Colorado General Assembly
The immediate financial impact on districts' budgets, especially for rural schools the formula is designed to help, would likely be a mixed bag, superintendents say.
Districts enrolled a total of 8,085 newcomer students after the October count and through Feb. 29.
The funding formula rewrite cleared a major vote in the House after bill sponsors introduced numerous amendments.
The bill sponsor cited too much last-minute pushback from defenders of seclusion.
The Colorado Education Association says it’s concerned about whether there’s enough sustainable funding for the new formula, but indicated that it’s open to further talks.
“I work in school nutrition to feed kids, not trash cans,” a dietitian testified at a legislative hearing last week.
The charter school bill that sponsors said was about accountability failed after hours of testimony Thursday.
Changing how Colorado funds schools has bedeviled legislators for years, but they hope the new proposal will represent a breakthrough.
The new tax credit would help about 45% of Colorado families
Colorado’s budget bill finally puts an end to the budget stabilization factor. It also includes more for K-12 and higher education.
In a recent Colorado teachers union survey, 32% of respondents said they had experienced physical abuse by a student in the past two years.
One proposes to improve accountability, though critics call it harmful. The other would open up a source of construction funds.
Parents and advocates testified for hours in support of a bill to ban seclusion in Colorado schools, calling the practice ‘inhumane.’ But some school officials pushed back.
Lawmakers unveiled the proposal on Tuesday after a week when budget committee members had to make big cuts.
Colorado’s budget committee has been hashing out legislation that would provide $24 million for schools enrolling new arrival students. On Friday, they approved the proposal for consideration.
The proposed fixes to the subsidy program would cost about $81 million in the first year.
The state is on track to have up to $7 million in leftover child care assistance funding this year.
This year, the meals cost $56.1 million more than budgeted.
“Nos dimos cuenta de que realmente podríamos lograr un cambio si nos esforzábamos de corazón”, dijo Niko Peterson, uno de los amigos de McKinney que ayudó a escribir el proyecto de ley.
“We realized we could actually make a change if we put our hearts to it,” said Niko Peterson, a senior at Animas High School in Durango who helped write the bill.