COLUMBUS, Ohio — Thousands of people gathered outside the statehouse Thursday, protesting against the state legislature's budget proposal that many say doesn't provide enough public school funding.
According to an analysis by the Ohio Education Policy Institute, the original state budget proposed by Gov. Mike Dewine would have cut public school funding by more than $100 million over the next two years, while giving more money to the state’s voucher program that helps students attend private schools.
House Republicans passed their own version of the budget, House Bill 96, which they said increases public school funding, but it strays away from the bipartisan “Fair School Funding Plan” that was created in 2021 and designed to have a more equitable and transparent system for funding K-12 education. HB 96 also puts a cap on how much money each district can carry over to the next year.
Protestors said both of the proposals would be detrimental to public schools and leave districts severely underfunded.
Regina Fuentes, who’s become the face for the Columbus Education Association and is a high school English teacher, said many educators feel disrespected by lawmakers and want the funding in the proposed budget to prove that they value public education.
“We meet the needs of the public. It is a come as you are type situation,” Fuentes said. “So we don't get to pick and choose the students that come to us, nor do we want to. We want to be able to service Ohio's children. This isn't just central Ohio. This is all over the state. So if you start cutting programs, you're not just cutting the programs in the inner city, you're cutting programs out in the rural areas, areas that don't have access to these vouchers that they're claiming that everybody will have. There's no private schools out in the rural areas. There's no charter schools in the rural areas for students to vouch to go to, to choose to go to. Public education is their only option.”
Christopher Monteiro, an English teacher and a member of the Columbus Education Association, said he thinks it's intentional.
“Of course they are trying to deceive the public on this. Like, they want to privatize public education. They want to destroy it by taking away enough funding that the schools start to decline, and then they can justify coming in and bringing their state programs to privatize everything,” Monteiro said. “Ultimately, schools are going to have fewer resources. Fewer teachers, fewer support staff meaning like school psychologists, counselors, basically all the people who make a school functional. When we have that, we're going to have overcrowded classes and every study in the world that's been done on it will tell you that kids learn worse in those environments. So ultimately, yes, this is just harming Ohio's kids that 90% of them who attend public schools.”
Despite the analysis from OEPI, Dewine has said that his budget proposal would fully fund the Fair School Funding Plan.
The process is still ongoing. The Senate is currently working on its own version of the budget. The final version needs to be signed by Dewine by June 30.
