NASHVILLE, Tennessee (WTVF) – Some of Nashville’s most prestigious private schools received millions of dollars in forgivable loans through the Federal Salary Protection Program (PPP).
But some of the schools decided to return the money to the federal government when they saw that enrollment was not going down and there was no danger of firing employees because of COVID.
Other private schools say they followed the program guidelines and plan to apologize for the loans, meaning they will not have to return the money.
Private schools applied for PPP loans last spring when Congress passed the CARES Act and disbursed billions of dollars in emergency funding for pandemics.
Traditional public schools do not meet the requirements for obtaining PPP loans.
Franklin Road Academy received $ 2,063,100 from the Check Protection Program according to data from the Small Business Administration.
The data also shows that Harding Academy, a private kindergarten through eighth grade school in Belle Meade, received $ 1,204,500, while Nashville Christian Schools Inc. of Bellevue, for children in preschool through 12th grade, received $ 1,043,300.
PPP loans are easily forgivable, which means they are essentially free money if schools use most of the funds to make sure employees were not fired during the pandemic.
“It’s very unpleasant to see the amounts there,” Metro councilor Dave Rosenberg said when we showed him what several private schools received.
Rosenberg doubts that private schools have seen a decline in enrollment due to COVID, especially when parents began taking their children out of public schools so they could attend class in person.
“The PPP was supposed to be aimed at small businesses that would otherwise have to lay off employees,” Rosenberg said.
“Private schools have a lot of sources of income, whether it’s endowments or tuition,” Rosenberg said.
Christ Presbyterian Academy on Old Hickory Boulevard received $ 3,189,529, but decided to return all the money to the federal government when the school realized that enrollment had not gone down.
“We decided to return it because frankly, if we didn’t need it, we shouldn’t use it,” said Nate Morrow, who is the CPA school principal.
“As we went through the months of May and June, it became very clear, very quickly, that our families would return to CPA,” Morrow said.
He said the school applied for the money last spring when no one was sure of the impact the pandemic would have.
Montgomery Bell Academy also returned the money it received from the PPP.
The school received more than $ 3 million, but decided it wanted to be a “good citizen” and return the money to others “without resources,” according to principal Brad Gioia.
Father Ryan High School, a private Catholic school, received $ 1,948,600 in PPP loans.
Nashville Diocese Communications Director Rick Musacchio said the school plans to keep the money and forgive the loans.
“We fully complied with the PPP program. It had requirements to keep all workers, which we certainly did,” Musacchio said.
Another Catholic school, Pope John Paul II High School in Hendersonville, received $ 1,139,100 from the PPP program.
Musacchio told us they also plan to keep the money even though full enrollment in Pope John Paul remained unchanged throughout the pandemic. He added that Father Ryan only lost three students.
NewsChannel 5 investigates He asked, “If parents kept paying tuition and tuition didn’t go down, will you ever be in danger of leaving people?”
Musacchio replied, “Yes. PPP loans were very important because we were able to focus on keeping people busy even in the face of the many challenges we faced caused by COVID.”
Musacchio said more families needed financial help because of the economic downturn and schools lost critical money when summer camps closed.
He said the loans helped pay off bus drivers and cafeteria workers who had no work to do during the shutdown.
Musacchio also said Catholic schools have lower enrollments than some of the other schools that returned loans, and he doesn’t think taking the money would prevent small businesses from getting it.
“There are still funds available, in PPP loans, that the government has not yet released,” Musacchio said.
Currey Ingram Academy, a day school and boarding school for preschool through 12th graders, received $ 1,566,000.
The school website states that it helps students with learning disabilities reach their full potential.
He sent a statement in which he reported that the school was using federal money to pay employees of its “Child Development and Diagnostic Center,” which are open to the public and could not operate during the extended quarantine.
Councilman Dave Rosenberg said the frustrating thing is that public schools could not even apply for PPP loans.
“In a public school you can see PTOs struggling to raise $ 5,000 to $ 10,000,” Rosenberg said.
“When you widen the gap between public and private schools it’s not good for us as a society. It’s not good for us as a city,” Rosenberg said.
We contacted all the schools in this story and some of them sent us the following statements.
Statement from Currey Ingram Academy
Amid uncertainty about what the next academic year would be like, Currey Ingram Academy applied for the Salary Protection Program in early 2020. The money received was intended to support Currey Academy faculty and staff. Ingram, as well as our Child Development staff. Center and Diagnostic Center, which are open to the public and could not operate during the extended quarantine, employed during the crisis. It was also aimed at implementing safety and health measures to enable our students to safely return to face-to-face learning in the fall. We recognize that companies in almost every industry have been affected by the COVID-19 crisis, and we are grateful to be able to receive a small portion to keep our staff busy and the community safe on campus.
CPA Statement
The Church (Christ Presbyterian Church) and the Academy submitted an application for the total amount offered with the uncertainty of the ability of our families to pay tuition or the ability of church members to contribute to annual donations during the pandemic. We are an organization that employs more than 250 employees, whose compensation depends on enrollment and the loan guarantee was a step forward in the uncertainty of the year. However, as it unfolded in the fall of 2020, our tuition income remained stable, allowing us to repay the full amount of the loan to other nonprofits that needed it most.
We are grateful that many of our neighbors and nonprofits in the Nashville area have had access to financial relief and stability in the uncertainty of this pandemic.
Additional information from the Catholic diocese of Nashville
The loans helped all our entities avoid cutting payroll to compensate for the loss of revenue during the pandemic. Loans not only kept people busy, as was the goal of the program, but perhaps most importantly, they saved many jobs that provide support services to meet a wide range of needs. For our non-school entities, the loans allowed us to maintain vital staff and experience, which allowed us to provide continuity of our services to the entire Nashville community. This would include providing affordable child care to low-income families, being a distribution arm chosen by the State of Tennessee to assist with tornado assistance services, and being chosen by the City of Nashville to assist with counseling and relief services. emergency services to families affected by the Christmas Day Bombing.
Loans related to our schools, for example, allowed schools to pay for bus drivers and cafeteria workers even though they had no jobs, as students were subject to home stay orders. The funds also helped provide PPE and support the implementation of protocols and modifications needed for safe reopening for face-to-face learning in the early academic year in August 2020. The 16 parish and diocesan schools returned to open in person. the planned learning and established safety protocols and modifications have allowed them to remain open throughout the year. Face-to-face learning not only provides security and education for both Catholic and non-Catholic students, but also relieves their families of the burden of providing supervision and support to students participating in distance education programs.