Schools in Lincoln County are still missing federal funds in the midst of a federal-level freeze. According to the superintendents at Chandler and Stroud, the schools are missing about $57,000 and $80,000, respectively, of what they received in federal funds last year.
The U.S. Department of Education announced on July 1 that it had frozen programs providing over $6 billion to schools nationwide. In a notice sent to states, it said the programs are under review despite the fact the funds were already allocated and approved by Congress, as well as scheduled to be delivered to schools by July 1.
For the State of Oklahoma, this comes to a total of over $70 million in frozen funds. It breaks down to over $240,000 from Title I-C, which helps the children of migrants; over $31 million from Title II-A, which supports professional development for teachers and leaders; about $6.4 million from Title III-A, which supports English as a Second Language programs; about $16.3 million for Title IV-A, which student support and academic enrichment programs; about $15.6 million for before and after school programs; $7.3 million for Adult Basic and Literacy Education; and $405,346 for Integrated English Literacy and Civics Education.
The Lincoln County News reached out to all superintendents in its coverage area, but only two responded before deadline.
Chandler Superintendent Scott Baade said the district has not received $57,466.68 of what it got last year in funding. He said in 2024-25, the school district received a total of $299,973.86 from federal programs.
The funds break down to $2,160.55 through Title I-A, $36,392.08 through Title II-A (professional development), and $18,916.05 through Title V, which is for rural schools. These are the amounts the district received last year. Baade said most of the funds are for Chandler’s elementary schools -- Park Road and East Side.
“They’re targeted assistance, because that’s where we want to put our funds in for those beginning readers and math and for our young kids,” he said.
“Some of this funding goes for programs, benchmarking and different software that may help in determining their skill levels and it helps with curriculum.”
He added that they purchase supplemental curriculum, as well as pay some salary for reading and math specialists.
While they are hoping the funds come in, Baade said the district needs to be prepared. They do have a little carryover from last year, but if it continues to be that much a downfall later on, then the budget will need to be adjusted. Once they use the carryover, the district will have to use general funds.
“We’re probably at a decent stage, but yet, we’ve depended on these federal funds. And, you know, that’s $57,000 and some change that we may not have this year,” he said. “I think after this year, if we continue to decrease that much, then it’ll start affecting us as far as our general fund.”
Joe Van Tuyl, superintendent at Stroud Public Schools, said their frozen funds were somewhere in the neighborhood of $80,000. However, he said it won’t affect operations, being used for some Pre-K things and aides, as they have the ability to backfill that.
“I’m blessed with a strong budget. My experience from working in districts that were not blessed with overall strong budgets is that each of those dollars is very important to your overall operations,” he said. “We just don’t sit in that kind of situation right now.”
Van Tuyl also speculated that there is more to come, saying he thinks we’ll be seeing some impacts on the Erate funding at some point. Also known as the Schools and Libraries Program, this is an initiative that helps helps schools and libraries pay for telecommunications and internet access.
“Rumors are that there’s some of that coming. I don’t know exactly where it might move on that.There’s another part of me that says that, you know, frozen now may not mean frozen forever,” he said.
The superintendent then said that he is only in charge of expenditures -- that’s all he can control -- while others control the funding, resources and allocations.
“I’ve just kind of had an attitude to try to not be overly concerned about the things I can’t control. If this is the allocation that comes, then I have to produce a product with that allocation. I’ll do what I can,” he said.