MAJURO (Pacnews) — The Marshall Islands and other Freely Associated States will receive less money for child development under recent federal legislation.
Pacific Resources for Education and Learning has released a report on the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 and its implications for education for the American Pacific region.
The report, published last month, was written by Hilda Heine, PREL’s senior scholar for FAS education.
“In effect, FAS’ eligibility for grants under the No Child Left Behind Act has been reduced,” she wrote. “By dollar volume, the states will get less money than they previously received under the Improving America’s Schools Act.”
The conclusion is based on several things.
First, the Freely Associated States Educational Grant Program, formerly extended to those states only, will now be shared with outlying areas, which in addition to the Pacific territories also includes the U.S. Virgin Islands. The competition for this program allocation is level funded at $5 million per year.
“A minimal resource will now be further minimized,” the report said.
“Second, there are fewer discretionary monies available to the FAS under the Act. Under the previous Act, the FAS were eligible to compete for discretionary funds, including those for bilingual education and the 21st Century Community Learning Center.”
FAS countries will now be ineligible to compete for new grants, the report said.
“This is unfortunate because this (CLCC) is one of the programs that received a substantial funding increase under the new Act.”
It is now also likely that the FSM and Marshall Islands will not be eligible for any No Child Left Behind funds when the new Compacts come into effect next year. The same will be true for Palau after 2006, when its new Compact is ratified.
