Missouri devotes $122.7 million in CARES relief to reopen colleges and universities

Missouri is spending $80 million of its federal COVID-19 relief money to ensure that the state’s public colleges and universities reopen safely for the fall semester, state officials announced Thursday.

“We know that we need PPE. We know that we need to modify our physical spaces. We know that we need testing capability. We know that we need resources to comply with local health orders,” Higher Education Commissioner Zora Mulligan said at Gov. Mike Parson’s afternoon press briefing.

Even with added precautions, Parson acknowledged, until there is a vaccine, the “virus will be in the schools.”

“It will be in the universities as that happens. You just got to be prepared for it,” Parson said.

There are roughly 350,000 students currently enrolled in higher education programs in Missouri, Mulligan said.

Last month, Parson made a $41 million cut to Missouri’s higher education budget and a $131 million cut to the state’s K-12 budget.

An additional $10 million of federal funding will be allocated to helping state colleges and universities expand their remote learning capabilities.

“One of the things we learned this spring is that it is possible to very rapidly move all of their instruction online, but that it is optimal to have a little bit more time and more resources to do so,” Mulligan said.

Still, she said, remote learning is no replacement for in-person learning.

“It’s vitally important for students to return to campus — to have the experience both inside the classroom and beyond that they need to learn and grow,’ Mulligan said.

Mulligan said her department is leading a series of conversations with experts and developing a document detailing how colleges and universities can safely reopen.

Another $23 million will be dedicated to ensuring state schools have the faculty and staff they need to serve students this fall and beyond, Mulligan said.

An additional $9.7 million of federal money will be allocated to workforce training, primarily through job training programs that can be accessed online or through job centers.

Missouri received approximately $2.4 billion in federal funding through the CARES Act, which was signed into law in late March.

This story was originally published July 9, 2020 at 5:16 PM.