Legislative Advocacy

February 2024 Updates

Exploring solutions to our district's enrollment and funding challenges. As you may know, our district receives inadequate funding from our state. We make up the difference with local levies, bonds, and our community’s generous donations. State funding depends on the actual count of students in the building, and it makes up the majority of staff costs. This means that when enrollment drops, we do not receive adequate funding to simply drop class size and retain staff; we need to re-budget and potentially cut staff and programs. Our PTA, board, and district are partnering with others around the state to seek legislative changes to the funding model that would help us maintain our staff and programs despite drops in enrollment. Such change is slow.


We expect enrollment to drop in the coming few years. We know this from detailed demographic data and from current enrollment numbers which show markedly fewer students enrolled in 8th than 12th grade and even fewer in lower grades. This comes at a time when the district is still trying to recover from the additional expenses of COVID.

 

One potential solution would be to open enrollment to a certain number of students from off-island. It is worth noting that school districts around us already have this policy. Our district has allowed open enrollment in the past, depending on the crowdedness of the schools. This solution could retain our student population numbers, allowing us to retain our existing staff and programs. In the absence of open enrollment, staff and programmatic cuts are highly likely.

 

Our school board will be deciding about open enrollment this spring. If you would like to share your opinion with our board, you can do so by emailing: board@mercerislandschools.org 

 

Please attend the 2/27 @ 7p district webinar and share your feedback on the curriculum review that could impact student schedules!

Our district is conducting a curriculum review of the health and PE programs and offerings in middle school, high school, and summer school. At IMS, this includes a review of the current PE waiver system and the potential impacts this may have on fine arts, world language, and other electives. Many current and former students have used the PE waivers to pursue both world language and music or other electives in both 7th and 8th grade. At MIHS, this includes a review of in-building school-year programming, summer school offerings, and the directed athletics option that allows students to receive PE credit for after school sports participation, as well as the implications for student schedules if these options are changed or eliminated. Similar to IMS, these MIHS PE offerings have allowed many current and former students the opportunity to pursue elective interests such as band and extra science classes. We encourage families who have used these options or who may do so in the future to join the webinar and learn more. Decisions have not been made, which makes this a great opportunity for families to learn more prior to when the district does make changes. Our administrators will be looking to hear from parents as part of the process.

 

Please join the webinar here: Link: https://mercerislandschools.zoom.us/j/89097768339 

 

January 2024 Updates

Even though this is a short legislative session, there are several proposed bills that would have a significant impact on our district.  As parents we know these issues matter a great deal to you so we are providing an avenue to have your voices heard.

 

A bill currently being considered by the Washington State Senate has the potential to increase funding for MISD, if passed. State Senator Lisa Wellman, who represents Mercer Island in the Washington State Senate, has co-sponsored Senate Bill 5956, "An Act Relating to Enrichment Levies," that would amend a law currently capping the amount of local taxes that can be used to support a school district, including teacher salaries. The amendment proposes applying a regionalization factor to the local levy authority of a given district,  so that areas like Mercer Island, which have higher costs of living, would be able to raise more funding through school levies. 

 

The bill was requested by the Washington Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction and was heard in the Senate Early Learning and K-12 Committee in mid-January, and is scheduled for Executive Session and a vote on January 31, 2024.

 

During the recent  hearing, Senator Wellman shared her view that "By adding the regionalization factor when calculating the district's levy capacity, communities that want to spend more on enrichment activities will have the ability to do so." The bill will not impact state funding, but will allow certain communities to increase local funding of their school district.

 

You can learn more about the bill here and watch the Committee hearing here. For those who wish to share their views on the bill, comments can be shared via this link.

 

A second bill, SSB 5882 and its companion bill HB1960, would increase State funding for paraprofessionals and non-instructional support staff in all schools statewide.   As of January 25, 2024, the bill has been considered by the Early Learning & K-12 Education Committee, and forwarded to Ways and Means with a Do Pass recommendation.  You can read the full text of the Senate Bill here and the House bill here.  Comments regarding the bills can be submitted here.

 

Last but not least, The Seattle Times published an editorial this week regarding proposed changes to the law requiring a 60% supermajority vote to fund capital improvements for schools such as school building improvements, athletic facilities, safety upgrades, and accessibility.  HJR4207 would reduce the voter approval threshold to 55%.  This resolution was initially introduced during last year's legislative session but its progress stalled.  It has been reintroduced this session and is scheduled for a hearing on January 30, 2024 at 4:00 pm.  You can watch the session here or send comments to our legislators here.

 

To follow the status of these and other pending bills this legislative session, go to the WA State PTA Advocacy page.  

 

Click here for the MIHS PTSA Resolution on Advocacy for Funding Education in MISD.

 

If you have any questions, please contact the MIHS Co-VPs Legislation/Advocacy.

 

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