Both Kansas Chambers Take Up School Funding

The Kansas House is taking up a plan to boost aid to poor school districts.

The House debate is expected to begin Friday morning. The Senate approved a less generous plan overnight that also blocks the multistate Common Core reading and math standards, and makes it easier to fire teachers.

The House plan would increase aid to the state’s poorest school districts by $141 million during the next school year. The Senate approved its plan early Friday, and a single proposal will need to be negotiated before the legislation goes to the governor

The proposals come in response to a Kansas Supreme Court ruling that ordered the state to increase aid to poor districts.

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The Kansas Senate has approved a Republican education funding plan that includes a measure blocking public schools from using multistate reading and math standards.

The vote early Friday morning was 23-17 and sent the measure to the House, which planned to debate an alternative plan later Friday.

The measure aims to boost aid to poor school districts to comply with a Kansas Supreme Court ruling last month in an education funding lawsuit. But conservative Republicans added other policy provisions.

One would make it easier for school administrators to fire teachers who’ve been on the job for more than three years.

Another would prevent the spending of tax dollars through June 2017 on implementing multistate Common Core reading and math standards. The State Board of Education adopted them in 2010.