PHOENIX — There was a common theme among public comment in the Arizona State Board of Education’s meeting on Monday.
School district leaders and education organizations who attended wished the Arizona Department of Education (ADE) would’ve been more transparent and communicative over the federal government decreasing Arizona’s allocation of Title 1 funding.
Schools that have higher poverty rates are named Title 1 schools. The federal government allocates funds to Title 1 schools through a budget from Congress.
According to the ADE, Arizona’s poverty rate decreased by around 7%, which means less Title 1 money will be coming from the federal government. ADE said this reduced Arizona’s funding from around $356 million in Fiscal Year 2024 to about $328 million Fiscal Year 2025.
“In the preliminary estimates, we had advised districts to commit 80% of their funds rather than their usual 90%,” Superintendent Tom Horne said in the meeting.
This resulted in millions of dollars in losses for some school districts next school year compared to years past.
Districts are now making last-minute changes as their budget for the next school year is typically done months before the end of the current school year.
In the Cartwright Elementary School District, which all its 18 schools are Title 1, Chief Financial Officer Victoria Farrar said they initially thought they’d have to adjust to a preliminary 20% loss in Title 1 funding. However, late last week, they were notified that it would be about 11%.
Regardless, that means they have to cut programs, which their summer school will no longer be able to accommodate about 1,100 students.
“We will only have summer school for the third graders that need extra support to pass the fourth grade,” she said.
Mesa Public Schools’ Assistant Superintendent of Teaching and Learning, Tracy Yslas, said 60 of their schools will be Title 1 schools next school year. That’s up from eight this current school year.
While they initially looked at a preliminary reduction of 21% before last week, she said they’ll still get 4-5% less than last school year, and for the largest district in the state, that will still have some ramifications.
“We'd have to readjust the budgets as well as set aside some things. It's challenging when we don't have that communication from the Arizona Department of Education and hadn't had it all along,” Yslas told ABC15.
During public comment in the meeting, districts told the board that ADE didn’t give them an early enough notice about the reduction in Title 1 funding from the federal government. They wished they had been notified earlier, which Farrar said in early March, ADE gave the preliminary reduction advice without clear reasons why that was happening. Farrar said they were given the reason why in April.
There was also unclear communication and confusion on whether or not funds were being cut or withheld by the ADE but that was not the case. ADE is not allowed to withhold federal funds from school districts.
“I think it’s important to eliminate the false statement that we cut funds. We don’t cut funds, we distribute it all. It’s the federal government that makes these decisions,” Horne said.
Multiple board members asked questions of ADE’s business officer, Chris Brown, after he gave his presentation on the reduction in funding.
While Horne and the Department of Education maintain that they did notify school districts and worked with individual school districts, Jacqui Clay, a state board member and Cochise County Superintendent, said that was not the case for schools in the county she oversees.
“I just believe that these questions, that if they were asked before this, you wouldn't have all these people here right now,” Clay said.
Horne continued to come to Brown’s defense in the work his department did in trying to notify staff. At the beginning of the meeting during the Superintendent’s report, Horne said they had more than 90 meetings with more than 100 school districts, charters and institutions about the government’s Title 1 funding reduction.
Horne said there was no reason people should be confused about this, asking Brown himself how many emails were sent to, what they believe, were all school districts and charters to explain the situation.
”So, if someone said they were confused and they didn't know what was happening, it meant they didn't read their emails, is that right?” Horne questioned. The crowd reacted to that, and districts ABC15 spoke with refute that, saying they were not notified.
“There is potential for that,” Brown responded in part.
“I think there were some very unfair attacks that went on here and I'm disappointed that people would say things that are not true,” Horne said after the meeting.
However, through the confusion over Title 1 funding and even before, some education leaders feel trust within the leadership in the Arizona Department of Education has been fractured.
“Unfortunately, over the past year and a half, the field’s trust has been bruised by the department,” said Alicia Williams with the Arizona School Administrators Association. “This is why there’s such a large interest in today’s agenda item.”
Congress just passed the budget; tentative allocations were sent out late last week to school districts, but the future is still murky for some districts that have to continue notifying staff about cuts and possible reductions in programs.