Category Archives: School Finance

I’ve shared with you before my concerns about the work of Colorado’s School Finance Partnership — too weighted down by established interests, too vague and unambitious thus far, etc. The Partnership put out a report in August, but now is transitioning to a series of technical discussions on how to make effective changes to school funding formulas and the like. State senator Michael Johnston, a key leader in the partnership, has stated his goal of striving to achieve both “bold” reforms to the School Finance Act and a “bold” request for additional tax revenue from voters (making such a tough request from cash-strapped voters in one sense would have to be bold). Just exactly how “bold” the respective proposals end up could make all the difference. You likely will hear more from me on that at a later point. But for now it’s interesting to note that Colorado isn’t alone in discussing this sort of “grand bargain.” Once more, our state may end up at the center of a national movement — at least according to an account from the Fordham Institute’s’ Michael Petrilli.

Yesterday I shared some thoughts about how a growing Brighton district with some crowded schools might find some creative solutions to its problem. While securing safe, functional and adequate facilities is a high priority for some school districts, others can bask gratefully in their new quarters and hopefully focus even more on the mission of educating students. Which brings us to another part of Adams County. Not every school district will be able to do what Mapleton has created with its colorful, new state-of-the-art Skyview Campus. On September 27, some of my Education Policy Center friends received a tour of the creatively-designed campus from superintendent Charlotte Ciancio and human resources officer Damon Brown. (from L to R): Brown, Raaki Garcia-Ulam, Ben DeGrow, Pam Benigno, Ciancio

A Denver Post Your Hub story from last week by Joey Kirchmer chronicles some growing pains in Brighton School District: Brighton High School and Prairie View High School are at or over capacity this school year, which has forced administrators to turn to outdoor modular classrooms, roaming teachers and possibly start looking at a split-schedule system.

Last week my Education Policy Center friend Ben DeGrow came out with a short, fun, and kid-friendly paper called “Colorado K-12 Tax Hikes Challenged.” The paper looked at five large school districts asking voters for more tax funds on this fall’s ballot: Jefferson County, Denver, Cherry Creek, Aurora, and St. Vrain Valley. DeGrow acknowledged that these school budgets have faced more pressure than they are used to — mostly because per-pupil revenue growth has slowed down, but not actually dropped. Yet the household budgets of citizens in these communities have been hit even harder during the recent economic downturn. The paper concludes by offering “a different approach” that focuses on more productive spending. Looking at one of the five districts, Denver Public Schools, a new report by EAG News makes some specific suggestions for spending reductions to inefficient salary structures and union perks. The total estimated annual savings would be $37.5 million, including the following proposals:

It’s not uncommon for me to tell you about the great need for public schools to spend dollars more productively. A recent brief, colorful paper written by my Education Policy Center friend Ben DeGrow makes the point with some great local significance for school districts asking voters for tax increases this fall. But, you may ask, why is this a problem in the first place? Why does the productivity of school spending tend to deteriorate over time? The answer, as Matt Ladner ably points out in a couple new posts, is Baumol’s disease. Wait a minute, I see some of you ready to run and hide. No, it doesn’t mean you’re going to break out with red blotches on your skin, develop a high fever, or experience bouts of memory loss. It’s not that kind of disease! Ladner points to a lecture by the brilliant education policy scholars Paul Hill and Marguerite Roza to explain the phenomenon: “the tendency of labor-intensive organizations to become more expensive over time but not any more productive.”

Four months ago, while introducing you to the education policy blueprint of a major party presidential candidate, I noted that one of the hardest areas in which “it might be hard to make a contrast” between Obama and Romney is K-12 education. Every time one of these major national elections comes up, serious questions and debates take place about the federal government’s role — like the seven-part video series on Choice Media TV with Joe Williams and Jay Greene. In the last installment, the question comes up about the deep potential and widespread problems with fraud and abuse in the federal Title I program for low-income students. Greene responds with the vital idea of attaching the Title I dollars directly to needy students rather than filtering them through wasteful bureaucracies — a great idea touted here before. But beyond that kind of choice, mobility and empowerment, what other reform ideas could be part of a conservative agenda for the federal role in education?

Talk about picking up where I left off. On Wednesday I shared the story of Adams 12 taxpayer Joseph Hein, from his daughter’s difficult confrontation with a schoolhouse bully to his own experience having to be escorted for his own protection away from union bullies at a school board meeting. At the end of last week’s post I noted: Now he and other district residents have begun pushing for district-union negotiations to be open and transparent, so taxpayers and teachers can see what’s being negotiated, to be informed and act accordingly. Well, that very night Mr. Hein made just such a case in his public comment to the Adams 12 school board:

It’s Friday, and I’m itching to get out and play. So let’s make today’s post short, sweet and to the point. For anyone paying attention, it’s no mystery that the Chicago teachers strike finally got resolved a couple days ago. Rick Hess has the best breakdown of winners (including the interesting trio of President Obama, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, and Chicago Teachers Union president Karen Lewis) and losers (Rahm Emanuel, reform-minded Democrats, and Class Warfare author Steven Brill).

Progress in education reform, like so many other areas, is never final. Just as bad policies can be undone, so can good policies. Simply put, we can’t rest on our laurels. I’m sure that Idaho superintendent Tom Luna and the team behind his Students Come First program are well aware of that reality now. Last year I told you about the yummy tater tots of education reform coming out of the Gem State — a few key pieces of legislation that, among other things, spurred some great innovative local pay-for-performance projects. But a report this week from Education News’ Julie Lawrence, the teachers union and other reform opponents collected enough signatures to put the reform items on the ballot for voters to reconsider:

From Todd Engdahl’s story yesterday in Ed News Colorado, at least 23 school districts in the state are going to local voters this year to ask for one or more tax increases–mill levy overrides for various operating costs, and/or bonds or BEST matching grant requests to pay for capital construction or renovation projects. (In the unusual case of Aspen, voters will decide on a sales-tax increase to fund schools.) The proposals follow one year after a historically-high 26 out of 38 local school tax proposals went down to defeat. Notably, this year five of the state’s nine largest school districts, cumulatively enrolling more than one-third of Colorado’s public K-12 students, are seeking voter approval of various tax increases. Some of them represent significant amounts (descriptions from Ed News in quotes): Jefferson County: “$99 million bond for a variety of building upgrades; $39 million override to maintain class size and protect some programs.” Denver: “$466 million bond for maintenance, technology, renovation and upgrades; $49 million override for enrichment, student support services and other programs. DPS also is an alternate for a $3.8 million BEST grant to renovate South High School, and some of the bond issue would provide a match.” Cherry […]