Potent increases for higher education and flatline funding for early childhood? The Senate Budget offers a deeply puzzling combination of the two, especially in a year when Kentucky has the revenue to respond well to our state wide needs.

Nearly two years ago, in June 2020, the Prichard Committee released a Call to Action for Racial Equity & Justice. In that statement, we expressed our commitment to doubling down on a longstanding call for greater equity in education outcomes, for greater systemic and community accountability for the progress of each and every student. We committed to continuing to press policymakers to invest in adequate and equitable education – early childhood through postsecondary – and an accountability system that ensures each Kentucky student has the opportunities and the support to meet and exceed their potential.

Although organizations have existed in some form since the beginning of time, the study and labeling of organizations began during the Industrial Revolution to make people and processes, like machines, more efficient and effective. The evolution of the study theories of organization has continued, which has had an influence over many industries and professions.  David Walonick (1993) succinctly stated that Classical Theory of Organization evolved in the early 1900’s and “represents the merger of scientific management, bureaucratic theory and administrative theory.” Major assumptions of classical theory include ideas such as: there is a head and a body of the organization; a formal role exist between the head of the organization and those who work for the head; due to the limit of energy, knowledge, and space, the head of the organization should have a limited number of people working for them, and this pattern is scaled through the organization until every person in the organization is accountable to someone.

Would you drive a car whose technology hasn’t changed in 30 years? Would you trust a surgeon who uses the same techniques used 30 years ago? As a consumer, would you expect continued innovation, research, development, and respectful progress in the profession? Would you support and invest in the organizations responsible for creating and producing these products and services in hopes of receiving the best and most innovative outcomes?

Our education system is at a crux. A generation of students face unprecedented challenges of a global society. Experienced teaching professionals with a wealth of institutional knowledge are in a phase of the retirement process. Young teachers feel overwhelmed and under-supported, and education funding is threatened daily. Further, superintendents are faced with a dilemma: meet the requirements of a traditional, bureaucratic instructional system whose academic performance is based on standardized testing or providing cutting-edge opportunities for their students to prepare them for a workforce of the future. A lack of time, money, and support for personnel adds to the burden of creating change within their districts.

We are pleased to see the commitment by the Governor to make strides that stem the erosion of education funding in the face of significant budget challenges.

Based on $1.256 billion in additional resources over the biennium, major elements of the Governor’s proposed budget include: investments to fully fund pensions, a $2,000 raise for school teachers, restoration of textbook funding, a 1% increase in the base SEEK per-pupil guarantee, increasing the base funding to colleges and universities, and increasing student financial aid continuing a commitment to allocate 100% of lottery proceeds to scholarships.

Purposeful, meaningful change in education requires innovative district-level leadership from both superintendent and school board. For instance, a school board can show support of a superintendent’s ideas and through the decision-making processes to allocate resources to support initiatives, such as personnel and funding (Lavalley, 2017). Research suggests that decisions made among districts’ superintendents and their school board members directly attributes to the academic performance within high-performing schools (Delagardelle, 2006).