Local school districts would be required to spend 65 percent of their operating budgets on instructional spending under a bill that cleared a House of Delegates committee today -- without any definition of instructional spending.
Exactly what that includes would be left up to the state Board of Education, which would use a lengthy public input process to develop a definition. If a school board does not meet the 65 percent threshold, according to the bill, the division would have to come up with a plan to increase the expenditure by .5 percent the next fiscal year.
The bill's goal mirrors one of the issues in Gov. Bob McDonnell's campaign platform.
McDonnell estimated during his campaign that 61 percent of Virginia education dollars go to the classroom. His education policy brief from that time states that "by shifting money from the central office and administration and increasing the percentage of funding that goes directly to the classroom by an average of 4 percent, the McDonnell/Bolling administration will direct an additional $480 million each year to Virginia's teachers and students."
The trick, it seems, will be deciding what the 65 percent should include, as even members of the House Education Committee disagree wildly. Lawmakers from disparate parts of the state voice concern over local considerations, for example, transportation in rural districts where students can travel many miles to get to school.
The committee chairman Del. Robert Tata, R-Virginia Beach, asked today, "If you can't get them to school, how are you going to teach them?"
Del. Adam P. Ebbin, D-Alexandria, said the dictionary defines instruction as teaching. There's no mention of school buses, cafeteria staff, library books, textbooks, new schools or maintenance.
"I don't see how they could define that as instruction and for that reason I'll be voting against the bill," he said.
Del. David L. Bulova, D-Fairfax, said that until a definition is set, "I don't understand how we can have any possible sense of what an appropriate percentage might be."
"It seems like we've got the cart before the horse until we have a definition that's set," he said.
The bill's sponsor, Del. Richard P. "Dickie" Bell, R-Staunton, said he tried to define instructional spending in the original bill but stripped it out to make it more agreeable to more people.
"I think transportation, cafeteria expenses, guidance counselors are all educational expenses. They are not necessarily instructional expenses," Bell said. "Children learn in the classroom, those are instructional expenses."
Committee members also raised questions about the significance of 65 percent, about which specific school funding this would apply to and the appropriateness of adding requirements to public schools while slashing their state funding.
Under the legislation, school boards would have to report annually to the Board of Education the percentage of their operating budgets allocated to instructional spending. If they didn't, the division would be audited by the Auditor of Public Accounts, who would submit recommendations to the board on how the division could reach 65 percent.
Similar measures to House Bill 76, which passed in committee today 13-7, have been introduced in past sessions.
As for its future prospects, "I don't know where this will go in the Senate," Tata said. "Other than in the tank."
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