To help schools determine funding for the upcoming year, the Texas Education Agency is working on guidelines. | Pixabay
The Texas Education Agency (TEA) is currently working on guidelines on how students will be counted for school funding purposes as COVID-19 has changed the education landscape.
“You can’t just go by the book,” TEA spokesman Jake Kobersky told San Antonio Express-News. “There’s going to have to be a unique solution.”
State funding for schools was previously based on student attendance, which is currently unknown due to the pandemic, according to San Antonio Express-News.
“We just don’t know yet how our enrollment may be impacted by parents who just aren’t ready to send their students back,” North East Independent School District (ISD) spokeswoman Aubrey Chancellor told San Antonio Express-News. “If we are permitted to do remote learning, that could make a huge difference.”
While North East ISD expects its fall enrollment to decrease by at least 300 students, with that figure not even taking into account the coronavirus, the Northside ISD is predicting that 20% to 40% of families will not be comfortable sending their children back to in-person school this fall.
“The issue I can’t overemphasize is, if schools can’t be funded to do what parents are asking us to do, then it’s going to put school district budgets in a free fall,” Northside ISD Superintendent Brian Woods told San Antonio Express-News.
TEA is expected to issue the school funding guidelines within a couple of weeks.
“This is the biggest decision they’re going to make,” Woods told San Antonio Express-News. “We know eventually there is going to have to be accountability tied to (funding) and we get it.”
Woods has suggested students who participate in distance learning be counted as attending school. This would include students who partake in virtual classes as they happen in real time as well as those who watch the recorded classes later on.
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