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State officials unveil Gov. Scott's education reform ideas

A woman wearing a blue blazer stands at a podium and speaks into microphones
Sophie Stephens
/
Vermont Public
Zoie Saunders, a former charter school executive from Florida, will be Vermont’s next secretary of education, Gov. Phil Scott announced at a press conference at the Statehouse in Montpelier on March 22, 2024.

Vermont would go from having more than 100 school districts to five and see the state government assume a much more direct role in deciding how much schools spend, which schools close, and what is taught, under a proposal released by Gov. Phil Scott’s administration Wednesday.

Vermont Education Secretary Zoie Saunders, alongside Tax Commissioner Greg Bolio, unveiled the plan in a special presentation to House and Senate lawmakers at the Statehouse in Montpelier.

Over the course of her roughly 40-minute presentation, Saunders repeatedly invoked Scott’s call, in his inaugural speech, for “bold” action, and acknowledged that his ideas will be enormously controversial.

“I know that the work that we're describing here is going to be really challenging, and that there's a lot in this plan that people may dislike,” she said.

The plan explained: 11 things that would change for Vermont schools under Gov. Phil Scott’s education overhaul

Scott’s plan would see significant power and oversight over schools centralized to the Agency of Education. The agency would take over rulemaking (which is currently a responsibility of the State Board of Education) and set statewide standards. Those standards would include standards for “small school eligibility,” which would dictate which schools should close.

“What we've been hearing is, historically, we've been pushing down a lot of these really hard decisions [to] the local level,” Saunders told reporters after her presentation.

The state’s 119 districts would be merged into five regional entities, with a single school board for each district. Scott’s plan envisions local “school advisory councils,” which would provide input on planning and budgeting. It’s unclear, however, how much actual power these panels would retain.

The cornerstone of Scott’s reform package is a transition to a so-called “foundation formula,” whereby the state would calculate how much districts should spend on their schools and provide them corresponding grants. These grants would be calculated based on a per-pupil formula, with adjustments to account for the extra funding necessary to educate certain higher-need students.

Currently, local voters decide how much their school districts will spend when they approve or reject budgets, typically on Town Meeting Day. Whatever the amount, the state must pay. To calculate each town’s fair share into Vermont’s more than $2 billion Education Fund, residential property tax rates are then adjusted based on how much each district is spending per pupil.

More from Vermont Public: How does Vermont pay for schools? A video explainer and glossary of terms

Under Scott’s proposed plan, districts would be allowed to spend more than their state foundation grants — though they would need to raise much of that money locally. Such a proposal is sure to prompt debate about whether it could withstand a constitutional challenge brought under Brigham v. Vermont, the landmark state Supreme Court case that prompted lawmakers to revamp school funding in 1997. Officials sought to get out ahead of these concerns Wednesday, emphasizing that the state would include equalizing measures to ensure that more affluent areas could not easily raise far more cash than their less affluent counterparts.

And they also argued that their proposal would do more to ensure the equity of education opportunity demanded by Brigham than the current system. Over the course of her presentation, Saunders repeatedly pointed to staffing and funding data that suggested local control was not directing money where it was needed most. She noted, for example, that when nearly a third of all budgets failed on Town Meeting Day last year, it was some of the lowest spending, poorest districts who received budget approval from their voters last.

Officials said that foundation formula modeling — with specific dollar amounts — would be released in the coming weeks.

Sunlight streams through large windows into a classroom filled with white tables and blue chairs.
Sophie Stephens
/
Vermont Public
Desks sit in a classroom at Twinfield Union School in Plainfield on Dec. 14, 2024.

If enacted as proposed, the governor’s proposals would represent a seismic shift in the way that school is funded, administered, and governed in Vermont. But his ideas are sure to be met with fierce pushback both inside and outside the Statehouse. Just minutes after Saunders’ presentation, the Vermont NEA released a statement calling Scott’s proposal “risky” and “short on the details.”

“The details matter — a lot. It doesn’t explain how these changes would be better for students. It doesn’t simplify an overly complex school funding system. And it doesn’t provide immediate and on-going property tax relief for middle-class Vermonters,” union president Don Tinney wrote.

While Scott attempted early in his tenure to aggressively pursue cost-cutting ideas in education, lawmakers pushed back, and he significantly retreated from the topic. A year ago, when the state initially forecast double-digit property tax hikes, Scott said he’d let lawmakers take the first pass at proposing a fix, and Democrats complained that the governor was abdicating leadership on the most important issue of the day.

But the Republican governor and his allies now believe that this is their moment. In an election where rising property taxes were front and center for many voters, dozens of Democratic lawmakers were sent home this November. Scott, meanwhile, was reelected by his widest margin yet.

While noncommittal, Democratic leaders in the Legislature have emphasized they’re open to Scott’s ideas — and grateful he’s taking the lead on a politically explosive topic. In a statement released shortly after Saunders’ presentation, Senate President Pro Tempore Phil Baruth and House Speaker Jill Krowinski thanked Scott for “bringing forward a proposal to transform Vermont’s public education system.”

“In the coming weeks, House and Senate committees will be hard at work digging into the Governor’s proposal and hearing from Vermonters, parents, educators, administrators, and students. The details matter and we need to get it right,” Baruth and Krowinski wrote.

A copy of Gov. Phil Scott's proposal is available below.

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Lola is Vermont Public's education and youth reporter, covering schools, child care, the child protection system and anything that matters to kids and families. She's previously reported in Vermont, New Hampshire, Florida (where she grew up) and Canada (where she went to college).
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