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Here’s the second Cap Journal article on rural Kansas schools. “Garden City students speak 26 native tongues, from Burmese and Vietnamese to Somali and Spanish. During the past few decades, the area’s burgeoning meatpacking industry attracted workers from around the world. According to census data, a fifth of the city’s residents are born abroad…[Garden City Superintendent Atha] points to state aid as vital to helping schools attract and retain educators. Kansas slashed its base aid for K-12 schools following the 2008 recession, and today this funding source remains at levels similar to 14 years ago. “Educators argue what...

This article is consistent with what we’ve seen as we have traveled throughout the state and talked to people in different communities. No one has easy fixes to school budget problems and every district is facing challenges with the current funding situation. This article also shows what goes into some of the larger funding numbers (transportation costs, inability to share costs among a large number of students), which puts them in perspective. “For [State Board of Education member Sally] Cauble, though these districts each are small alone, their contribution to the state as a whole is great, and...