Dive Brief:
- The Kansas Supreme Court says it will close all public schools unless politicians come up with a better state funding formula by July 2016.
- Currently, the state has a temporary fix in place that the court says violates the state's constitutional requirement that "a suitable education for every student" be financed by the state, ABC News reports.
- This week's decision was a long time in the making, stemming from a suit filed by four districts six years ago, which argued that poor districts had been disproportionately hurt by the temporary funding formula.
Dive Insight:
Those involved in and affected by the slow-moving funding crisis in Kansas might want to look to the state of Washington to see an example of what to avoid. There, lawmakers have now been held in contempt of court since August, with fiscal penalties totaling $100,000 per day.
Small steps have been made in Kansas over the past few years regarding the funding formula, including a $140 million increase in education funding in 2014. An attorney for the Dodge City, Hutchinson, Wichita, and Kansas City school districts — the four that initially sued the state in 2010 — says that schools are currently underfunded by a total of $73 million.
Kansas districts can also look to the second-largest school district in the U.S., Los Angeles Unified, as it tries to find solutions to its own serious financial crisis that has been referred to by some as a looming "budget meltdown."