PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) – Funding for schools, literacy programs and special education teachers in Oregon, a state where 60 percent of third-graders can’t read at grade level, could be in jeopardy by a walkout Republican who has stopped hundreds of bills. and derailed the Legislature for nearly six weeks.
The showdown over a bill that would expand access to abortion and gender-affirming health care could derail much-needed education funding in a year when the stars seemed to be aligning on Oregon’s budget.
Tax revenues have exceeded projections by state economists, enabling lawmakers to pass a record $10.2 billion K-12 budget. But the education spending legislation needs a vote by the Senate, which has been unable to do business since May 3 because of the GOP boycott, and time is running out, with just two weeks left in the legislative session.
“Supporting strong schools and improving student outcomes should be enough to get anyone to show up for the job,” state Rep. Courtney Neron, D-Chairman of the House Education Committee, said in a recent concentration against the march. “From early childhood to higher education, our schools and students need us to respond to serious challenges.”
The Republican office of the Oregon Senate said in an email that “it is very important that we ensure that education is fully funded.” Republican Minority Leader Sen. Tim Knopp also said in an email that his caucus will return on June 25 to pass “substantially bipartisan” bills and budgets.
But Democrats say waiting until the last day of the session to pass budgets isn’t feasible, and school districts need a sense of potential funding by early July to begin planning for the upcoming school year.
“There is no way we can pass every budget on June 25,” state Sen. Michael Dembrow, D-Sen., chairman of the Senate Education Committee, said in an email. “Just getting budget projects through both chambers will take several days.”
If lawmakers don’t come back soon, Dembrow said he suspects Gov. Tina Kotek “will have to call a special session at some point to do the budgets.”
Like other states across the country, reading and math scores plummeted in Oregon following the COVID-19 pandemic. School closings especially affect young children, depriving them of critical face-to-face instruction needed to learn to read. About 60 percent of Oregon third graders are not proficient in reading or math, according to the latest state assessment results.
In addition to the $10.2 billion K-12 budget, which passed the state House with bipartisan support, the Senate Republican march could also derail education bills that try to offset pandemic learning losses and address the education workforce crisis.
One such bill aims to address the shortage of teachers and other school personnel, especially in rural areas, and increase the pay of special education teachers. Another would invest $140 million in a new early literacy initiative for children from birth to third grade. The initiative is a central piece of Kotek’s agenda.
“This should be an emergency, a wake-up call,” said Gini Pupo-Walker, executive director of the nonprofit advocacy group The Education Trust. “It’s unfortunate that these really important bills that could really reshape the way reading is taught and could really transform students’ learning experiences … are now being held hostage to an entirely separate issue.”
In particular, the early literacy bill received more than 150 written public comments. Among other things, the measure would fund tutoring for struggling readers and direct schools to base literacy instruction on research into the science of reading, which emphasizes the importance of phonics in ‘time to teach children to read.
Anna Ingram in Eugene was one of the parents who testified in favor of the bill. She described feeling angry, anxious and desperate when she saw her son was having trouble learning to read. His first grade teacher provided a list of 200 common words that he should memorize. At third, he was encouraged to guess words from their first letter and by looking at pictures, he said.
“It wasn’t actually recommended to sound out the letters of the word,” he said in written testimony. “He learned to read because I invest thousands of dollars a year to tutor him with explicit, systematic instruction.”
Education spending in the coming years will be especially critical as federal pandemic funds expire, said Jon Valant, director of the Brown Center on Education Policy at the Brookings Institution in Washington, DC.
“We are probably more in need of thoughtful, smart, and careful education policymaking than we have been in generations. This was a bigger success for America’s schools than anything in recent memory,” he said of the pandemic
“When the resources are potentially there, I think it’s extremely important that we use them and use them well,” Valant added. “Because the resources are not there forever.”
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Claire Rush is a staff member of the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a national nonprofit service program that places reporters in local newsrooms to report on undercover issues.
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