Help End 24 Years of Unconstitutional State Funding of Public Schools

 

ACTION ALERT - May 19, 2021

Do You Want Fair School Funding? Send a Message Today! Help End 24 Years of Unconstitutional State Funding of Public Schools

The Ohio House has approved HB 110, the state budget plan. HB 110 includes the Fair School Funding Plan, a high quality solution to the problem of inadequate and inequitable school funding in Ohio. The budget must pass the Ohio Senate by June 30. The HB 110 plan recognizes the diversity of Ohio’s 609 school districts and 1.5 million students. It uses the actual cost of educating a student to determine the amount of funding guaranteed to all students, and more accurately identifies the ability of local communities to pay their share of the cost. The plan also increases the state’s contributions to transportation, and to educating children who live in poverty, are gifted, or have disabilities. It ends deduction funding for charter schools and vouchers.   The Ohio Senate is considering removing the Fair School Funding Plan from the budget and replacing it with a Senate version. This would devastate Ohio's schools ... yet again. We need the Fair School Funding Plan to remain in the budget as-is with its 6-year phase-in schedule.   The Senate's talk of attaching state money to the child and following that child to any public or private school would destroy our public school system.   We need YOU to call, particularly if your state senator is one of the two in our area on the Senate Finance Committee, Senator Dolan and Senator Antonio. Contact Your State Senator Today -- And Mark Your Calendar to Contact Your Senator Every Week Until June 30! Let them know we care. Don't know who your state senator is? Click here. Don't know how to contact your state senator? Click here. You may call and leave a message, or cut and paste this message into an email -- today, and every week, until the Senate acts! Here's the message: Please pass the Fair School Funding Plan as part of HB 110 and strengthen our system of public education.   The Ohio Constitution guarantees that every Ohio child will have access to a public school that is required by law to protect that student’s rights and meet that student’s particular needs. These guarantees are fundamental to our system of public education, a system that is unique among nations and an institution essential for our democracy.     We must protect this legacy for our children and their children. The Ohio Constitution requires a thorough and efficient system of public schools. These must be the legislature’s priority, not tax supported private schools or charter schools which lack any Constitutional mandate and are not held to the same standards for inclusion, protection, or oversight as our public system.   Pass the Fair School Funding Plan, as written, and as part of the FY 2022-2023 state budget, and in so doing, ensure that Ohio’s public education system is adequately and equitably funded.