ESSER Reporting

All local education agencies (LEAs) and non-LEA entities receiving Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER) funds under the CARES Act (ESSER I), the CRRSA Act (ESSER II) and/or the ARP Act (ARP ESSER) must complete and submit the ESSER Funding Status Report to the Pennsylvania Department of Education (PDE). This includes all school districts, charter schools, intermediate units (IU), career and technical centers (CTC), approved private schools (APS), private residential rehabilitative institutions (PRRI), chartered schools for the deaf and blind, and entities providing educational programs to neglected, delinquent, and at-risk youth that received ESSER funding.

The ESSER Funding Status Report data collection template is available on the PIMS Excel Reporting Tools web page. School districts, charter schools, IUs, CTCs, APSs, PRRIs, and chartered schools for the deaf and blind that received ESSER funding should follow the LEA ESSER Funding Status Report instructions (PDF) and submit their report in the Pennsylvania Information Management System (PIMS).

Entities providing educational programs to neglected, delinquent, and at-risk youth (non-LEA entities) that receive ESSER funding should follow the Non-LEA ESSER Funding Status instructions (PDF) and email their report as an Excel file to ra-edarpesser@pa.gov.   

The ESSER Reporting instructions can be found on the ESSER Reporting web page. PDE has prepared ESSER Funding Status Report instructions for both LEAs (PDF) and non-LEA entities (PDF). The instructions outline the federal reporting requirements (including the time-period of expenditures to be reported), which entities must complete each section of the report, and how to categorize expenditures. 

LEAs and non-LEA entities receiving ESSER funds must submit the ESSER Funding Status Report to PDE no later than Friday, March 7, 2025. LEAs and non-LEA entities may submit their reports to PDE anytime between January 31, 2025 and March 7, 2025. All grantees are encouraged to submit their completed reports as soon as possible.

The reporting period for the ESSER Funding Status Report is July 1, 2023 through June 30, 2024, which is the 2023-2024 fiscal year (FY). LEAs and non-LEA entities should complete the ESSER Funding Status Report based on activities and expenditures in the 2023-2024 FY for ESSER I, ESSER II and ARP ESSER, respectively. LEAs whose fiscal year starts on January 1 should use the method of converting their financial information from July 1 to June 30 as they do for reporting on the Annual Financial Report. 

DO NOT include receipt or use of other COVID-relief funds, such as Governor’s Emergency Education Relief (GEER) Funds, Emergency Assistance to Nonpublic Schools (EANS) Funds, ARP IDEA Funds, ARP Homeless Children and Youth (ARP-HCY) Funds, and/or any other federal, state, or local COVID-related relief funds.

Funds previously reported as expended should only be reported in response to questions that include the language “during the previous reporting periods.” LEAs and non-LEA entities must ensure that cumulative totals from ESSER reporting do not exceed what was awarded.  

Submission of the federal ESSER report is a condition of continued receipt of ESSER funds, and this requirement is built into every ESSER grant agreement. LEAs and non-LEA entities that do not complete and submit the ESSER Funding Status Report will jeopardize their ESSER funding.

The CARES Act, the CRRSA Act, and the ARP Act allowed at least 90% of each state’s total ESSER allocation to be dedicated to Mandatory Subgrant Awards to LEAs. Subgrants had to be distributed to school districts and charter schools in an amount proportionate to Title I-A shares. See the table below.

Mandatory Subgrants to LEAs

The CARES Act, the CRRSA Act, and the ARP Act define the SEA Reserve Allocation as the remainder of a state’s ESSER allocation under each act (up to 10 percent).

The Pennsylvania General Assembly determined how the ESSER SEA Reserve Allocations for ESSER I and ARP ESSER were distributed. See the tables below. There were no ESSER SEA Reserve Allocations to LEAs for ESSER II.

ESSER I SEA Reserve

ARP ESSER SEA Reserve

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Questions about the ESSER Funding Status Report should be sent to ra-edarpesser@pa.gov.