Academic Decathlon and Pentathlon are allowable activities under American Rescue Plan Act
The global pandemic has taken a lot from Alaska’s students, including opportunities to participate in fun and enriching team activities like Academic Decathlon or, a newer addition, Academic Pentathlon.
The Alaska Department of Education & Early Development has $504 million in COVID-19 relief funding to help districts recover from the past year’s challenges. AKDEED has provided guidelines to assist with making decisions about how to utilize these funds and Academic Decathlon and Pentathlon qualify as allowable activities.
Academic Decathlon and Pentathlon are afterschool programs, for high school and middle school students respectively, that can supplement learning (guideline 11). The programs encourage academic rigor that could help mitigate learning loss (guideline 12) and each team includes students with a range of grade point averages, so they engage students in special populations (guideline 4). Students participate on teams of nine students, working together toward a common goal, which could be a mental health boost after more than a year of isolation.
If those reasons weren’t enough, there are opportunities for students to earn scholarships and college credit, which makes these one-time funds go that much farther.
You can find out about other SERRC programs and activities allowable under ARPA here.