McDONALD — Patching up issues from the COVID-19 pandemic has become a harder feat than expected, the McDonald Board of Education heard Monday.

McDonald and other local public schools await the approval and disbursal of the Ohio Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER) funds, previously approved by the CARES Act in March 2021.

The U.S. Department of Education’s $489.2 million can be used for schools to help with expenses directly caused by or related to the pandemic, as well as “other activities that are necessary to maintain the operation of continuity of services,” according to the Ohio Department of Education. The funds are available for costs between March 13, 2020, and Sept. 20, 2022.

All public, private and charter schools can apply to the pandemic relief funds. Once they apply, however, there are waiting lists and some schools haven’t heard back in months about the status of their ESSER money.

The dollars are disbursed in multiple rounds after approval from the Ohio General Assembly — Rounds 2 and 3 are supposed to be on the way.

In the meantime, some school districts are still having daily struggles from the delay.

“We’ve seen a dramatic increase in failures, especially in the first nine-week grading period,” said Superintendent Kevin O’Connell, for example. “We want to bridge the social and academic gaps for everyone.”

The McDonald school district has been allocating the funds it should receive from ESSER 2 and 3 toward a one-year limited contract Learning Loss instructor for both the high school and elementary schools. The teacher is paid at $20 per hour for no more than 28.75 hours a week. This is equivalent to about $30,000 per year. The exact amount of money McDonald will receive is not certain until officially approved.

Because these funds haven’t yet been disbursed to the school district, McDonald has been using additional funds in its budget to cover the costs.

“We’re lucky to have additional funds, but other schools might not have the same privileges as we do,” said O’Connell. “We can’t do this for much longer though, so we’re hoping the remainder of the ESSER funds come in soon.”