By Tim Carpenter, Kansas Reflector
TOPEKA — Two Republicans leading the Kansas task force developing a new public education finance formula expressed frustration that superintendents were being recruited to join a prospective lawsuit amid speculation the reform process would result in elimination of districts with fewer than 100 students.
Wichita GOP Sen. Renee Erickson and Rep. Susan Estes, who serve as chair and vice chair of the task force, said Wednesday disruptive speculation was rampant despite no formal policy votes by the task force on reshaping the frequently litigated formula.
“I’ve been disturbed that I’m getting phone calls from superintendents who are saying they are being told, ‘We’re going to need a lawsuit. Oh, districts with less than 100 students are going to cease to exist,’” Estes said.
Erickson said she was approached by superintendents who said they had taken part in meetings of the Kansas Council of Superintendents in which superintendents were told the task force would write the 10 school districts with fewer than 100 students out of the formula. She declined to identify the source of that claim, but characterized the assertion as “fearmongering.”
“There has been a poisoning of the well against this process already, and superintendents are worried,” Erickson said. “It doesn’t benefit anyone to poison the well and already start gearing up for an expensive lawsuit without having anything to sue over yet. That mentality is not helpful to anyone in this process.”
In 2017, the Kansas Supreme Court found the formula devised by the Legislature to be in violation of Article 6 of the Kansas Constitution. The decision was the culmination of years of litigation by Schools for Fair Funding which represented individual school districts that served as plaintiffs in the case.
Task force members Jim Porter, a Fredonia member of the Kansas State Board of Education, and Brad Neuenswander, superintendent of the Jefferson West School District, said they hadn’t participated in presentations to superintendents about a hypothetical lawsuit.
“That discussion has not happened in my presence,” Porter said.
Frank Harwood, a deputy commissioner at the Kansas Department of Education and a task force member, said he was skeptical the state would do away with the rural districts that enrolled fewer than 100 students.
“I don’t think Kansas can ever get rid of all districts below 100 because we just have areas where that’s what they need,” he said.
The current Kansas school finance formula expires in June 2027, but GOP leaders of the task force expect to submit a revised formula to the 2026 Legislature in January. Republicans hold supermajorities in the House and Senate, which suggested a school finance bill could pass on party-line votes. If the Legislature waited until the 2027 session to complete work on a new formula, the bill would be presented to a new governor because Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly’s second term would end in January 2027.
During the task force meeting at the Capitol, Estes triggered a lengthy discussion about whether the finance formula should set a statewide baseline for public school teacher salaries. She said a mandate that local school districts comply with a minimum teacher salary of $45,000 per year might be appropriate. Federal poverty status for a family of four was $41,000, she said.
“It’s reasonable to have a discussion that sets a minimum standard of teacher salary above the federal poverty limit,” Estes said. “There’s nothing more important in a classroom, that we touch, than teachers.”
Teacher salaries should remain a function of local school boards and district administrators while remaining outside of the state’s school finance formula, said GOP Sen. Beverly Gossage, a Eudora member of the task force.
Rep. Kristey Williams, R-Augusta, told colleagues on the task force the Legislature could direct districts to pass a percentage of state appropriations to teachers in the form of salary. She also said public school teachers had 190 contract days each year and had the option of securing a second job in summer months when schools were closed.
Erickson, the task force chair, challenged the premise higher teacher salaries would improve educational prospects of students.
“We overpay our ineffective teachers way too much,” Erickson said. “The longer they’re embedded in the system, the harder it is to get rid of the teachers who are not doing right by our kiddos. The sad truth of the matter is those are the teachers that are the highest paid because they’ve been there the longest.”
Erickson said it was discouraging for “young, effective teachers” to observe educators with 30 years of experience arrive at school just before the morning bell rang and beat half the students to the parking lot at the end of the day.
Kansas employs about 37,000 public school teachers, but districts reported 1,900 vacancies in fall 2024.
The task force debated whether the revised formula should continue to include state funding for at-risk pre-kindergarten children aged 3 and 4.
No vote was taken by the task force, but it appeared a majority was content to concentrate the formula on K-12 programs and leave pre-K initiatives to local school districts.
Williams, the Augusta House member, said Kansas hadn’t done a satisfactory job handling K-12 education and shouldn’t be part of preschool education. She said the federally funded Head Start program for 3- and 4-year-old children hadn’t lived up to expectations and the opening of Kansas public schools to pre-K programs undermined private schools that operated in that realm.
“We have put out of business many Christian schools, preschools and other types of classical education because they can’t compete with a free education,” Williams said.
Williams, who has been an advocate in the Legislature for distribution of state tax dollars to private schools, said that if the state wanted to continue investing in pre-K programs the funding should be made available to parents so they could decide where to enroll their children in preschool.
“I get heartburn when we talk about giving state funding to private entities, especially if they’re not accredited,” said Rep. Nikki McDonald, an Olathe Democrat on the task force.
