Federal aid package includes $9 million for GCC
Orleans/Niagara BOCES allocated $277K
Photo by Tom Rivers: Genesee Community College’s main campus in Batavia is shown in this photo. GCC also operates campus centers in Orleans, Wyoming and Livingston counties.
The newly passed $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan includes $2.6 billion for colleges, universities and students in New York, including $9,165,000 for Genesee Community College.
Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer released a breakdown of the aid today, which also includes $277,000 for the Orleans/Niagara BOCES.
The public and non-profit schools will use half of their award on emergency financial aid grants to students to help them with college costs and basic needs like housing, food, and healthcare, Schumer said.
The other half of the funds will allow institutions to provide additional student support activities, and to cover a variety of institutional costs, including lost revenue, reimbursement for expenses already incurred, technology costs associated with a transition to distance education, faculty and staff trainings, and payroll. Proprietary schools must use their awards exclusively to provide financial aid grants to students.
“As New York’s colleges, universities, and students face over a year of unprecedented hurdles, they do so at a steep cost that it is our responsibility to address and overcome,” Schumer said in a news release. “In prioritizing the health and safety of students, faculty, and staff, New York’s higher education institutions have ripped massive holes in their budgets and are now facing down financial devastation – and we simply can’t let that happen.
Some of the funding allocations include:
- GCC, $9,165,000
- Geneseo SUNY, $11,955,000
- Monroe2-Orleans BOCES, $344,000
- Brockport SUNY, $21,778,000
- Monroe Community College, $34,921,000
- Roberts Wesleyan College, $3,830,000
- Orleans/Niagara BOCES, $277,000
- Niagara County Community College, $12,359,000
This funding announced today is in addition to the $2.4 billion Schumer secured for New York’s institutions of higher education in the past Covid relief bills. In total, Schumer has secured over $5 billion for New York’s colleges and universities in the past year.
“As Majority Leader, I was proud to make funding for New York’s higher education institutions and students a top priority, and the American Rescue Plan will deliver this much needed $2.6 billion in assistance to help our world-class institutions through the crisis, get students safely back to classes, and get campuses across the state back to ‘normal’,” he said.
