Access News from January 25- January 29, 2010

Daily news stories about education funding litigation, education funding policy, cost studies, advocacy and No Child Left Behind.

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January 29, 2010

Education Finance – General
CO---For teachers in Colorado’s largest school district, Thursday’s $110 million cut in state education funding means their 1 percent raise in April will be a stipend and not a permanent increase.
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ID---Public schools chief Tom Luna told lawmakers Thursday he wants to siphon more than $52 million from state endowment fund reserves to soften a financial blow to Idaho's K-12 education budget next year.
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NY---Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg has said that if the city does not wring pay concessions from the teachers’ union and all of Gov. David A. Paterson’s proposed budget cuts are approved — a worst case — the city may have to get rid of 11,000 of its 79,000 teachers.
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VA---State education groups are warning that public schools will have to lay off thousands of employees, increase class sizes and cut classroom and extracurricular programs under reductions in Virginia's proposed budget and the Legislature's rejection of a tax increase.
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January 28, 2010

School Funding/Litigation
CA---Editorial: The time has come for school districts and communities to come together and file an adequacy lawsuit against the state of California for failure to provide adequate funding to educate all children in our State. Children are our most precious resource and we need to show our commitment to them by our actions and not just our words.
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SC---Charleston's charter schools notched a major legal victory Wednesday in terms of the money and services the school district must provide them, but their fight might not be finished.
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Education Finance – General
To grease the legislative wheels, Education Secretary Arne Duncan said, the administration will reserve $1 billion to fund programs that may emerge through a revision of the 2002 [No Child Left Behind] law. In addition, he said, President Obama is proposing to raise elementary and secondary education spending by $3 billion in the fiscal year that begins in October
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Federal Stimulus Issues
GA---A new state report shows that Georgia has used federal stimulus money to pay for more than 20,000 jobs over the last three months…Most of the jobs funded by the stimulus cash were in education, where the federal aid paid for 4,629 jobs.
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January 27, 2010

Education Finance – General
President Obama will propose a major increase in funding for elementary and secondary education for the coming year in Wednesday's State of the Union address, one of the few areas that would grow in an otherwise austere federal budget, officials said.
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SC---South Carolina teachers would take a pay cut and students would take fewer tests under cost-cutting measures that won initial legislative approval Tuesday.
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Federal Stimulus Issues
CO---Editorial: Colorado accepted federal stimulus dollars to the tune of $621 million, split up between K-12 and higher education. In order to receive the federal handout, Colorado had to agree to maintain our education funding levels of 2005-06 until the stimulus dollars run out in 2011. Unfortunately, the recession has hit Colorado's revenue stream and education funding at that level may be unattainable unless we reverse the policies passed by legislative Democrats and signed into law by Governor Bill Ritter.
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January 26, 2010

Education Finance – General
President Obama will call for a three-year freeze in spending on many domestic programs, and for increases no greater than inflation after that, an initiative intended to signal his seriousness about cutting the budget deficit, administration officials said Monday.
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FL---Crist, who is running for the U.S. Senate, announced the record $22.7 billion education budget proposal during a visit to a St. Petersburg elementary school he attended as a child. He's asking for a $179 increase in per-student spending. That would be a 2.61 percent hike, and the first increase in two years. The proposed $7,045 per student would be the second-highest ever, he said.
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IA---A top Democrat in the Iowa House says one of Governor Culver’s key education recommendations is not going to pass. Earlier this month, Culver asked legislators to forward an additional $100 million to Iowa’s K-through-12 schools for the next school year.
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MO---Republican leaders in the Misssouri Senate say they’re committed to giving the state’s public schools the full amount of money called for under the state’s school financing formula.
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NY---Gov. David Paterson recently released $750 million in school aid that he had withheld last month because of the state's money troubles. That's very good news for the schools across the state that were suddenly facing budget shortfalls not of their own making.
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VA--- In December, a month before leaving office, then-Gov. Tim Kaine made a decision with far-reaching ramifications on school budgets across Virginia.
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Federal Stimulus Issues
MD---A top Maryland budget analyst advised lawmakers on Monday that $389 million in new stimulus money assumed in the state budget may not materialize, and he counseled them on ways to make up for the money if it isn't approved.
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January 25, 2010

School Funding/Litigation
AZ---Two teachers are challenging a maneuver by lawmakers to balance the state budget by taking money they say legally can go only to supporting public schools.
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Education Finance – General
CA---Despite Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger proclaiming this month that his proposed budget "protects education," school administrators say they will actually lose about $200 per student under Sacramento's version of new math
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RI---The state Department of Education is developing a proposal for a school-financing formula that education officials hope will receive prompt legislative support, even if it means some Rhode Island cities and towns will lose out — a prospect that has derailed previous attempts to establish a formula.
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Federal Stimulus Issues
AZ---Child and education advocates are worried about Gov. Jan Brewer's new round of proposed cuts to Arizona's education budget, including axing state financial support for all-day kindergarten. They also fear that cutting education spending will risk the state's right to keep federal-stimulus money it received as part of last year's American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.
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OH---Ohio school districts are spending money meant for disabled students to stabilize their shaky budgets, and the state has made it easier for them to do so.
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Other News
MI---State preschool programs over the past 25 years are saving the state $1 billion this year in crime and education costs, with increased productivity, according to a new study announced by state school superintendent Mike Flanagan and early childhood development advocates.
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