On May 7, 2024, the General Assembly passed H.B. 5523, a budget stabilization bill that appropriates funds for fiscal year 2025 and makes a number of different policy changes to K-12 education and other areas. Along with maintaining the $150 million in additional funding for K-12 education in FY 2025 that was allotted as part of the state budget passed last year, the bill overhauls how Connecticut distributes state education funding to school districts.
This collection of policy briefs covers Connecticut's multilingual learner population, their education, current challenges, and opportunities to improve education programs and services for multilingual learner students and their families.
This policy briefing details the current mismatch between student learning needs and per-student spending in Connecticut’s local and regional public school districts, and examines some of the factors that contribute to this mismatch.
During the 2023 regular legislative session, the Connecticut General Assembly passed a bill of rights for the parents and guardians of multilingual learners. This infographic, available in English and Spanish, explains the Multilingual Learner Parent Bill of Rights and what protections are afforded to parents/guardians as they navigate their student's education.
As a result of school districts serving different student populations with different needs, and having access to varying levels of resources, differences in the type of instruction Connecticut students received during the 2020-21 school year varied greatly. This variation resulted in districts with higher student needs being impacted more than those with lower student needs.
This report explores the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on learning models and attendance rates among Connecticut’s local and regional public school districts and charter schools. Additionally, this report examines each district’s student needs and the resources available to address changes and disruptions caused by the pandemic.
Connecticut's public school districts remain deeply segregated and significant funding gaps continue to exist between districts that predominantly serve students of color and districts that largely serve White student populations. These are two of the overarching findings from this School and State Finance Project report, which examines racial disparities in Connecticut education funding.