Some Missouri school officials say the state's decision to fall about $190 million short of fully funding its K-12 foundation formula will create uncertainty for districts.
The legislature sent its annual budget to Gov. Mike Kehoe on Wednesday, which keeps the same amount for schools – over $4.2 billion – as last year's. It's the first year since 2017 the General Assembly has not increased funding for public education.
That decision has undermined confidence in lawmakers' ability to send money to schools in future years, said Matt Michelson, director of education policy for the Missouri State Teachers Association.
"And so when that confidence is shaken, districts are more reluctant to give teachers raises," Michelson said. "They're more reluctant to fund programs, to start new programs."
Michelson said districts across the state have made an effort to improve teacher recruitment and retention, but the budget could harm any progress.
"When teachers start seeing their pay stagnant, and districts start pushing back and saying that budgets are tight because the legislature has said budgets are tight, it's going to make it harder to really beef up those recruitment (and) retention efforts," Michelson said.
Tough decisions had to be made in a tight budget year, said Rep. Ed Lewis, R-Moberly, a former teacher who helped craft this year's budget.
"It's so easy to tear down, it's very difficult to govern," Lewis said. "It's a lot harder to actually get down here and make the choices and say, 'Well, we've increased, we've increased, we've increased. It's time to be flat this year and make sure we have a little bit on the bottom line so that we're not going to short people next year.'"
Although each district will feel the change differently, Ritenour Schools Superintendent Chris Kilbride said the money his schools won't get this year would have been enough to cover all of the bus drivers' salaries and benefits, or the cost of running the district's libraries and media centers, for a year.
The district will have to scale back on curriculum development and supplies to prioritize paying teachers, Kilbride said.
"It amounts to us looking everywhere outside of salaries where we can trim, so that we can work to make staff whole, and so that we can try to minimize the impact to kids," Kilbride said, adding that it's not enough to keep state funding for education the same because "everything else in life is getting more expensive."
St. Louis Public Schools is "already doing some belt-tightening as it is," said Byron Clemens on behalf of the American Federation of Teachers St. Louis Local 420.
"It seems the legislature has abdicated its responsibility in not fully funding the public schools while prioritizing giving taxpayer dollars to private and religious schools," Clemens said, referencing the legislature's decision to allocate $10 million more for private school vouchers than last year.
Lewis said the legislature has appropriated record levels of funding for Missouri schools in recent years. He also pointed to money for education not included in the foundation formula, including transportation funding and grants for small schools.
"What we are seeing are superintendents telling their teachers that, 'You got to get up there and whine, and whine, and whine and complain because you know they're underfunding us,'" Lewis said. "It isn't true."
Lewis, who said the way the foundation formula calculates funding increases for schools is "arbitrary," is one of the lawmakers appointed by Kehoe responsible for rewriting it by December.
And schools should not be concerned about funding because they have a record amount of money in reserves, Lewis said.
Kilbride this isn't true for every school district. Ritenour already relies on the fund to pay teachers until the state provides its annual funding.
Adding to the future uncertainty are the facts that lottery money for schools fell short of expectations last year and voters will decide whether to replace the state income tax with higher sales taxes – both of which could also affect the education budget.
"We're heading into a time of a high level of uncertainty around funding, and that's the worst thing I would say for children," Kilbride said. "Children deserve stability. Children deserve consistency, and so do teachers and staff."
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