Federal Grant Programs

Census Estimates used to Determine Title I Funding for SY2024-25 (Fiscal year 2025)

The federal Census Bureau has released preliminary 2022 poverty and population data for Massachusetts school districts that, once finalized later this year, will be used to calculate school year 2024-25 (fiscal year 25) Title I, Part A district allocations. We are providing you these preliminary estimates because they give an early indication of possible changes to your district's Title I allocation amounts and could be helpful for planning and budgeting purposes.

Preliminary estimates do not include counts of all eligible children, such as foster and neglected children, and the federal Census Bureau does not provide data for charter school, virtual school, or regional vocational school districts. We will publish final 2022 Census numbers, including data for charter schools, virtual schools, and regional vocational schools, when we release final SY2024-25 Title I allocations this summer.

These preliminary data provide an early sense of your eligibility for each of the four funding streams that make up the Title I, Part A allocation. Most importantly, we include warning flags to alert you if your district is hovering around an eligibility threshold, and therefore could potentially lose eligibility when the final numbers are released later this year. As a reminder, eligibility thresholds for each of the four Title I funding streams are as follows:

• Basic Grant: 10 or more students in poverty, representing 2 percent or higher of age 5–17 population
• Targeted Grant: 10 or more students in poverty, representing 5 percent or higher of age 5–17 population
• Education Finance Incentive Grant (EFIG): same as Targeted Grant
• Concentration Grant: 6,500 students or more in poverty or a poverty percentage of 15 percent or higher for age 5–17 population

Importantly, Census poverty estimates differ, oftentimes significantly, from Massachusetts' low income metric. Census poverty is usually much lower because it measures 100% of poverty, whereas MA's low income measure is defined as 185% of poverty. Should your district believe there is a discrepancy in the preliminary Census figures themselves (light blue shaded columns), please contact the federal government's Small Area Income and Poverty Estimates (SAIPE) Branch of the Census Bureau at (301)763-3193 or sehsd.saipe@census.gov before March 13, 2024. When sending an email, please include your name, mailing address, telephone number, e-mail address, and district name. More information and guidance on the census estimates and challenge procedures is available at Challenge Procedures for Estimates.

As always, please feel free to contact our office for questions or further clarification: federalgrantprograms@mass.gov .