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The special commission charged with reviewing the state’s main school finance law is recommending major updates to key parts of the state’s minimum school spending standard that would increase school aid and local contribution amounts for most municipal and regional school districts.
The final report of the Foundation Budget Review Commission, released on Oct. 30, includes recommendations from the preliminary report issued last June to update how health insurance costs are accounted for in the “foundation” budget set for school districts under Chapter 70 school finance law and to adjust special education cost factors to better reflect actual spending at the local level.
The report includes new recommendations developed in the fall to make spending adjustments to reflect best educational practices for educating low-income and “English language learner” (ELL) students.
The report includes an impact summary that describes how the health insurance and special education formula changes would affect statewide school aid and local contribution amounts using fiscal 2016 data. If fully implemented for fiscal 2016, the changes would have increased the fiscal 2016 statewide foundation budget by nearly $1.1 billion, to $10.9 billion. Under the rules in effect for fiscal 2016, the foundation budget rose by $224 million.
According to the impact summary, required local contributions would have increased by $543 million in fiscal 2016 to $6.1 billion and school aid by $495 million to $4.9 billion. Some districts would have remained as “minimum aid” districts. This analysis does not include the impact of updating the formula to account for ELL and low-income students.
At the Nov. 10 meeting of the Local Government Advisory Commission with Lt. Gov. Karyn Polito, municipal and school officials asked the administration to start implementing the recommendations in the fiscal 2017 state budget recommendation due to be filed in late January. The presentation included Arlington Town Manager Adam Chapdelaine, Wrentham Selectman Charlie Kennedy, Sandwich Town Manager Bud Dunham, and King Philip Regional School District Committee member Patrick Francomano representing the Massachusetts Association of School Committees.
Because any significant changes to school aid and local contributions would have a major impact on municipal and school budgets, municipal officials asked that the governor work with House and Senate leaders to reach agreement on how Chapter 70 will be funded and administered next year, much in the way that agreement is reached on anticipated state tax revenues and pension funding, noting that a resolution on municipal and school aid by March 1 would be helpful for local budget planning.
The recommendations for the health insurance component of the foundation spending standard would change the current employee health insurance rate to a new rate linked to the average state Group Insurance Commission rate. The plan would also establish a new component for health insurance for retired school employees that is not now part of the foundation budget, and would create a special health care cost inflation factor for these two foundation budget components.
The commission also recommended that the foundation budget components for in-district and out-of-district special education be adjusted to reflect actual special education costs, which have substantially exceeded the original expectations adopted in the early 1990s. The plan would increase the current assumed in-district special education enrollment rate from 3.75 percent of students to 4 percent (from 4.75 percent to 5 percent for vocational students), and would increase the out-of-district rate to capture spending up to the level before special education “circuit breaker” reimbursements are triggered.
Analyses by the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education and others have shown that these factors in the 1993 law now significantly understate actual costs.
The commission, established by the fiscal 2015 state budget act, is charged with reviewing parts of Chapter 70 school finance law, with a focus on how the “foundation” spending standard is calculated. The commission, with 21 voting members, is co-chaired by Rep. Alice Peisch and Sen. Sonia Chang-Diaz, the House and Senate chairs of the Legislature’s Committee on Education. There is also a six-member non-voting advisory committee.
The commission includes eight legislators and four members of the Executive Branch. Nine members represent other public education stakeholders, including Attleboro Mayor Kevin Dumas, who represents the MMA.
In response to concerns raised by school officials about the inadequacy of the foundation budget recognizing the high cost of educating ELL students, particularly at the high school level, the final report recommends that the ELL factor be restructured and increased for all grade levels, including high school, in order to increase the range of ELL-only weightings and expand available funds for staff-intensive, high school age interventions. The report also recommends that the increment be applied to vocational school ELL students.
After analysis and discussion about how well the foundation budget accounts for the cost of educating low-income students, the commission made a series of recommendations, including increasing the low-income increment for districts with high concentrations of low-income students.
The commission also recommended that every school district be required to post a plan on a state website and on the local district website describing the following:
• How it will use the funds calculated in the ELL and low-income allotments to serve the intended populations
• What outcome metrics they will use to measure the success of the programs so funded
• Performance against those metrics
• The results of the funding on improving student achievement
The commission recommended that plans “detail how funds are being used to improve instructional quality, and/or ensure that services are provided that allow every student to arrive at school physically and mentally healthy, with their social and emotional needs met, and ready to learn.”
The commission also writes that it anticipates “that districts will use funding flexibility for one or more of the following best practices”:
• Expanded learning time, in the form of a longer day and/or year, and inclusive, where appropriate, of common planning time for teachers
• Wraparound services that improve and maintain the health of public school students, including social and emotional health and skills, mental health and oral health
• Hiring staff at levels that support improved student performance and the development of the whole child
• Increased or improved professional development rooted in pedagogical research, and focused on instructional improvement, including evidence-based practices such as hiring instructional coaches
• Purchase of up-to-date curriculum materials and equipment, including instructional technology
• Expanding kindergarten, preschool, and early education options within the district