Arizona’s charter schools have continued to thrive after 20 years, with charter students consistently outperforming their peers on state and national tests. The Cronkite News Service interviewed Association President and CEO Eileen Sigmund and leaders from some the state’s best schools, who explained why school choice is an important piece of the education landscape.
Arizona does many things well, including school choice, according to an Arizona Republic year-in-review column that ran last month. School choice was among eight items listed as the Arizona’s biggest strengths and reasons we stand out from other states.
The article calls Arizona a “leader” in the charter school movement, noting that the concept of school choice is still a novelty in many other states. More work needs to be done to equitably fund public schools and serve poorer students, but the state’s progress is undeniable.
Arizona has paved the way for nearly a dozen new charter schools as the state continues to meet the needs of Arizona students and families.
The 11 new schools, set to open in August 2016 and August 2017, were approved by the Arizona State Board for Charter Schools on Monday. Once built out, these schools have the capacity to serve an additional 9,000 students.
The Classrooms First Initiative Council met Wednesday, Dec. 2 to unveil its final recommendations for reforming Arizona’s outdated school finance system to Governor Doug Ducey.
The Council shared 17 findings, including three additional recommendations, on what was needed to improve school finance.
As Arizona’s K-12 enrollment has grown, including students with disabilities, our school finance formula has stayed relatively unchanged. It has not fully addressed recommendations made in a 2007 special education cost study[1] nor has it kept pace with the 5 percent increase in our special education population, as we found in our first blog. The Association investigated the current funding formula to understand how special education students are funded and how the funding mechanism is impacted by increases in student enrollment in order to determine whether it serves the needs of our special education students.
Arizona’s school funding formula addresses special education funding using two separate mechanisms. The first funding mechanism, called Group A[2], provides funding for every student in the state, regardless of special education designation. This portion of funding is designated for a particular group of special education students as well as other programs like gifted, career exploration, and remediation programs. Group A funding is distributed to all schools based on the total student enrollment; each student receives an identical weight in the funding calculation. The second funding mechanism, called Group B[3], provides funding according to the most severe special education category identified in students’ Individual Education Plans. The Group B categories and their definitions are presented in the following table:
Like the overall system, these two funding mechanisms are directly impacted by total population growth (Group A) and special education population growth (Group B). The Association set out to analyze the current special education enrollment and funding data to determine how these dollars are allocated within the designated categories.
According to the FY15 school finance data[4], Arizona has 121,602 identified special education students, representing 11 percent of the state’s student population. The distribution of students by special education category – Group B designation – is presented in the following table in order of severity (least to greatest) and their relative funding weights (lowest to highest). The student count represents the total number of identified students, based on their Individual Education Plan. The weight identifies the multiplier that is used in the funding formula found in A.R.S. § 15-943; each category has an associated weight. This multiplier generates the weighted student count, which is then multiplied by the base funding level of $3,373.11 for most charters and $3,415.27 for most districts. The associated funding levels by category and per pupil allocations are a result of the funding formula.
This shows 84 percent (102,142) of the state’s special education population are identified as having emotional disabilities, mild intellectual or learning disabilities, speech impairments and other health impairments. This group of students is funded by both the Group A and Group B portions of the formula. As evidenced in the table, the small funding weight (.003), results in a weighted student count of 306 students. In other words, this large group (102,142) is funded as if there were only a small number of students (306) in the state with these characteristics. The result is a per pupil amount of $10.24, in addition to Group A funding.
The remaining 16 percent of special education students (19,460) are funded as significantly higher weights given their designations. Students diagnosed with multiple disabilities and severe sensory impairments (MD-SSI) are identified as the most significantly impacted group and therefore receive the highest funding weight. As evidenced in the table, the large funding weight (7.947), results in a weighted student count of 6,008 students. In other words, this small group (756) is funded as if there were a large number (6,008) in the state with these characteristics. The result is a per pupil amount of $27,149.88.
While $10,781 to $27,149 may seem like a lot of money for each special education student, the implementation of the current funding formula lacks an understanding of the needs, and recent estimates of the actual costs of serving special education students. The 2007 cost study recommended both increases to the Group A and Group B weights to account for the expenses incurred to support students’ needs. However, we know that the needs identified in 2007 have not been properly addressed and it’s likely that these needs have changed in the last eight years. Policy makers should consider the current categories and funding weights as they make recommendations for future modifications.
This is Part II in the Association’s series on Special Education funding. Read Part I here and Part III here.
