Legislatures Plan to Overhaul Basic Education

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Story Published: Apr 22, 2009 at 5:34 PM PDT

By Chelsea Kopta

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TRI CITIES -- It's the first bill to rewrite basic education since 1979. Lawmakers are gunning for longer school days, more high school credits, all-day kindergarten, a new system to spend money in schools and teacher performance standards.

"It really is a fundamental change," Kennewick School District Spokesperson Lorraine Cooper said.

But so far, the bill is shrouded in the obvious: how can schools afford it?

"The bottom line though, these are great ideas Chelsea, but there's no money there," Richland School District Superintendent Jean Lane said.

"I think those who are supporting this bill hope it will lay the framework, and makes a statement that this is what we'd like education to look like, but haven't figured out the funding of how to get there," Cooper said.

In fact, lawmakers have not set aside money to pay for the new policies, which some expect could cost an extra $2 billion. For local districts, it could mean re-shuffling the same deck.

"If the pot of money stays the same but the reform bill has these new expectation, we're going to be in the same spot," Lane said. "Higher expectations, not as much money."

Indeed, lawmakers hold a lot of cards. Washington's constitution says providing for basic education is the state's paramount duty. But the definition of what constitutes "basic", and how it will be funded, is left to the Legislature to decide.

As it stands now, local districts have to make up for a lot of programs on their own -- like art, music, kindergarten -- with local levy taxes. And the state already provides three quarters of their funding.

Not to mention lawmakers' catastrophic cuts to education in the proposed state budget earlier this year.

"The pot of money for the state is only so big," Lane said. "Are we going to take more out, or are we going to take less out? What's going to give?"

So why is the overhaul happening now?

"I don't think the idea of overhaul is new," Cooper said. "People have been working on this for years and I think it's just coming to its fruition at a very unfortunate time, at a time when those best intentions only look like another unfunded mandate."

The state house approved the bill late Monday night and it's now expected to go to the governor to sign.

The state teachers union has opposed the bill.

You can check out the education reform plan House Bill 2261 online at http://www.leg.wa.gov/legislature.

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