Most of the large grants that school districts are eligible to apply for are provided by state and federal agencies. These grants use tax payer money to fund programs that they support. In order to receive the available funds, a school district's proposed program must meet certain criteria established by the granting organization (usually the New York State Education Department or the United States Department of Education).

An increasing amount of the aid that school districts receive for their maintenance is placed into competitive grants instead of being given to schools directly. This means that we can no longer rely solely on state aid and local tax dollars to support quality programming for our students, instead we have to compete with other district for available funds.

Government grant money is taxpayer money...and I would rather have it working for our students and in our community.