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State officials announced they were unable to reach an agreement on how to move forward with the state budget at the end of last week. As of midnight Friday, Governor Dannel P. Malloy will now run the state by Executive Order. ConnCAN CEO Jennifer Alexander released the following statement:
At ConnCAN, we understand that Connecticut is financially in jeopardy and our state leaders have a difficult task at hand. However, we are disappointed that officials were unable to develop an Education Cost Sharing formula during the regular and now special session. By not implementing a new formula, we are depriving our children of their fundamental rights to a quality education. Without a funding formula we are ruling out the opportunity for a successful future for our kids and for our state.
While state revenue numbers are painfully dismal, evidence shows that providing students with a quality education is imperative to digging our state out of this hole. Passing on the opportunity to develop a funding formula will come with a cost. Research shows that the lack of a quality education can lead to higher dropout rates and higher dropout rates cost Connecticut almost four times more than other citizens on health care, corrections and welfare programs.
Furthermore, without an education funding formula, children who have been placed on waiting long lists in order to get into a quality school, now remain unsure if they will have a seat at their school of choice. These children should not have to pay the consequences for our state’s political divide.
The chance to develop a funding formula happens once every generation, at best. We cannot wait any longer for a solid, fair, and predictable funding formula that consolidates the 11 different ways that we currently fund our schools into a single formula, based on learning needs for all school types.
We look forward to continuing to work with our state leaders towards a new funding formula that put our kids first.