We are painfully familiar with the Kansas Policy Institute, their deceptive use of data, their coziness with many legislators who receive their data unquestioningly, and their insistence that they be treated as education funding and policy experts though their main staffers have no education experience and are paid by a Koch-backed organization to lobby for a low-tax, free-market ideology. We hope WSU really didn’t postpone the forum on the block grant just because KPI complained. The comments following this article are worth a read for those of you unfamiliar with them. Read them here: http://www.kansas.com/news/local/education/article19838694.html

We note that the block grant increases are generally for KPERS, and it makes substantial cuts to equity aid, which the legislature added last summer to comply with the Gannon court decision. Thus, some districts are cut more than others, and though legislators took credit for funding increases while campaigning last summer and fall, we now see reductions taking place during the school year after contracts have been in place and options are limited.