Commit to taking action in response to state adequacy study recommendations. We encourage the development of a blueprint for sustainable and adequate funding in our state. As a district, and as a result of State and Federal Funding practices, Jeffco will be reducing our district budget by tens of millions of dollars this year alone, utilizing a multilayered approach to include stakeholders at the district and school levels in decision making. All Colorado students deserve improved investment and support.
Ensure that no public monies for K-12 Education are used to fund private institutions through vouchers or any other method.
Protect and increase total per pupil spending to get to the national average. Colorado falls far short. As a State, we are:
- Between $2,000–$3,000 below the national average in per-pupil spending (NCES, US Census, Ed Week)
- 43rd in spending on education adjusted for regional cost differences (Ed Week, 2021 Quality Counts)
- 50th in teacher wage competitiveness—compares teachers to non-teachers with similar education, experience and hours worked (Education Law Center).
This includes consideration of multiple avenues for increasing both state and local revenues.
Prevent reinstatement of the Budget Stabilization (BS) Factor or any similar defunding mechanism with a different name. The State must be vigilant in ensuring that the budget stabilization factor is not reintroduced in the future. Bills and initiatives that require “backfilling” for school funding can only happen if there is enough General funds or State Education Funds available. Since 2009-2010, ~$10B has been withheld from Colorado’s public education budget, impacting one whole generation of students. Jeffco’s share of this burden of underfunding totals $930 million. Jeffco will never recoup the lost funds from those years.
Keep four-year averaging in place until full implementation of the new funding formula. It is critically important that the four-year averaging provision (which calculates funding for a district based on average enrollment over four years) built into the new school funding formula remains in place. This provision provided Jeffco, and nearly half of all districts in Colorado experiencing swiftly shifting demographics, a runway to adapt to funding losses and appropriately shift resources to provide a thriving experience for students.
Avoid creating new grant programs and reduce state reliance on grants to supplement educational funding. These one-time funding opportunities often create position “cliffs” and use resources that, if allocated to the school finance act, would create predictable and ongoing funding to sustainably support student learning across all districts. The legislature should consider a periodic review of each grant program, its effectiveness, and whether or not to continue as a grant program or as a critical component to the funding formula. Any new grant programs should have defined goals, measurements for effectiveness and evaluation, and a sunset review.
Adopt the School Finance Act (SFA) no later than 21 days prior to the end of session. Recent 11th-hour SFA adoption trends put unnecessary pressure on school district budget development and adoption processes where employee negotiations, staffing, student resource, and professional development decisions have to be delayed. This domino effect compresses statute-required budget timelines that impact districts starting at the end of May.
Avoid any additional contribution of local-specific ownership tax toward the total program. This would cost Jeffco an estimated $17M in annual revenue, based on discussions the JBC has had about this idea. This would negatively impact funding for all Colorado school districts.
Improve educator affordability factors to make it possible for school district employees to live where they serve. This includes exploring possibilities to pool health insurance coverage with other government entities, support housing initiatives for educator benefit, and measures with the intention to increase district compensation and benefits package options for employees.
