Now Consider This: Brownback has changed emphasis on K-12 spending

In a TV ad for his re-election campaign, Gov. Sam Brownback says, “We’re putting more money in public education.” That’s true. Total school funding in Kansas is more for fiscal 2015 than it was in fiscal 2011, when the governor took office. Brownback and others rightly point with pride to increased funding for teacher pensions and capital costs, and to some extra money and local property-tax relief ordered by the courts. But in Brownback’s first gubernatorial campaign and earlier in his term, he complained that too few dollars were making it into Kansas classrooms, even using a questionably low percentage to try to prove his point. His count-it-all view now seems at odds with his classroom emphasis back then. And as Mark Tallman of the Kansas Association of School Boards recently wrote, “when measured against changes in the cost of living, funding for educational programs that can actually be spent on teachers, administrators and student support programs has declined by $500 million since 2009.” That’s why hearing Brownback’s claims of “more money” for schools makes many of those who work in schools want to raise their hands in objection. – Rhonda Holman

This story was originally published August 25, 2014 at 7:05 PM with the headline "Now Consider This: Brownback has changed emphasis on K-12 spending."