Education stakeholders — including lawmakers, superintendents and municipal leaders — gathered Thursday to call out Gov. Ned Lamont’s administration for a lack of financial investment in K-12 education and to urge state leadership to make it a priority in the upcoming 2024 legislative session.
Education advocates and officials said the gap largely comes down to whether cities and towns can fund teaching and learning in their districts on their own, without needing to rely heavily on state and federal money to offset funding gaps.
Hearst's multi-part report found that wealthy communities dominate poorer ones across sports, with one particularly successful town having won more state titles over the past decade than the 10 poorest towns and cities combined. Of the seven schools with the most championships during that period, all but one came from one of the state's wealthiest suburbs.
With over $1 billion in COVID funding available to school districts, a new report by The School and State Finance Project, ConnCAN, and FutureEd found more than 50% is going toward hiring and training staff, while 20% is being used to address learning loss.
A bill that would have enhanced state funding for all types of public elementary and secondary schools bogged down this spring amid fears that it would force primary education and early childhood development programs to compete for the same dollars.
The Connecticut House of Representatives will consider legislation that would increase funding for public schools across the state. In 2017, Connecticut lawmakers created a school funding formula that would go into effect in the 2019 fiscal year with a 10-year phase-in. The formula would roll out funding for lower-income districts and decrease funding for wealthier districts. This means “full-funding” would be reached by 2030.