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Thursday, 07 February 2013 12:01
Yesterday, finally, the Governor released his district by district breakdown of school funding. To say that the numbers didn't reflect the rhetoric given at the rollout would be quite the understatement. During the rollout the Governor and his education advisors led everyone to believe that funding levels would be based upon district property wealth and income. The breakdowns produced however show almost the opposite.
If districts were expecting more, the vast majority are going to be greatly disappointed. We looked at the percentage funding increase being offered for 2014 and produced the following chart
As you can see from this chart, 396 of 614 districts received zero extra dollars for 2014. When one factors in inflation, the number grows in real terms to over 400. Worse still, the funding data released by the Governor does not include money that districts will lose to charter schools and voucher recipients - in 2012 that was over $700 million in Ohio.The Governor had promised $1.2 billion in extra funding, but when totaling the increases for 2014 and 2015 we can only count to $563,713,406. Even accounting for the $300 million "Straight A fund" we're struggling to see how we get to the promised $1.2 billion
In order to explain this bizare school funding formula, the Governor's education advisors had to resort to even more bizarre word games with reporters
What is real is the ongoing underinvestment in Ohio's public schools by this Governor. The numbers, which he was reluctant to release, speak for themsevles.
David Varda, executive director of the Ohio School Business Officials Association, said he suspects many school officials in poor districts expected more state aid under Kasich’s plan.
“Based on the premise that this funding was going to deal with disparity, I’m surprised by some of the lower-wealth districts not getting any increase while some higher-wealth districts are getting more, although they seem to be districts with growing enrollment,” Varda said.
As you can see from this chart, 396 of 614 districts received zero extra dollars for 2014. When one factors in inflation, the number grows in real terms to over 400. Worse still, the funding data released by the Governor does not include money that districts will lose to charter schools and voucher recipients - in 2012 that was over $700 million in Ohio.The Governor had promised $1.2 billion in extra funding, but when totaling the increases for 2014 and 2015 we can only count to $563,713,406. Even accounting for the $300 million "Straight A fund" we're struggling to see how we get to the promised $1.2 billion
In order to explain this bizare school funding formula, the Governor's education advisors had to resort to even more bizarre word games with reporters
Kasich education policy advisor Barbara Mattei-Smith said that’s because school districts that many people think of as “poor” are not actually poor for the purposes of determining state funding under the Kasich plan.
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Kasich education advisor Dick Ross said, while the funding estimates may surprise some, they represent “reality.” “Maybe the perception needs to be recognized as not being what’s real,” he said.
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Kasich education advisor Dick Ross said, while the funding estimates may surprise some, they represent “reality.” “Maybe the perception needs to be recognized as not being what’s real,” he said.
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Wednesday, 06 February 2013 12:03
A week after the Governor's orchestrated school funding plan announcement, we are still waiting on him to release his actual school funding numbers
Perhaps if his hand picked Superintendent wasn't fired for serious ethics violations, and his hand picked President of the State Board of Education spent less time comparing her ideological enemies to genocidal maniacs, and perhaps if his acting State Superintendent and his deputy weren't both looking for new jobs, we might have had the numbers by now. But if all that wasn't enough, news breaks today of even more shocking failure of leadership at the Ohio Department of Education
The Governor's education team is out of control. We wish we were just talking about bureaucratic incompetence, but sadly we are now well into the realm of serious failures of ethics and criminal behavior.
Ohioans still can’t see how their tax dollars will be divided among local school districts under Gov. John Kasich’s school-funding plan.
Although Kasich spokesman Rob Nichols had said on Friday that the information likely would be released yesterday, it turns out there was a problem with some of the data and “it’s still being worked on.”
Kasich adviser Barbara Mattei-Smith compiled and used the data to help the administration formulate its funding plan, which was released on Thursday, Nichols said.
The administration initially said such a record didn’t exist, then said it was merely her “notes” and didn’t have to be made public, before now saying the information Kasich relied on in the $15.1 billion education plan apparently was wrong.
The Ohio Department of Education said it fired its chief operating officer after learning he was under investigation for possessing child pornography and then finding such images on his work computer.
John T. Childs, 47, of 2239 Planetree Court on the Northwest Side, was fired on Nov. 2, said John Charlton, an Education Department spokesman. Childs had been on paid administrative leave since around Oct. 15.
“He was under investigation by local law enforcement for child pornography on his home computer. We put Childs on paid administrative leave until we could investigate the alleged charges and we could look at his work computer as well,” Charlton said.
The department turned Childs’ work laptop computer over to the State Highway Patrol, which found thumbnail images "of pornographic nature."
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