K-12 Education Forum

I know many people have questions about how the proposed changes to our K-12 school system being debated by the Legislature may impact their kids, school, community, or property taxes. Join me for a K-12 Education Community Forum at 10:00am-noon on Saturday, May 10th at the Vergennes High School. I will be joined by Rep. Peter Conlon who chairs the House Education Committee, Senator Steve Heffernan who is a member of the Senate Education Committee, and area K-12 education leaders.

The forum is open to the public. We will present information about the current status of the K-12 education transformation bill H.454 and its potential impact on the Addison District. We will leave plenty of time to hear your concerns and ideas, and answer your questions about the process, timeline, and details of the bill. Here’s how you can participate:
1) Come in person – RSVP HERE
2) Watch the MCTV livestream
3) Submit your questions in advance HERE

The education transformation bill has itself transformed over the past several months. Here are links to several versions of the bill and supporting materials:
1) Governor’s plan outline and bill as introduced in late-February
2) House bill as passed in March, JFO summary, and transformation timeline
3) Senate Education Committee bill passed last Friday

The bill will next come to the Senate Finance Committee, where I’m a member. I have concerns about the draft proposed by the Senate Education Committee, which alters the empirically derived foundation formula proposed by the House and under-funds payments to school districts, which is the situation that lead to the 1997 landmark VT Supreme Court Brigham Decision and our current funding model. I have other concerns as well, and hope to be able to make changes before it goes to the Senate floor.

We’ll catch you up on all of this on Saturday.  I hope to see you there!