{"id":10606,"date":"2012-09-10T11:00:28","date_gmt":"2012-09-10T17:00:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/?p=10606"},"modified":"2012-10-23T21:53:34","modified_gmt":"2012-10-24T03:53:34","slug":"idaho-education-department-disputes-funding-cuts-are-near-the-top-in-the-nation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/2012\/09\/10\/idaho-education-department-disputes-funding-cuts-are-near-the-top-in-the-nation\/","title":{"rendered":"Idaho Education Department Disputes Funding Cuts Are Near The Top In The Nation"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_8969\"  class=\"wp-caption module image left\" style=\"max-width: 300px;\"><a class=\"fancybox\" title=\"After the Council School District lost its shop program, locals donated time, goods and services to start it up again.  \" href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/files\/2012\/07\/IMG_0784.jpg\" rel=\"\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-8969\" title=\"Council High School Sign\" src=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/files\/2012\/07\/IMG_0784-300x218.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"218\" srcset=\"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/files\/2012\/07\/IMG_0784-300x218.jpg 300w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/files\/2012\/07\/IMG_0784-620x450.jpg 620w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-media-credit\">Molly Messick \/ StateImpact Idaho<\/p><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">After the Council School District lost its shop program, locals donated time, goods and services to start it up again.<\/p><\/div>\n<p>A recent report by the non-partisan research organization Center on Budget Policy and Priorities says <a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/2012\/09\/06\/idaho-education-cuts-among-deepest-in-the-nation\/\" target=\"_blank\">education cuts in Idaho have been among the deepest<\/a> in the nation over the last five years.<\/p>\n<p>As <em>StateImpact<\/em> <a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/2012\/09\/06\/idaho-education-cuts-among-deepest-in-the-nation\/\" target=\"_blank\">reported last week<\/a>, CBPP&#8217;s study shows per-student spending in Idaho has dropped 19 percent since 2008. Just three states have cut more.<\/p>\n<p>The Idaho Department of Education takes issue with these figures and spokesperson Melissa McGrath says CBPPs report isn&#8217;t an accurate measure.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The fact is the state hasn\u2019t reduced education funding per student by 19 percent,\u201d McGrath says.<\/p>\n<p>Here&#8217;s where it gets complicated. <!--more--><\/p>\n<div class=\"related-content alignleft\"><h4 class=\"related-header\">Related<\/h4><div class=\"links\"><h5>Posts<\/h5><ul><li class=\"link\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/2012\/09\/06\/idaho-education-cuts-among-deepest-in-the-nation\/\">Idaho Education Cuts Among Deepest In The Nation<\/a><\/li><li class=\"link\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/2012\/05\/21\/tiny-idaho-town-ponies-up-but-its-school-still-suffers\/\">Tiny Idaho Town Ponies Up, But Its School Still Suffers<\/a><\/li><li class=\"link\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/2012\/04\/13\/study-questions-constitutionality-of-idahos-education-funding-plan\/\">Study Questions Constitutionality Of Idaho\u2019s Education Funding Plan<\/a><\/li><li class=\"link\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/2012\/06\/21\/superintendent-luna-per-student-funding-isnt-the-only-measure-of-success\/\">Superintendent Luna: Per-Student Funding Isn\u2019t The Only Measure Of Success<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/div><div class=\"topics\"><h5>Topics<\/h5><p class=\"topic\"><img class=\"alignleft\" src=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/files\/2012\/04\/MarioVillafuerte_Getty.jpg\" height=\"60\" width=\"60\" \/><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/topic\/education-funding\/\">Idaho\u2019s Education Funding Glossary<\/a><\/p><\/div><\/div>\n<p>The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities applied a standard methodology across all 50 states to compile its report.\u00a0 One of the report authors, Phil Oliff says they looked at each states&#8217; &#8220;major education funding sources&#8221; and emergency federal spending &#8212; think stimulus dollars &#8212; over the last five budget cycles, beginning in 2008.<\/p>\n<p>In Idaho, Oliff says data came directly from the annual <a href=\"http:\/\/legislature.idaho.gov\/budget\/publications\/LBB\/current\/LBBFrame.htm\" target=\"_blank\">Legislative Budget Book<\/a>. \u00a0To calculate how much Idaho spends per-student, CBPP used enrollment numbers from the federal Department of Education.\u00a0 Those are tallied on the first day of school.<\/p>\n<p>Finally, CBPP adjusted its year-over-year spending calculations for inflation.\u00a0 Oliff says if Idaho&#8217;s Education Department doesn&#8217;t adjust for inflation, that&#8217;s likely the difference.<\/p>\n<p>The state Education Department maintains per-student spending has dropped nearly 12 percent, but that&#8217;s just looking at fiscal years 2008 to 2011.<\/p>\n<p>The director of <a title=\"Resource: The Idaho Center For Fiscal Policy\" href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/topic\/idaho-center-for-fiscal-policy-2\/\" target=\"_blank\">the Idaho Center for Fiscal Policy <\/a>Mike Ferguson <a title=\"Study Questions Constitutionality Of Idaho\u2019s Education Funding Plan\" href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/2012\/04\/13\/study-questions-constitutionality-of-idahos-education-funding-plan\/\" target=\"_blank\">published a report<\/a> on the decline of the state&#8217;s share of education spending back in April.\u00a0 He also was consulted by CBPP <a href=\"http:\/\/www.cbpp.org\/files\/9-4-12sfp.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">on their report<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Whether it\u2019s 12 percent or 19 percent, it\u2019s still a pretty big decline,&#8221; says Ferguson. He says it boils down to a different way of counting the same thing.\u00a0 Ferguson says adjusting for inflation makes more sense statistically, because it takes into account the change that happens over time in price level.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_10540\"  class=\"wp-caption module image right\" style=\"max-width: 176px;\"><a class=\"fancybox\" title=\"Click on the image to enlarge.\" href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/files\/2012\/09\/9-6-CBPP-Edu-Spending1.jpg\" rel=\"\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-10540\" title=\"9-6 CBPP Edu Spending\" src=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/files\/2012\/09\/9-6-CBPP-Edu-Spending1-176x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"176\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/files\/2012\/09\/9-6-CBPP-Edu-Spending1-176x300.jpg 176w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/files\/2012\/09\/9-6-CBPP-Edu-Spending1.jpg 487w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 176px) 100vw, 176px\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-media-credit\">Center on Budget Policy and Priorities<\/p><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Click on the image to enlarge.<\/p><\/div>\n<p>And when inflation is applied, the percentage decline in education spending will go up.<\/p>\n<p>Ferguson says <a href=\"http:\/\/www.cbpp.org\/files\/9-4-12sfp.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">CBPP&#8217;s method<\/a> can be useful because it looks at all states over time, rather than the year-to-year accounting that happens at the individual state level.\u00a0 &#8220;It\u2019s a consistent comparison across geography,&#8221; Ferguson says, &#8220;and it&#8217;s important to see how Idaho fits in.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Still, Idaho Department of Education spokesperson McGrath says, \u201cI just don\u2019t think it\u2019s an accurate portrayal of school finance or the money we\u2019ve distributed to public schools, whether that\u2019s in a single year or since 2008.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A recent report by the non-partisan research organization Center on Budget Policy and Priorities says education cuts in Idaho have been among the deepest in the nation over the last five years. As StateImpact reported last week, CBPP&#8217;s study shows per-student spending in Idaho has dropped 19 percent since 2008. Just three states have cut [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":40,"featured_media":8969,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[15],"tags":[236,156,85,206],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10606"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/40"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10606"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10606\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12334,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10606\/revisions\/12334"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8969"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10606"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10606"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10606"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}