SPRINGFIELD
 â One day before consolidated elections, the Illinois State Board of Elections executive director was placed on administrative leave after being the subject of an online extortion attempt, ISBE said in a news release.
The eight-member elections board voted unanimously on Monday, April 5, to place Director Steve Sandvoss on leave, according to the release.
The board also approved the appointment of Assistant Executive Director Bernadette Matthews to serve as interim director while Sandvoss is on leave.
âThe board also authorized the agencyâs Chief Information Security Officer, Jeremy Owens, to cooperate fully with the law enforcement investigation, as well as conduct an internal assessment of all SBE devices to which Director Sandvoss had access and ensure the security of the Boardâs systems,â the release states.
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Geneva District 304 has received about $4.2 million in federal coronavirus-relief funding over the past year. (Shutterstock)
GENEVA, IL Geneva District 304 is set to receive nearly $2.6 million from the American Rescue Plan, the $1.9 trillion economic relief package signed into law last month by President Joe Biden.
The district-level federal funding allocations come from the third portion of the Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief program, dubbed ESSER III. District 304 has received about $4.2 million across the three disbursements from the ESSER program.
The third portion includes nearly $122 billion in funding to states and school districts. About $4.5 billion has been set aside for Illinois elementary and high school districts over the next three years, along with $1.3 billion for the state s postsecondary institutions.
Subscribe It is particularly important that ARP ESSER funding will enable State and local educational agencies, as well as schools, to support students who have been most severely impacted by the pandemic, which has even further exacerbated the inequities in our education system, Cardona said.
Combined with money included in the first two rounds of the ESSER program allocated in last year s Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security, or CARES, Act and January s Coronavirus Response and Relief Supplemental Appropriations Act Illinois education system has so far awarded $7.8 billion in federal pandemic relief.
Nearly 90 percent of that money has gone directly to school districts.
By Peter Hancock / Capitol News Illinois
• 2 hours ago
Gov. JB Pritzker on Monday visited an early childhood learning center in the Champaign school district.
Gov. JB Pritzker took to the road Monday to urge local school districts in Illinois to carefully target the roughly $7 billion in federal funds they will soon receive in order to help students overcome the learning loss they may have suffered during the pandemic.
“We’re all wondering if this was a lost year for our children,” Pritzker said at an early childhood learning center in the Champaign school district. “We worry if a year’s worth of online classes and virtual play dates will impact their future in some negative way in the future.”
Pritzker urges schools to focus COVID relief funds
$7 billion in federal aid to help schools reopen fully
By PETER HANCOCK
Capitol News Illinois
SPRINGFIELD – Gov. JB Pritzker took to the road Monday to urge local school districts in Illinois to carefully target the roughly $7 billion in federal funds they will soon receive in order to help students overcome the learning loss they may have suffered during the pandemic.
“We’re all wondering if this was a lost year for our children,” Pritzker said at an early childhood learning center in the Champaign school district. “We worry if a year’s worth of online classes and virtual play dates will impact their future in some negative way in the future.”