SB128 - Public schools; Standards of Quality funding calculations.

1 Co-Sponsor

Public school funding; certain calculations. Places several parameters on Standards of Quality funding calculations performed by the Department of Education, including (i) requiring the Department, when calculating the cost of salaries under the Standards of Quality funding formula, to include facilities staff and transportation staff salaries in the calculation of any cost of competing adjustment to salaries for instructional and support positions that is provided as part of the state share of basic aid pursuant to the general appropriation act; (ii) requiring the Department, when estimating the cost of any compensation supplement for instructional and support positions under the Standards of Quality funding formula, to include and estimate the cost of such a compensation supplement for facilities staff; (iii) prohibiting the Department from applying any cap on inflation rate adjustments to non-personal cost categories during the biennial process of rebenchmarking the direct aid to public education budget; and (iv) requiring the Department to utilize a three-year average of the most recently available data to calculate the composite index of local ability-to-pay for each school division.