On Tuesday, February 6th, Governor Josh Shapiro gave his 2024-2025 state budget address. Below please find details of the funding proposals in the budget, including links to spreadsheets that will download and open as Excel files..
Click HERE to read the full response of the PA Schools Work campaign to education funding in Governor Shapiro’s in his 2024-2025 state budget.
This Proposal Offers Something for Every District!
- Districts most harmed by unconstitutional state funding will receive substantial adequacy investments that will begin to close their funding gaps and/or recognize their high tax effort.
- Districts with declining enrollment that benefit from hold harmless will have their base reset, which provides stability moving forward and removes the threat of losing funding if basic education were redistributed through the formula.
- Cyber charter reform will return $262 million to ALL districts and help keep cyber charter costs controlled moving forward.
Specific Investments
$1,072,000,000 Increase in Basic Education Funding
Adequacy Investments
- $736,000,000 targeted to school districts that are inadequately funded
- $136,000,000 targeted to school districts with high property taxes to promote tax equity
The two investments will meet the first-year investment (of seven) recommended by the Basic Education Funding Commission (BEFC) to address Pennsylvania’s unconstitutional school funding system.
- $ 200 million through the basic education funding line to be distributed to all 500 districts
This investment also follows the recommendation of the BEFC
The BEFC recommended updating the current funding formula to improve predictability and stability of funding. These included smoothing the poverty factors and resetting the BEF base to the 2023-24 allocation.
$50 million increase in special education funding, a 4% increase over FY 2023-24.
Cyber Charter School Funding Reform
The Governor proposes establishing a statewide cyber charter tuition rate of $8,000 per student per year (current range is $8,639 – $26,564 per student per year).
The special education supplement to the base rate remains unchanged.
Enacting this reform is estimated to save school districts $262,000,000 annually.
Additional Investments
Career and Technical Education
- $2.4 million increase for career and technical education, a 2% increase over FY 2023-24.
- $7 million for dual enrollment programs.
$300,000,000 for the School Environmental Repairs Program.
$16,667,000 increase in School Food Services
This increase continues funding for initiatives, including the universal free breakfast program adopted as part of the FY 2023-24 budget.
$3,000,000 increase for School District Health Services to provide feminine hygiene products at no cost to students in schools.
- This investment will help meet students’ basic needs.
- Nationally, 1 in 4 teens have missed class due to a lack of access to period products.
$150,00,000 distributed by the PCCD’s School Safety & Security Committee:
- $100 million for K-12 Mental Health
General Fund dollars replace federal ARPA funds used in FY 2023-24
- $50 million for School Safety and Security
Funding for physical upgrades or mental health services for school entities
$28 million in funding to support teacher recruitment and retention and professional development.
$32,700,000 increase for Pre-K Programs
- $30,000,000 for Pre-K Counts, an 11% increase over FY 2023-24
- $2,700,000 for Head Start, a 3% increase over FY 2023-24
- $17,000,000 increase for Early Intervention, a 5% increase over FY 2023-24
Higher Education
A new Blueprint for Higher Education and substantial funding increases. We are awaiting additional details on the proposal.
Click HERE for the slides from our budget presentation.
Click HERE to watch our presentation about Governor Shapiro’s 2024-2025 education funding proposal.
We have an exciting budget season ahead. Make sure to stay connected so that we can all work together to get this proposal across the finish line–WITHOUT A NEW SCHOOL VOUCHER PROGRAM that will undermine investments in our public schools!!
