Time is now to invest in Pa. students

To Gov. Shapiro: Following the historic Commonwealth Court ruling month declaring the school funding system in Pennsylvania unconstitutional, we write to urge you to include a significant investment in public education funding in your proposed budget for FY 2023-24 and to use your budget address to set forth a road map for fixing the state’s broken funding system during your current four-year term.

Specifically, we urge you to propose, at a minimum, an increase of $2.3 billion in funding for schools, including at least $1 billion for Basic Education Funding, along with sizable investments in special education, school facilities, and career and technical education. This would represent a down payment toward meeting the state’s constitutional obligation and putting Pennsylvania back on the path to ensuring that all students, no matter where they live, have the resources necessary to succeed. It has been made clear that it is their constitutional right and fulfilling it should not be delayed any longer.

Pennsylvania is 43rd in the country when it comes to the share of revenue for local school districts that comes from the state, which means the burden is passed to local taxpayers through property taxes. As a result, Pennsylvania leads the nation in inequality of educational resources and opportunity. The state’s total spending on K-12 education is AT LEAST $4 billion short of providing an adequate education to all students, by the state’s own standard of adequacy. That figure does not even take into account other critical needs such as pre-K education, special education, career and technical education, and school facilities.

As a result, while Pennsylvania has pockets of educational excellence, these are largely correlated with pockets of adequate funding. That shows that Pennsylvania public schools and students succeed with sufficient resources. But much of the education system is performing far below our students’ potential due to widespread underfunding that disproportionately harms our most vulnerable children. Pennsylvania’s school funding system simply does not meet the needs of all its students, particularly lowincome students, and students of color. This underfunding affects the vast majority of the state’s school districts from our cities to our most rural communities. But those with the widest funding gaps serve a disproportionate share of the state’s students of color, students living in poverty, students with disabilities, and English learners. To target those schools and communities that need it most, the new BEF investment we propose for this budget should be distributed through both the Fair Funding Formula and the Level Up supplement, with one-third going through Level Up.

On behalf of Pennsylvania’s nearly 1.7 million public school students, we thank you for making full and fair funding for public schools a central pillar of your platform and, as Attorney General, submitting a brief to the court supporting the lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the state’s public school funding system. We are now counting on you to respond decisively to the court’s ruling with a significant budget investment this year and in the following three years of your term. We recognize that you have inherited this crisis but have the opportunity to lead the way to a solution. With a projected state operating surplus at the end of this fiscal year of more than $8 billion and another $5 billion in the Rainy Day Fund, the funds are there.

Finally, we strongly believe that any solution that does not address the funding equity across districts and leaves an adequacy gap among districts will not cure the problem and should not be considered. As long as any public school is not fully funded, no state dollars should be diverted to lifeline scholarships or other voucher programs. We urge you not to include such proposals in your budget and to reject any attempts by the General Assembly to fund them.

Once again, thank you for your leadership and commitment to Pennsylvania’s students. We look forward to working with you to enact a budget that includes a big down payment on the state’s over $4 billion adequacy gap this year, to make sure we do not deprive another generation of students of the quality of education that they deserve, and that the constitution demands.

The PA Schools Work Campaign

PA Schools Work is a non-partisan coalition of organizations from across Pennsylvania representing teachers and other educators; urban, suburban, and rural communities; and parents and community members working together to advocate for PA public schools, their students, and the communities they serve.