Teachers fleeing the state? Promises to schools broken time and again?
Heres some context for the statements you heard about Kansas education Wednesday night both in Democratic Gov. Laura Kellys State of the State Speech and Republican Senate President Susan Wagles response.
Kelly: Weve fallen into a troubling pattern. It begins with a promise from elected leaders to fund our schools. Then a failure to follow through on that promise. That is going to change this year. This year, we will end this cycle of litigation.
Kansas has faced school finance lawsuits for a long time. Oh, lets say since the 1970s. Back in the day, it was all about making sure poor school districts had resources akin to their richer cousins. Then there was a kind of turning point in school finance lawsuits nationally. The fights became not just about rich-poor gaps, but about whether states really spend enough to give all students a decent education. After all, tons of kids still arent passing state math and reading tests.
The 5 Themes at the Heart of Kansas Ongoing School Finance Lawsuit
In the mid-2000s, Kansas finally promised to give schools a lot more resources. But it reneged on that by slicing hundreds of millions of dollars amid the Great Recession and then-Gov. Brownbacks sweeping tax cuts. The courts have gradually forced restoration. Kelly wants to sign off on the last $100 million or so needed to put the latest lawsuit to bed.
Kelly: Remember, just a few short years ago, schools closed early because they literally could not afford to stay open. Test scores dropped for the first time in a decade … Teachers fled the state.
Kelly rattled off several ways she says that underfunding hurt schools. Some of what she mentioned is true. A few things are debatable or even untrue.
Kelly seemed to reference 2015 in particular the year of clawbacks. Thats when Brownback rejiggered school budgets eight months into the fiscal year deleting about $45 million and causing widespread anxiety and anger among superintendents trying to pay bills.
Shaving days off of academic calendars was indeed one of the ways a few districts found to cope.
But did teachers really flee Kansas for schools in other states? That was a popular narrative at the time that even made national news.
The data to support it never existed. Statewide tallies even suggested more teachers were moving to Kansas to teach here than were leaving.
Thats not to say Kansas doesnt have a teacher shortage. Parts of the state do, and the situation recently got worse.
What about test scores? They dropped in two ways in 2015, but who gets the blame? Legally speaking, schools had already been underfunded for years.
