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“Kansans might think that state lawmakers tasked with understanding and deciding how to evaluate and reform the state’s school finance formula would be interested in hearing from educators, school administrators and the state agency or board directly charged with education oversight. They’d be wrong, however.”http://www.hutchnews.com/Editorialblogs/edit–school-finance-meeting...

Some interim education members agreed with presentations by paid staff of the Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice and Kansas Policy Institute on a “staffing surge” but others recognized that “many other professions were included in this nonteaching category, such as special education instructors, reading specialists, school psychologists, audiologists, and speech pathologists,” that some of that hiring is mandated by federal and state law and that many smaller districts are losing students but still need a superintendent (who also performs many other jobs). We also note that hiring aides is sometimes a response to funding pressure, as it is...

We’ve heard some legislators claim that the move to change judicial selection has nothing to do with wanting to reign in court protection of school funding. We hope this story ends those claims, and Kansans see what’s really going on here. “[Senate President] Wagle – whom the governor called a ‘rock star and personal hero of mine’ – projected that a decision requiring lawmakers to increase school funding would push the Legislature to go to voters with a constitutional amendment to change the way Supreme Court justices are picked. ‘It will be a very tough year if we’re...