The full funding plan of the bill calls for $3.75 billion for education initiatives. | Pixabay
The full funding plan of the bill calls for $3.75 billion for education initiatives. | Pixabay
Sen. Tim Kearney (D-Chester) hopes a new bold education plan will give students and educators the resources necessary to be successful for years to come.
According to the House Appropriations Committee, Kearney and several House Democrats and education advocates, proposed a school budget plan that would be the biggest investment in public education in state history.
“It's a bold plan that takes a holistic approach to providing students with the resources they need to be successful,” Kearney wrote on Twitter. “Our students deserve it.”
The initiative includes a $1.1 billion investment for the Fair Funding Formula, which establishes each district’s fair share of the amount of funding available to allocate from the state, according to the House Appropriations Committee.
The committee stated that the fair funding formula is student-based but there are inadequacies because each school district does not receive the same amount of state funding per student.
“That would be unfair and would ignore the vast differences in local resources available to districts as well as the research-supported evidence that some students require more resources than others to succeed,” the House Appropriations Committee said.
The proposal would include $250 million for staffing and recruitment, along with the $1.1 billion into restoring “toxic schools,” according to a news release.
“As the only architect in the legislature, I'm particularly concerned about the state of our school buildings,” Kearney added on Twitter. “By recent estimates we're underfunding maintenance and repairs of PA schools by about $2.7 billion every year."
The proposal also includes $125 million in mental health support and $100 million in academic support.
“We are confident in the sustainability of this plan because Pennsylvania is experiencing an unprecedented revenue surplus due to a huge economic turnaround aided by federal investments,” Sen. Vincent Hughes (D-Philadelphia) said. “There can be no more excuses for toxic schools and inequality of opportunity. We are sitting on the largest pool of unspent funds in Pennsylvania history.”
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