We knew.
“So locking in funding for two years – though it’s more stable and certain for the state – isn’t meeting districts’ needs in a time of increasing enrollments and instruction, transportation, health and utility costs.
“Who knew?
“Superintendents, school boards, teachers and other education leaders did.
“But they were not part of the secretive, hurried work of writing the block-grant funding bill in March before its limited vetting and rushed passage, including the disgraceful two hours during which the House waited as the state plane was sent to pick up a ‘yes’ voter…
“Meanwhile, Brownback continues to blame schools for their budget shortfalls, complain about their insufficient spending in the classroom and declare that their state funding ‘is going up substantially’– refusing to acknowledge that the increased state aid for teacher pensions, while welcome and necessary, cannot be used to pay operating costs.
“USD 259, for example, has $5.6 million more in state aid this year, but only $329,000 of it is usable ‘in the classroom’ and then mostly for special education. Factor in the district’s anticipated $14 million in cost increases, including 20 new teachers to cover enrollment growth, and the district expects to lower its contingency reserve to equal just six days of operating costs.
“Is this any way to ‘make suitable provision for finance of the educational interests of the state,’ as the Kansas Constitution demands? Some of those who dwell under the Capitol dome think so.
“But from where school board members, administrators, teachers and parents sit, the state is only making it harder to prepare students in Kansas public schools for career and life success.”
Read more here: http://www.kansas.com/opinion/editorials/article31829319.html