A study of public education spending by the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission released this week concludes that Virginia lags behind a number of benchmarks, including national and regional averages, and recommends changes to the formula used to calculate funding for public schools.
Though the report generated predictable partisan soundbites from state officials, JLARC has given lawmakers a perfect opportunity to set aside their differences and work together to address this crisis — either through this year’s state budget or when the General Assembly convenes again in January.
Though Virginia began a new fiscal year on July 1, uncertainty swirls around the state budget. Lawmakers adjourned the General Assembly without making adjustments to the two-year spending plan adopted in 2021, and subsequent negotiations collapsed last month without a deal.
The primary issue dividing the two chambers is how best to use Virginia’s budget surplus, with Republicans and Gov. Glenn Youngkin pushing for $1 billion in tax cuts while Democrats advocate investing that windfall in public schools, mental health and other priorities.
This week’s JLARC report will shape that debate, now and in the years to come. The audit arm of the legislature does not serve partisan interests, making its deep dive into public education spending long on facts and short on campaign-style rhetoric. And its conclusions are damning.
According to the study, Virginia spends 14% less per pupil — about $1,900 — than the national average and 4% less than other states in the South Atlantic region. Virginia spends less per student than neighboring West Virginia, Maryland and Kentucky.
The shortcoming appears to originate with the state’s Standards of Quality funding formula, which appropriates money to schools based on estimates of staff size within each school division. JLARC found the formula significantly and consistently underestimates staffing needs, meaning most school divisions spend more than what the SOQ formula predicts.
All told, the report concludes that Virginia should overhaul its SOQ formula to tie funding to student enrollment rather than staffing estimates; change other measures affecting K-12 funding, including an adjustment that dates to the Great Recession a decade ago; and boost the total state expenditure for public education.
Total cost: $3.5 billion.
Obviously that’s not a figure the commonwealth can absorb all at once. But it also cannot afford to keep waiting to make the sort of investment in public education for which administrators, teachers and, yes, parents have been advocating. The JLARC report puts a finer point on arguments that many school districts, particularly in Virginia’s rural corners, have made for years.
But it’s also a report that comes at an ideal time. Virginia’s budget negotiations are stalled, the governor campaigned on a platform focused on public education, the state is sitting on an enormous budget surplus, and lawmakers now have ample data that the formula used to pay for K-12 education — arguably the most important purpose of state and local government — is deeply flawed.
This is the time to make the big investment, to help make rural districts whole and to give a needed boost to urban districts. This is the time to level the playing field with neighboring states and aspire to exceed the national average. Virginia may never again have the revenue to make a generational difference in the trajectory of public schools.
What’s more, this is the time to do this vital work together. Come back to Richmond and do what’s needed: Overhaul the SOQ formula to ensure accuracy and sustainability, and start to pay into public education the money denied public schools for a decade.
Virginia comes to this in a position of strength. The commonwealth already boasts a well respected and accomplished public education system, good enough. CNBC this week ranked Virginia as the second-best place in the U.S. for business, with the quality of education here weighing heavily on those results.
But we know we can do better, especially for rural school districts struggling to keep pace. JLARC has handed lawmakers the blueprint. They need to set aside their partisan differences and follow it.
