ESSER Information

In response to COVID-19, several pieces of legislation sent billions of dollars in relief funds to states. Tennessee received, in total, $4.2 billion to be spent on schools across the state in three phases. This is known as the Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund (ESSER), and for the third phase, the Tennessee Public Charter School Commission was granted approximately $3.8 million.

ESSER funding directly supports Commission authorized charter schools to mitigate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. The Commission sought to provide maximum autonomy so authorized charter schools can direct these funds to best meet their unique student needs, while ensuring alignment with state and federal requirements. The district LEA plan documents can be found below, and oral translation of these documents may be requested by emailing Charter.Commission@tn.gov.

Commission authorized charter schools received the majority of the district’s ESSER 3.0 relief-funding, and were responsible to develop their own spending plans based on the needs of their students and feedback from their local communities. These plans are required to be updated every six months. The purpose of the ESSER Addendum Survey was to capture feedback on what Commission authorized charter schools should prioritize in existing plans as part of the addendum process. The Charter Commission shared feedback gained through this survey with schools to inform their updated plans. Below are links to the Commission ESSER Plan and Health and Safety Plan documents we sought feedback on. The Commission continued to received feedback until November 1, 2023.