School News

Horseman Family Saturdays Break Through The Dark Clouds Of Funding Uncertainty

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Anna Povich de Mayor of Folkore Urbanico leading a workshop at Horseman Family Saturdays last spring

September 10, 2025

By Elizabeth Tucker—

For a while this summer, it looked like the Horseman Family Saturdays program would lose its funding. In the end, however, the much-revered program that provides meals and educational activities to families in the Tarrytowns got the money it needed to survive.

At the end of June, the federal government announced plans to withhold $6 billion in federal education grants. The news came only one day before the deadline for disbursement of the funds and more than a month after schools had approved their budgets for the upcoming year. Following a lawsuit by 24 states, including New York, by the end of July, more than $5 million of the frozen funds had been released.

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With the intended cuts, President Trump took aim at the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, passed in 1965 by Lyndon Johnson. The act sought to ensure greater educational equity by supplementing the funds that school districts raise through property taxes and from state governments (it was extended again first by George W. Bush as No Child Left Behind and later by Barak Obama as Every Student Succeeds).

The percentage of its annual budget that a district derives from the federal government depends on many factors. In the schools of the rivertowns, the amount varies between 3 and 5 percent, with the Tarrytowns receiving the most. While the other rivertowns districts were largely unaffected by the threatened cuts, those directed at Title III, providing extra-curricular support for English language learners, were significant in the Tarrytowns. There, 498 students out of 2,623 were enrolled as English language learners in 2023-24, of whom 460 are economically disadvantaged. During the period of uncertainty over the summer, TUFSD believed it would lose $250,000, which it had relied on for Horseman Family Saturdays.

The program takes place once per month during the school year and, while it is open to the whole community, reaches out in particular to families of disadvantaged children from Spanish-speaking households. Attendees are served brunch with fresh ingredients provided by the TaSH farmer’s market, participate in an activity and can also receive information about local nonprofits and school groups. In the past, activities have been led by representatives of organizations such as the Westchester Children’s Museum, Folklore Urbanico, and Rivertown Dance Academy.

TUFSD Superintendent Ray Sanchez says the district is committed to Horseman Family Saturdays regardless of the availability of federal funds. For all districts, however, it remains to be seen how federal cuts to state budgets will affect states’ ability to come through with education funding. In the words of Hastings superintendent William McKersie, “The thunderclouds are pretty severe.”

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