State gets new way of funding schools

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Ohio Governor Ted Strickland (D-Lisbon)

COLUMBUS (AP) — School districts across Ohio are evaluating how they’ll fare in the state’s transition to a new school funding policy, a major initiative in the two-year budget lawmakers passed this week.

Gov. Ted Strickland, a Democrat, got the “evidence-based” funding system he wanted. In return, Republicans who control the Ohio Senate were able to maintain funding for charter schools that the governor wanted cut.

The plan lawmakers approved Monday results in a 5.5 percent overall increase in funding for school districts. All of the increase is from federal money, which offset a slight decrease in state aid to schools.

Previously, Ohio officials determined how much the state could afford, or wanted, to spend on education and then divvied the money among school districts, with special consideration for those in poorer areas.

The new system gives aid to school districts based on the cost of funding a high-quality education. The costs are determined using the latest research findings about everything from class size to teacher training to testing.

The new funding plan also reduces the amount of school funding that comes from local property taxes, which was a central element of why the state Supreme Court found the state’s school funding unconstitutional four times.

Not all school districts are pleased with the change.

“We think that the formula doesn’t make sense for a district like Cincinnati,” said Janet Walsh, a spokeswoman for the city’s school district, which will see a 1 percent cut in state aid the first year of the budget and a 2 percent cut in the second year. With federal money, the district will see a 10 percent increase over the two years.

Walsh said the formula gives less state aid to Cincinnati because it has a high property-tax value. But the district also has a high poverty rate, and 20 percent of its students have some sort of disability, so it ends up losing out in the end, Walsh said.

State Rep. Stephen Dyer, one of the new funding system’s chief proponents, said the state would gradually pick up an increasing amount of the bill, as opposed to local property taxes, over the next six years.

All but three of the state’s eight urban school districts will see increases in state aid under the new plan.

Like Cincinnati, Toledo public schools will lose 1 percent in state aid in the first year, and 2 percent in the second. Akron will lose 1 percent in the first year and 1.5 percent in the second.

State aid for Columbus city schools, the largest in the state, will go down one tenth of a percent the first year and go up three quarters of a percent the second year.

“We are thankful to the governor and state lawmakers, who in these challenging economic times came to a budget agreement, which preserves education funding for Ohio’s schoolchildren,” said Gene T. Harris, superintendent and CEO of Columbus City Schools, in a statement.

A sampling of how Ohio school districts fare in the new school funding formula, both in state dollars and when incorporating federal money:

Pickerington, Fairfield County: -1 percent in state aid in first year; -2 percent in state aid in second year; -0.6 percent over 2 years when federal money added.

Bexley, Franklin County: -1 percent, -2 percent; +5.1 percent

Sycamore, Hamilton County: -1 percent, -2 percent; +26 percent

Toledo, Lucas County: -1 percent, -2 percent; +4.7 percent

Put-in-Bay, Ottawa County: -1 percent, -2 percent; +46 percent

Source: The Ohio Legislature