discussing the continued support given to our district as we safely reopened.
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Episode 3 - Transportation & Food Services
Host: Tracie Helmbrecht
Special Gusts: Rodney Stufflebean, Director fo Transportation, and Joe Brown, Executive Director of Food Services
Transportation and Food Services can only operate when schools are open. Or so we thought. Rodney and Joe take us back to March 13, 2020, and help us understand the immediate shift in resources needing made due to the pandemic. In episode 3, we learn how both departments were able to use COVID-19 relaxed regulations to keep our students fed, and use buses as hot spots throughout our communities. We learn specifically the support given by Transportation and Food Services to ensure our students remained nourished and had access to the necessary Wi-Fi connections as teaching and learning went 100% remote. We also are taken back to the changes needed to support hybrid and eventual return to full time in person teaching and learning.
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Episode 4 - Payroll & Talent Management
Host: Tracie Helmbrecht
Guests: Betty Arey, Supervisor of Payroll and Courtney Hale, Interim Director of Talent Management
When the schools closed, many wondered what would happen to their livelihood. How would necessary paperwork get turned in if the district was shuttered? These were the exact questions faced by Betty and Courney when COVID-19 forced all CCS buildings to close, including HR and Payroll. Betty and Courtney share with us the necessary and immediate changes needed and how ESSER funding allowed the district to move to a more paperless system and ensuring not one single payroll cycle was missed during the closure. Some of these systems and structures made out of necessity have become permanent and we learn how these permanent changes continue to support and respond to the pandemic closure.
