NEWS ANALYSIS
Emergency Funding Continues Portland State to Continue Offering Emergency Funding Through 2021-22 School Year
THE PACIFIC SENTINEL
by Dan Chilton Illustrations by Astrid Luong At a student media press conference held during this quarter, Stephen Percy, Portland State’s President, confirmed that PSU will continue to offer emergency funding for students throughout the 2021-22 academic year. At the beginning of the 2021-22 academic year, eligible students were automatically funded eight hundred dollars to their account for emergency related needs such as food, rent, tuition, or healthcare. It will come as a relief to many that this financial assistance will continue. The money allocated for Winter term has already begun to be distributed and with a two hundred dollar addition, bringing the quarterly relief funds for this quarter to one thousand dollars—a significant help to many in need.
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These federal funds, allocated through the CARES Act: Higher Education Emergency Relief Fund (HEERF), will continue to be automatically awarded to qualifying students in need. The parameters for automatic eligibility are as follows: • Pell-eligible or equivalent students with an Estimated Family Contribution (EFC) of 0 • Enrolled as of October 10, 2021 While HEERF did allow students to apply for emergency relief if they did not meet the requirements for automatic enrollment, the deadline for the enrollment application has since passed. If you do not qualify and are in need of emergency assistance in order to stay in school, there are options for you and you
should reach out to the Financial Wellness Center for help. The CARES Act went into effect in March of 2020 and allotted $2.2 trillion to Americans negatively impacted by COVID-19. Of this, about $14 billion was given to the Office of Postsecondary Education for disbursement with another $21.2 billion added in January of 2021. Portland State University has reportedly received $8.3 million of this allocated funding and distributed nearly all of that based on the CARES Act federal guidelines. These guidelines factor in student priority needs starting from housing and food to health and childcare.
