School districts lost out on $7.6 billion from state, study finds | www.myajc.com

No teacher hired by Gwinnett County Public Schools during the past five years has received a raise. No teacher employed by Clayton County Schools got one during that time, either.

School district officials have long complained that the absence of state funding, combined with an increasingly poor student population and a shrinking property tax base have made for a perfect financial storm.

Now, districts have a detailed foul weather report from the Georgia Budget and Policy Institute, a left-leaning policy group that has thrown some eye-popping numbers into the debate about school funding.

Over the past decade, Georgia didn’t give public school districts $7.6 billion that they were due under a state formula, a study from GBPI has found. That happened while the recession clobbered governments and the percentage of Georgia students who qualified for school meal assistance climbed from 45 percent to 60 percent. Educators argue that, for a variety of reasons, it takes more money to educate poor students than it does to educate affluent ones.

Eight of the 10 districts that lost out on the most money over the past decade were in metro Atlanta, with districts in Gwinnett County ($739 million), Cobb County ($491 million) and DeKalb County ($444 million) leading the way.

The state’s complicated funding formula, called the Quality Basic Education formula, directs funding to districts based on the number and needs of their students. Metro Atlanta districts are among the largest in the state. But GBPI’s study also found that financial pain is acutely felt in rural districts, which do not have large property tax bases that can be tapped to make up for an absence of state funds.

“This report holds no surprises for local school districts,” Gwinnett Superintendent J. Alvin Wilbanks said. “We fully understand the impact the recession has had on the state budget. However, we also know that we cannot continue to provide a quality and effective education without additional revenue.”

Legislators, wrestling with declining state revenues, provided districts with $7.6 billion less than QBE called for them to receive over the past decade.

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