The Oakland Unified School District (OUSD) has launched a new pilot program that rewards kids with perfect attendance with weekly stimulus checks worth $50.
By lowering living expenses, an attendance reward system seeks to improve the performance of low-income earners by incentivizing students to attend classes.
The program, which began as a 10-week course and has already enrolled one hundred students, has the potential to influence the future formulation of educational policy and enhance strategies for raising attendance rates across the country due to its positive outcomes.
How do You get paid $50 per week?
Thus, in order for the students to be eligible for the weekly payment of $50, they need to meet two requirements. First and foremost, one needs to make sure they attend every lesson from Monday through Friday.
Secondly, pupils must participate in a mental health assessment procedure. Because of the program’s holistic approach, which prioritizes student welfare in addition to academic accomplishment, there is a need for this dual requirement.
When a client has emotional issues that may hinder his ability to learn, the mental health component is crucial. OUSD therefore aims to promote a healthier learning environment by introducing financial incentives and mental health support for students.
This is how the $200,000 in grants and California’s ARC model finance the stimulus check program
The main source of funding for the program is California’s attendance-based revenue model for schools, or ARC.
Funds are distributed to schools according to this approach in proportion to the daily enrollment of students. Therefore, raising attendance rates has an impact on the participating students’ and institutions’ financial viability.
In addition, the effort has received funding of $200,000 from Rockefeller Philanthropy, the NoVo Foundation, and Education First. The project, officially known as the Equitable Design Project, has benefited greatly from this financial backing in its infancy.
The $50 weekly stipend was created to help families with financial difficulties and free up students’ time for education.
In Oakland, 61 percent of pupils missed at least one day out of ten, according to data from the state evaluation 2022 and released by the Oakland Unified School District.
Oakland, however, is a leader in educational reform as it is the only American city that is now implementing financial incentives to improve school attendance. If executed well, the program might boost academic performance, double attendance rates, and serve as a national model for other struggling SDs.
Thus, the $50 weekly stimulus check program offered by the OUSD is an innovative and motivating approach to address absenteeism and support students both monetarily and emotionally.
If this massive, $1 billion pilot program is successful in implementing a framework that focuses on students’ academic achievement as well as their physical and emotional health, it may establish a new benchmark for how American schools address truancy and student absenteeism.
Leave a Reply