Message from the Coalition for Gifted Education
THE BUDGET The good news from the House and Senate is that the budgets passed in each house provide for implementation of education reform in September 2011 (HCP becomes a […]
budget
Update – Message from the Washington Coalition for Gifted Education
This message has been sent to you by The Washington Coalition For Gifted Education. Comments or questions can be sent to wagifted@earthlink.net or grevewandi@gmail.com If you wish to have your name deleted from our mailing list, send a notice to wagifted@earthlink.net.
OUR FOCUS FOR GIFTED EDUCATION DAY AND BEYOND
The Supplemental Budget has passed both the Senate and the House but in different versions which will need to be reconciled. Since both versions provide nearly the same amount for HCP as in the original budget for the current school year, it appears that the first hurdle of this legislative session has been successfully – well – hurdled.
The Biennial Budget and SB 5475 lie ahead of us. The fate of SB 5475, introduced on behalf of the Governor, will be basic to the budget.
The Legislature has some important decisions as outlined below.
• Proceed with the scheduled implementation of Education Reform (ESHB 2261 and SHB 2776) and they will write one budget.
• Follow the Governor’s proposal to delay implementation of parts of Education Reform and this requires a different budget.
– Delay implementation to 2013 and the biennial budget needs to contain approximately $18 million in categorical funding for HCP at at least maintenance level. This funding is not a sure thing.
– The Governor’s proposals assume delayed implementation (SB 5475) and $0 in funding in her budget.
The Coalition Position
SB 5475
We request that the words “Beginning with the 2013-14 school year” be removed from Sec. 2 (2)(g), Section 3(10)(c), Sec. 5, and Section 6(1) of SB 5475 as these would delay inclusion of HCP in basic education until 2013.
Other sections of this bill move forward with the 2011 inclusion of the Learning Assistance Program, and the Transitional Bilingual Program into basic education
and implement the prototypical school funding formula, MSOC allocations and the new transportation formula. The QEC has linked HCP with LAP and TBL as programs that close the opportunity gap; this bill removes that linkage.
Educational reform was designed as a whole. Delaying some parts of it will upset the design and make planning difficult. It will be disruptive to districts and students. Local districts have limited funds to continue programs in a delayed implementation. It will be more expensive to reintroduce them than it would be to implement them now.
We understand that implementation cost is high and that funding in full is not likely. Better an underfunded reform than no reform. For HCP, better an underfunded mandate than no mandate. Funding can be adjusted upward as the fiscal situation improves.
Your contacts with Legislators, until further notice, should request that implementation of the new definition of basic education not be delayed beyond the scheduled date of September 2011.
Since the bill is currently in the Senate, contact with your Senators should take place first but both Senators and Representatives will need to be contacted.
The Budget for 2012-2013
If inclusion of HCP is implemented in full in 2011 we hope that some amount of Section 708 funds will be appropriated along with MSOC but have not taken a position on how much this should be. We need to see what is in the budget proposed by the Legislature. (Information on these categories of funds is in the attachment.)
If implementation is delayed (SB 5475), it is our position that we will advocate to obtain as much funding for the current categorical program (which will still exist) as we can. Again, we will signal we are willing to accept a cut but it must be proportional. The budget proposed by the Governor provides no funds for HCP (as a categorical program based on her request to delay implementation of HCP inclusion). This is not proportional.
More Information.
If you are relatively new to gifted advocacy or you just like to dig into the details, please see the (long) attached pdf file which has all the appropriate references and citations.
For those in the Seattle School District, we have attached Dr. Robert Vaughan’s statement to the Senate Ways & Means Committee on January 31 regarding SB 5475.
Senate Bill to Delay Inclusion of Highly Capable in Basic Education
On Monday, January 31st, the Washington State Senate K-12 Education Committee will hold a public hearing at 1:30 p.m. on Senate Bill 5475, a recently submitted bill that includes a delay of inclusion of Highly Capable in the 2009 Education Reform Bill definition of basic education until 2013-2014. If SB5475 passes as currently written, highly capable programming would remain optional for districts to provide and vulnerable to funding cuts that basic education funds are not.
If it is possible for you to attend this meeting and make public comment on this bill, please follow these links for details on how and where to testify.
Committee Agenda and Meeting Location
Basic Information on Visiting the Legislature and List of Related Links
Update from the Washington Coalition for Gifted Education
This message has been sent to you by The Washington Coalition For Gifted Education. Comments or questions can be sent towagifted@earthlink.net or grevewandi@gmail.com If you wish to have your name deleted from our mailing list, send a notice towagifted@earthlink.net.
Pause, take a deep breath!
The supplemental budget bill left committee with funding restored for Highly Capable.
By voice vote, on an amendment proposed by Rep. Hunter, nearly full funding as established in the Second Supplemental from December was restored – for details, see fact sheet below. Centrum and FPS/DI took approximately 6% cuts in their already small funding, but the funds to districts are fully restored at the rate of $401.08 per student. As of this writing, the full text of 1086 is not yet available on the web sites so our information is from the amendment as posted and from watching the webcast of the session.
Now, the bill, as amended in committee, goes to the House floor on Friday, January 21, late morning (after the caucus meetings, where floor managers make sure they have the votes they need before proceeding to a vote). You can watch on TVW if you have time.
Next step.
Limber up those fingers and get busy contacting your district Representatives today. The risk to Highly Capable funds would come from a floor amendment to either reduce the amount and/or to impose a cutoff date to funding during this school year. (A cutoff date amendment failed in committee on a party line vote.) Ask Representatives to reject either option and to support section 508 for Highly Capable as reported by the committee.
If you had already contacted your Legislators because they are members of the Ways & Means committee, say Thank You for the funding and please vote to uphold it on the floor.
Emails can be sent through the Legislature web site. Go to http://apps.leg.wa.gov/rosters/MembersByDistrict.aspx
and find your district. A click on your Representatives will take you to the individual home pages from which you can send your email.
Your overwhelming response has heartened all Washington advocates of the gifted. We thank you on behalf of the highly capable students of Washington.
Chairman Hunter remarked that he had received a great deal of email about the gifted funds.
Pat yourself on the back for a job well done.
From here the supplemental will go to the Senate where we may have to again make many contacts to ensure funding. We will keep you informed.
For the most current information, follow us on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/wagifted
or on our blog at http://wcge.wordpress.com
Don’t forget Gifted Education Day in Olympia on February 11. We need you there.
Fact sheet for those of you who like to dig into the details.
Approved December supplemental budget called for $9,188,000 for 2010-2011.
Governor’s and Hunter’s proposed budgets called for $2,053,000. Included slightly reduced funding for Centrum and FPS/DI ($159,000 and $84,000) and nothing for districts. (About $1.78 million was to cover payments to districts for 2009-2010 made after the start of the state’s fiscal year but during the school year. Please don’t ask why; it’s too complicated.)
Difference $ 7,135,000.
Amendment to the proposed supplementary passed the committee and calls for $7,118,000 in HCP funding.
Add to the $2.035 million and this totals $9,171 million. Add on the cut amounts (total $17,000) from Centrum and FPS/DI and we arrive back at the $9,188,000.
Important Message from the Washington Coalition For Gifted Education
This message has been sent to you by The Washington Coalition For Gifted Education. Comments or questions can be sent to wagifted@earthlink.net or barbaragmaurer@yahoo.com. If you wish to have your name deleted from our mailing list, send a notice to wagifted@earthlink.net.
“Failure to help the gifted child is a societal tragedy, the extent of which is difficult to measure, but which is surely great. How can we measure the sonata unwritten, the curative drug undiscovered, the absence of political insight? They are the difference between what we are and what we could be as a society.” — Dr. James J. Gallagher, University of North Carolina
The Governor has just proposed to eliminate all state highly capable program funding for the next two years. This is the third time she’s made such a proposal. Her last attempt was rebuffed by the legislature during the just completed special session only five days ago. The only way she can legally do this is if the Legislature suspends implementation of ESHB 2261.
Highly capable programming is not something extra to be funded only when times are good. As the legislature declared in ESHB 2261 in 2009, “for highly capable students, access to accelerated learning and enhanced instruction is access to a basic education.” The Washington Coalition for Gifted Education will work together with families of highly capable students and advocates for highly capable programming across the state to oppose the Governor’s short sighted decision. The first step in our campaign will be to write letters to the editors of our local newspapers protesting this action and sharing the important role highly capable programming has had in the education of our students
You can find contact information for your local paper in the print edition of the paper or at the paper’s website. The Secretary of State also maintains a listing of newspaper websites at http://www.sos.wa.gov/library/wa_newspapers.aspx. Most papers will provide contact information on an “About Us” or “Contact Us” page. Many will accept letters to the editor submitted via email, while others will provide a mailing address.
If you have never written to a paper before, the National Association for Gifted Children’s advocacy web site at http://www.nagc.org/index.aspx?id=3148 has some excellent suggestions and examples of where to begin. Be sure to adapt your letter to reflect your personal experiences and the issues facing highly capable programming in Washington State.
Some key issues in Washington are:
– Full funding of Highly Capable Programs in the 2011 – 2013 biennial budget.
– Full implementation of the education reforms promised in ESHB 2261 beginning in September 2011. Under ESHB 2261, highly capable program services will become a mandated part of basic education. This places them within the protections of basic education regarding funding, and it is vital that implementation proceed as scheduled. The Governor’s budget proposes to not fund a program which will be protected as part of basic education unless the Legislature follows her request to suspend implementation to some unspecified future date.
– Highly Capable Programs are an essential part of securing Washington’s economic future. This is a high-tech state and gifted programs are the place where STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) talents are best nurtured. Funding highly capable programming is an investment in our state’s future.
This is just the first step in our campaign for highly capable programming. You can stay current with the latest activities of the Washington Coalition for Gifted Education at our website, http://wcge.wordpress.com or by becoming a fan on Facebook, http://www.facebook.com/wagifted.
Thank you for your continuing advocacy for our Highly Capable Learners!
Budget Update – Message from the Coalition for Gifted Education
The state Legislature has passed the second supplemental budget bill and it restores highly capable funding to the level in ESSB 6444 – $18,377,000 for two years, including $170,000 per year for Centrum and $90,000 per year for FPS/DI. That is, the 6.287% across-the-board-cut ordered by the Governor this fall is rescinded.
This bill plugs only half of the budget hole so there will have to be either another supplemental when session starts on January 10, or another round of across the board cuts. For those interested in the details, you can get the bill and the explanation at http://leap.leg.wa.gov/leap/budget/detail/2010/co2010p.asp Click on Summary.
The Governor’s budget proposal for the 2011-2013 biennium is due out no later than Wednesday. When we see what is in it for highly capable funding, we will have a better idea of what advocates need to do.
This was just an opening skirmish in what is likely to be a bruising contest for limited funds. Your outstanding efforts in contacting Legislators have brought us this far. We will need additional efforts in the coming weeks and months. If you have a newly elected Legislator(s), make every effort to contact him/her to begin their education about gifted. Newly elected Legislators will not have Olympia email addresses or phone numbers until they are sworn in on January 10. Many campaign web sites are still active and contain contact local information.
And do make plans to be in Olympia for Gifted Education Day on February 11, 2011. Your presence is vital to our efforts.
Budget Update – Message from the Coalition
There is a face-off going on down in Olympia. The Governor v. the Legislature. The Governor v. her own democrats. The democrats v. the republicans. The house v. the senate. And caught right in the middle is funding for Highly Capable Programs in the supplemental budget.
It appears there will be a special session beginning Friday to consider the supplemental budget, provided the five parties to the discussions get their act together. We can’t wait to see if they do. We need you to take action immediately to make known your wishes regarding Highly Capable funding for 2009-2010.
The governor made across-the-board cuts in November. That resulted in 6.3% cuts to Highly Capable Programs: $561,000 from categorical funding to districts, $11,000 from Centrum and $6,000 from FPS/DI, totaling $578,000 and leaving an appropriation of $8,628,000 for the year.
Now the governor proposes to totally eliminate all highly capable funding retroactive to September 2010.
Online Petition to Save Gifted Education
This online petition was spearheaded by a Seattle parent. They are seeking as many signatures as possible statewide to get this message to the Governor and state legislators. It only takes a minute and here’s the link:
http://www.PetitionOnline.com/budgcuts/petition.html
Thank you!
Update – From the Washington Coalition for Gifted Education
Threat of a Special Session is Back
There has been a significant amount of budget news over the last two days. Both the Washington State House Democratic Caucusand the Washington State Senate Republican Caucus released responses to Governor Gregoire’s earlier suggestion of budget cuts. The House Democratic Caucus proposal would leave in place the earlier across the board cuts to highly capable funding that the Governor imposed, but would go no further and would not eliminate all funding for FY2011. The Senate Republican Caucus also would not result in any additional cuts to highly capable funding. Representative Alexander also sent a letter to the Governor that argued that whatever cuts are made in a special session, they should not be retroactive. As you might remember, the Governor’s original proposal would have made the elimination of highly capable funding for fiscal year 2011 retroactive to September 1, 2010.
It remains unclear whether there will be enough agreement to justify a special session, though there is mounting pressure for all sides in the discussion to resolve their differences and get something together very quickly. The Seattle Times editorialized yesterdaythat the Governor’s cuts, including the elimination of highly capable funding, should be adopted immediately. It is essential that you contact your representatives now, before a special session begins. Once a special session begins, it is quite likely that there will already be an agreed upon solution in mind. Your chance to influence your legislators is now.
Help Re-instate Urgently Needed Funding for Javits Act
The Jacob Javits Gifted and Talented Students Education Act was established to provide funds to help highly capable disadvantaged students in the US. As things currently stand, the Javits Act […]