Oregon Faces Call to Overhaul Outdated School Funding and Pump Millions More into Classrooms

A recently released report from the nonpartisan American Institutes of Research, commissioned by the Oregon Legislature, indicates that the state’s decades-old funding formula needs an overhaul.

It also needs to spend significantly more per pupil to close the gap on its stated goals for student success, especially in schools serving a concentration of students from low-income families.

Increased Oregon Education Spending Recommended In Legislature Report

A six-part report issued by the prominent American Institutes of Research is one of several reports dealing with problems in the education sector that have emerged. One report opines that the typical Oregon school needs to spend 33% more per student to give every child a chance at academic success.

This funding should be heavily weighted toward schools with higher poverty, lower median family incomes, and more Black and Latino students.

All schools are currently allocated the same base amount per pupil. This amount is then adjusted to account for local needs to cover expenses such as high transportation costs. School districts also currently receive additional funds for students with higher needs.

The new report argues that the Quality Education Model, long viewed as an indicator of how much Oregon should spend on schools to get 90% of graduating students ready for college or a career, also underestimates the funding needed for better student outcomes.

The increased spending is predicted to equip the state’s schools to generate a 90% graduation rate, raise math and reading mastery levels to state targets and reduce chronic absenteeism.

The reports are tools to motivate the state to go beyond the $11.3 billion spending budget, which is the 11% increase proposed by Gov. Tina Kotek for K-12 schools for the next two years.

The most recent version of the only-in-Oregon model suggests the state should spend $13.5 billion on the K-12 school system over the next two school years- over $2 billion more than the Governor’s proposal.

The American Institutes of Research report does not include a dollar amount for K-12 spending but says the typical Oregon school needs to spend 33% more per student.

The organization proposed an entirely new funding formula that would more properly account for the costs of educating the highest-needs students, particularly children from economically disadvantaged families and those with mild to severe disabilities.

Despite that national test scores indicate that students from certain states that spend significantly less per pupil than Oregon are achieving better results, especially those from low-income families or families of color, the proposal represents a 16% increase in spending for students from wealthier families and a 46% increase to schools that serve the most significant concentrations of high poverty students, students with disabilities and Black or Latino students.