(The Center Square) – Two studies released last week are calling for Colorado to spend billions more on K-12 education programs.
This comes as absenteeism grows and enrollment and graduation rates decline. A large percentage of students also continue to underperform testing expectations.
Both studies were prepared for a task force within the Colorado Department of Education, allowing it to then make funding and budget recommendations to the General Assembly.
In total, the recommendations include encouraging the state to spend at least $3.5 billion on K-12 education for it to reach an “adequate funding level.”
The “Input-Based Financial Adequacy Study Report” gave recommendations for how the school finance formula should be updated, using factors like cost of living and district size adjustments. This formula helps decide how much money the state should be spending per student.
Currently, Colorado allocates $8,726 per student. Under the new formula proposed, the state would be allocating $12,346 per student, with additional money for at-risk students.
Tracie Rainey, executive director of the Colorado School Finance Project, assisted on the report. Rainey told The Center Square that she believes more funding is greatly needed.
“We know it’s not adequate,” Rainey said. “I think this report highlights opportunities to think about how the legislature creates a plan or a blueprint in order to get to adequate funding.”
Experts at the Common Sense Institute believe more funding isn’t necessarily the solution to fixing many of the problems facing Colorado’s students.
Kelly Caufield, executive director of the institute, said that it is time for a “new conversation.”
“The data is showing us time after time that more money is not resulting in better academic outcomes for Colorado’s K-12 students,” she told The Center Square. “It’s much easier to just have the funding conversation, versus the harder conversation about priorities within the classroom and how we are addressing the needs of students.”
In Rainey’s opinion, additional funding would help build up the K-12 system in the state, including hiring more specialists and reducing class sizes.
“We are considered to be a wealthy state when it comes to resources, and yet we don’t invest in our systems,” she said. “I think that our leadership in Colorado needs to step up to the plate and be champions for going to the voters for increased funding.”