Press Releases

Today, Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-VA) joined Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY) and 30+ of their colleagues in introducing the Green New Deal for Public Schools Act.

The ambitious new legislation — which aims to invest $1.43 trillion over 10 years in public schools and infrastructure to combat climate change — would make a transformative and unprecedented investment in public school infrastructure by upgrading every public school building in the country, addressing historical harms and inequities by focusing support on high-need schools, and hiring and training hundreds of thousands of additional educators and support staff. If enacted, the legislation would fund 1.3 million jobs per year and eliminate 78 million metric tons of CO2 annually, the equivalent of taking 17 million cars off the road.

The Green New Deal for Public Schools proposes $1.43 trillion in new funding over 10 years, including the following distribution of resources:

• $446 billion in Climate Capital Facilities Grants and $40 billion for a Climate Change Resiliency Program

  • Climate Capital Facilities Grants will fully fund healthy green retrofits for the highest-need third of schools, as measured by the CDC Social Vulnerability Index, and offer a mix of grant funding and no- or low-interest loans for the middle and top thirds. Grants will cover two-thirds and one-third of retrofit costs for these schools, respectively. 

• $250 billion in Resource Block Grants

  • Resource Block Grants will fund staffing increases, expanded social service programming, and curriculum development at high-need schools. The program will allow Local Educational Agencies across the country to hire and train hundreds of thousands of additional educators and support staff, including paraprofessionals, school psychologists and counselors, and learning specialists. The funds may also be used to design locally-rooted curricula; adopt trauma-informed, culturally responsive, and restorative justice practices, to move towards a “whole child” approach to public education; and partner with community organizations to offer a range of services to schools and surrounding neighborhoods, such as after-school programs. 

• $100 million for an Educational Equity Planning Grants Pilot Program

  • Educational Equity Planning Grants will encourage neighboring Local Education Agencies to form regional consortia, which will receive funding to conduct extensive community outreach, identify the historical and current sources of educational disparities within the region, and create and implement a Regional Education Equity Plan to address those disparities. This pilot program is modeled on the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Sustainable Communities Regional Planning Grants, which are designed to encourage equitable, locally-driven economic development. 

• $695 billion over 10 years for Title I and IDEA (Individuals with Disabilities Education Act) increases

  • This bill proposes quadrupling Title I funding to reach $66 billion annually to support schools and districts with students living in poverty, as well as increasing funding for IDEA Part B to reach $33 billion annually to support students with disabilities.

Original co-sponsors of the legislation are Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), Nanette Diaz Barragan (D-CA), Cori Bush (D-MO), Tony Cardenas (D-CA), Andre Carson (D-IN), Yvette Clarke (D-N.Y.), Gerry Connolly (D-VA), Danny K. Davis (D-IL), Adriano Espaillat (D-N.Y.), Jesús G. "Chuy" García (D-IL), Raúl Grijalva (D-AZ), Pramila Jayapal (D-WA), Ro Khanna (D-CA), Barbara Lee (D-CA), Andy Levin (D-MI), Carolyn B. Maloney (D-N.Y.), Grace Meng (D-N.Y.), Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.), Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-D.C.), Mark Pocan (D-WI), Ayanna Pressley (D-MA), Jamie Raskin (D-MD), Thomas R. Suozzi (D-N.Y.), Mark Takano (D-CA), Bennie Thompson (D-MS), Rashida Tlaib (D-MI), Nydia Velazquez (D-N.Y.), Juan Vargas (D-CA), Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-N.J.), Peter Welch (D-VT), Nikema Williams (D-GA), and Frederica Wilson (D-FL).

Organizations endorsing the Green New Deal for Public Schools include American Federation of Teachers, Sunrise Movement, EduColor, Alliance for Quality Education, Justice Democrats, Climate Justice Alliance, Green New Deal Network, People's Action, Center for Popular Democracy, Global Grassroots Justice Alliance, Democratic Socialists of America, Working Families Party, Indivisible, Building and Construction Trades Council of Greater New York, Jobs with Justice, NY Renews, NYC Environmental Justice Alliance, New York Lawyers for the Public Interest, Gulf Coast Center for Law and Policy, Green Latinos, Future Coalition, March for Our Lives, Friends of the Earth US, Sierra Club, Greenpeace USA, Women's Environment and Development Organization (WEDO), Progressive Democrats of America, and 350.org.

Click here to read the text of the bill.

Click here to read a summary of the bill.