School funding measure would come at districts’ expense

Here’s a news item from the Associated Press: BOISE, Idaho (AP) — A plan to restore funding protections for school districts with enrollment declines is getting a hearing in the 2012 Idaho Legislature, though it’d be at districts’ own expense. The state previously let shrinking school districts keep a one-year extension of 99 percent of the state funding that came with a departed student. But those protections were eliminated in education reforms approved last year. Public schools chief Tom Luna argued Idaho shouldn’t give schools money for “ghost students” a year after they left their classrooms. But lawmakers late in the 2011 session restored a bulk of those funding protections, at 97 percent, for one year. That’s costing the state roughly $2 million. Legislation introduced Monday would maintain the 97 percent provision but shift the cost to districts, forcing each to give up a portion of their per-student funding.