Seeing the issue from all sides, inequities in Pa. school funding is real
Last week, the Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court issued a historic ruling declaring our state’s school funding system unconstitutional. In her decision, Judge Renee Cohn Jubilerer declared that “students who reside in school districts with low property values and incomes are deprived of the same opportunities and resources as students who reside in school districts with high property values and incomes.”
As an educator, I’ve taught in the Allentown School District, which is underfunded by nearly $6,000 per student; served as school board president in the Bethlehem Area School District, which is underfunded by nearly $3,000 per student, and now teach in Southern Lehigh School District, which is adequately funded by the state’s adequacy standards. Through these experiences, I’ve seen firsthand the disparities that Jubilerer ruled unconstitutional.
Before the pandemic, my students in Allentown had no real access to basic technology in the classroom. As teachers, we had to teach students how to use Chromebooks and Google Classroom through Zoom. Students in other districts could pivot seamlessly to a virtual environment while we struggled for weeks. In Southern Lehigh, my students are fluent in all aspects of technology, which allows teachers to plan more engaging and robust lessons.
All students in any district, any zip code, deserve to have the same opportunities and, more importantly, are capable of success when they are provided with the right resources.
It’s true that Gov. Tom Wolf was a champion for education who lived up to his promises and
worked with the General Assembly to invest in our public schools through historic increases in education funding and a new Level Up supplement to support our most underfunded districts, including Bethlehem and Allentown. Those investments have helped us stave off tax increases in BASD for three of the past four years.
But even with these investments, BASD relies heavily on local property taxes to fund our school district, with over 70% of our budget funded through property taxes in recent years. This overreliance on local wealth – Pennsylvania ranks in the bottom 20% nationally for state share of overall education funding
– is what drives the inequities between districts that the court found unconstitutional.
Gov. Josh Shapiro has shown leadership on school funding by writing an amicus brief in support of the lawsuit and calling for full
funding of our public schools on the campaign trail and in his inaugural address. Now, as he determines his budget priorities, he and our legislature have a constitutional mandate to invest heavily in public education.
Despite Wolf ’s leadership, Pennsylvania’s public schools are still underfunded by over $4 billion, the result of decades of state underfunding along with skyrocketing mandated costs for districts. This shortfall continues to put pressure on many districts to make difficult decisions that could cause us to lose an entire generation of students.
Federal stimulus funds are set to expire soon, but many of the problems caused by the pandemic are still present in our classrooms. Learning loss, increased trauma and mental health risks, and teacher shortages continue to burden our schools. With these one-time federal funds, we have supported Pennsylvania’s
teachers with literacy, math, and social and emotional learning coaches who provide teachers with strategies to support our neediest students. We cannot risk rolling the dice by eliminating the supports that are currently in place to support our students.
Beyond increases in basic education funding and Level Up, the Commonwealth must invest in career and technical education. As we continue to emerge from the pandemic, workforce shortages stand in the way of true economic recovery. A robust career pathway program will set up Pennsylvania to be a leader in putting students to work after graduation. Investing in our trade schools and career and technical education programs in high schools will help provide the workforce to support local industry, grow our economy, and repair our crumbling infrastructure.
With last week’s ruling, there has never been a better time to
fix Pennsylvania’s unconstitutional school funding system.
All Pennsylvanians must contact Shapiro and legislative leaders and demand large investments in education funding: $4 billion over four years to fully fund all schools, along with targeted investments in areas such as career pathways.
With billions in reserves and the rainy day fund, we have the resources now. An investment in our children is not only constitutionally required, but it’s the best investment we can make in our commonwealth’s future.
Mike Faccinetto is the President of the Bethlehem Area School District Board of SchoolDirectors, where his children also attend public schools. He is also an elementary schoolteacher in the Southern Lehigh School District, a former Teach Plus Pennsylvania Senior Policy Fellow, and a past president of the Pennsylvania School Boards Association.