School groups oppose Daniel's education plans

INDIANAPOLIS -- Gov. Mitch Daniels' plans for education could lead to painful cuts in staff and programs and leave the state's poorest students without the help they need to get a good education, some school leaders say.\nIn his State of the State speech Tuesday night, Daniels proposed freezing basic funding for K-12 and higher education, changing the school funding formula to benefit growing districts and imposing a temporary moratorium on school bonds for new construction.\nOpponents say without increased funding, schools cannot keep up with the rising costs of health care, teacher salaries, utilities and other expenses.\n"They'll have to cut staff, make classes bigger and eliminate programs," said Dan Clark, deputy executive director of the Indiana State Teachers Association, a union representing more than 50,000 Indiana teachers and school employees.\nDaniels said education must play an "essential" role in the state's financial recovery by living without funding increases.\nState Superintendent of Public Instruction Suellen Reed, however, said she hoped lawmakers might find additional revenue sources.\n"The General Assembly's just starting," Reed said. "I don't give up until the gavel falls."\nIndianapolis Public Schools Superintendent Pat Pritchett said school officials recognize the state has fiscal problems. But, he said, "We know it can't take any less money to educate children."\nReceiving no funding increase could put his district in a bind, Pritchett said.\n"We would have to look at reducing staff, no question, and that doesn't help achievement," he said.\nDaniels also wants to change the school funding formula.\nFor years, Indiana's formula has included a "minimum guarantee" that ensures all districts get an increase in base funding. But some Republicans say the guarantee prevents them from adequately funding growing districts while giving increases to schools with stagnant or declining enrollments.\n"This formula has been jury-rigged over time in back rooms into a complicated mess based not on principle but on a bare-knuckles scramble of every district for itself," Daniels said in his speech Tuesday.\nDaniels said the formula should begin with equal dollars per child, adjusted for special needs like poverty or disabilities.\nBut some Democrats and education officials say the system Daniels proposes might not be fair to the majority of the state's school districts -- those which are not growing. Education officials say urban and rural districts with declining enrollments still face increasing costs for salaries, health care and utilities.\n"It takes the same electricity to turn on the lights if there are 25 people, 35 people or 50 people in a room," Reed said.\nSen. Tim Lanane, D-Anderson, said he was concerned that more families would leave urban districts if booming suburban schools received a larger share of state funding. That would leave only those too poor to leave "trapped" in schools with even fewer resources, he said.\nDaniels also said he would issue a 120-day moratorium on any new school bond issue while the Department of Local Government Finance draws up new guidelines on appropriate construction.\nDaniels said Indiana's school buildings are "larger per student, more expensive per square foot, and more tilted to nonacademic facilities than makes good sense."\n"We have drifted into practices that work well for architects and contractors but not well for teachers or property taxpayers, and it is time for change," Daniels said.\nReed said many schools do include extras like swimming pools or meeting rooms, but such facilities are sometimes used by the community, which pays for schools through local property taxes.