Montgomery County School Officials Beseech State Representatives for More Education Funding

John Worthington | The Reporter•

The Pennsylvania House Appropriations and Education Committees hold a public hearing on education funding at Lansdale Borough Hall as part of a statew

Local school officials underscored the urgent need for additional school funding in Montgomery County Thursday afternoon at a public hearing on the state of education in Pennsylvania.

"Ultimately, thousands of Pennsylvania students are not being adequately served due to funding issues,” said Brittany Lourea-Waddell, director of student services at the Montgomery County Intermediate Unit.

Held at Lansdale Borough Hall, the hearing was part of a statewide tour by the Pennsylvania House Appropriations and Education Committees to discuss education funding following the recent Commonwealth Court ruling declaring Pennsylvania’s public education funding system unconstitutional.

According to the Public Interest Law Center, the plaintiff in the lawsuit, Pennsylvania’s public schools are underfunded by $4.6 billion, with 86% of Pennsylvania students attending underfunded schools. The issue is primarily due to the state’s distribution of funding on the basis of outdated enrollment data and the reliance on property taxes to fund education.

As a result of the current funding system, Pennsylvania has the largest funding gap between wealthy and poor school districts in the country, with the wealthiest districts spending 33% more per student than the poorest districts, according to PA Schools Work. Nationwide, Pennsylvania ranks 45th in state education funding, with roughly a third of the cost covered by the state.

At Thursday’s hearing, four local school officials testified to the dire funding situation in Montgomery County schools, with increasing numbers of disadvantaged students, significant staffing shortages and soaring costs of mental health and special education services.

Fair Funding Formula

During his testimony, Souderton Area School District Superintendent Frank Gallagher requested the full allocation of the $4.6 billion in needed education funding through the new 2016 funding formula, which is more closely tied to current needs and enrollment numbers but only used for new funding. As a result, just 11% of basic education funding and 13% of special education funding is driven through the 2016 formula.

"Most of the school funding is run through an antiquated system that doesn’t take into consideration the factors that drive up our costs,” said Gallagher.

However, state Rep. Napoleon Nelson questioned the districts’ ability to spend additional funding "responsibly.”

"What do you think about your ability to take what would be significantly more resources than you’re used to getting from state aid and spend appropriately?” asked Nelson.

In response, North Penn School District Superintendent Todd Bauer said that his district currently has a whopping $193 million in outstanding capital projects, including building renovations, parking lots and other infrastructure projects. He also noted that three of the district’s middle schools do not have air conditioning.

Gallagher added that his district cannot keep up with the rising costs of mental health and special education services and is being forced to borrow from reserves to balance its budget, even with significant property tax increases.

"I would have no problem spending a couple million more dollars,” said Gallagher. "I don’t know any districts that would have trouble spending that money.”

Mental Health Services

On the topic of mental health and special education services, Waddell described "an explosion” in the need for such services over the last four years, with Montgomery County school districts spending 25% more on student mental health services from 2019-2023.

Waddell said that mental health funding has traditionally been geared to adolescents but is now needed across all grade levels, adding that the service costs have spiked dramatically due to increasing numbers of students with complex needs.

"It’s really extensive,” she said. "We’re seeing record numbers of students being referred with complex needs.”

State Rep. Jordan Harris then questioned whether such students are being over-diagnosed, pointing to studies showing an over-diagnosis of special needs in Black males.

In response, Waddell said that counselors and psychologists are trained to use culturally and linguistically fair assessments. She stressed that schools are witnessing firsthand a rise in students with complex needs, including autism, multiple disabilities and emotional disturbances.

Bauer concurred, saying that elementary students in particular are "in crisis” due to the absence of appropriate resources or facilities.

"You walk into a kindergarten classroom in some of our schools right now, and I am not exaggerating when I say that the teachers and children in the room are in crisis,” said Bauer. "The facilities and resources don’t exist for a 5-year-old. We are not used to nor equipped to handle 5- to 12-year-olds [with special needs] the way we are for 12- to 18-year-olds.”

Waddell additionally described the mental health grant application process as "restrictive” and "complicated.” As a solution, she suggested shifting funding to a line item in the budget to remove certain restrictions and give districts more flexibility in spending.

Charter School Funding

Another issue was the cost of charter school payments. Gallagher noted that brick and mortar charters and cyber charters receive identical tuition payments from public school districts despite cyber charters having lower operating costs. He further pointed out that charter schools receive a flat $35,000 tuition payment per special education child regardless of the services administered, far exceeding the cost of such services in Souderton.

"If that child receives speech services, the cost in Souderton would be about $3,000, yet we still pay a charter school $35,000 per year,” said Gallagher. "I don’t mind paying for a service to a child, but I do have a great issue with paying charter schools for services that are not actually being delivered to a child.”

Gallagher also criticized the lavish spending of some cyber charters, including Commonwealth Cyber Academy, the state’s largest cyber charter school, which reported $122 million in profits for the 2021-2022 year. Gallagher revealed that the school purchased a waterfront shopping complex in Homestead, Pennsylvania and spent $19 million on marketing over a two-year period, including over $600,000 on a 6abc Thanksgiving parade float.

Gallagher suggested adding provisions to cyber charter school funding that require the schools to operate in actual costs.

Gina Guarino Bull, CEO of Renaissance Academy Charter School, agreed with the need for fair charter school funding. She suggested a standardized reauthorization process for charter schools to reduce costs, characterizing the current reauthorization process as redundant, inefficient and wasteful.

"I’ve been through three reauthorizations myself and each one has been vastly different,” said Bull. "Having a standardized process would not only enable you to see better accountability and transparency for charter schools but would better allow us to plan and have less wasted resources.”

A persistent theme throughout the hearing was staffing shortages. In recent years, the state legislature has attempted to address the issue by expediting the teacher certification process. However, the school officials argued that expedited certifications fail to attract new educators.

"Being able to fill vacancies is important but being able to have high quality educators in front of our students who are really in need is much more critically important,” said Bull. "Rushing through the process of putting teachers in the classrooms is only exacerbating the needs of the kids and the lack of ability to meet those mental health and education needs.”

The officials’ suggested tuition forgiveness, hiring bonuses and affordable housing as potential solutions. Bauer, a former teacher, also stressed the need for competitive salaries, revealing that he took an administration position solely to provide for his family.

"When you can graduate with a math degree from Bucknell and you can get a starting salary in public industry that is easily twice as much as in a public school, that’s a challenge,” said Bauer.

"I just had a professional leave to go to the corporate world, working from home, a lot more money,” added Gallagher. "There’s things we can’t offer that corporations can.”

State Rep. Emily Kinkead criticized the focus on teacher salaries, arguing that additional funding should be geared to programmatic education.

"We need to make sure we have quality educators, but how could we spend an additional 8 million dollars? Programmatic availability in terms of mental health services, the technology supports; We need to make sure that we are providing for those things as well.”

Testing Mandates

Gallagher also pointed to excessive testing mandates as a factor, saying that they restrict teacher autonomy and erode teachers’ passion for education.

"With all the testing and all the mandates, it’s harder and harder for teachers to let their passion come out,” said Gallagher. "There’s so much content that we have to cover in order to get to the Keystone exam in May.”

The officials’ cited the primary factor behind teaching shortages as declining morale amidst a hostile political climate. They jointly emphasized the importance of a respectful work environment to teacher retention and recruitment.

"I also lost some very amazing teachers who found it was just too much, too much stress on them,” said Bull. "There was no amount of money that would compensate for being emotionally attacked.”

"It’s very hard for a child to watch what’s goes in television and the way in which people talk about education as indoctrination of children and think, ‘Boy, that’s my calling,’” said Bauer.

State Rep. Steve Malagari concurred, arguing that both the state and society have a vested interest in supporting teachers.

"The fact that I’ve heard multiple times, ‘Teachers don’t need more help, they don’t need more retirement, they have the summers off,’” he said. "If we don’t have good educators now, that next generation won’t be inspired to go into the field.”

Following the education tour, the Basic Education Funding Commission, a bipartisan group of state officials, will present its recommendations for improving Pennsylvania’s public school funding system to the General Assembly. The current deadline is November 30, with the recommendations expected to provide a roadmap for next year’s budget.

This article appears courtesy of a content share agreement between North Penn Now and The Reporter. To read more stories like this, visit www.thereporteronline.com.