By BOB GRIFFIN
The average K-12 student in Alaska costs the state 2.2 times the $5,960 Base Student Allocation after all the multipliers in the funding formula or about $13,100 per year. The funding formula is just one component of the $20,535/student Alaska spent in local, state and federal K-12 funding in 2022-23 according to the NEA.
All correspondence school students in Alaska are currently funded and 0.9 BSA or $5,364/year. With 24,000 Alaskan kids enrolled in correspondence programs, the state is currently saving around $186 million/year in what those students would cost in formula funding if they were enrolled in neighborhood schools.
There is a proposal in Juneau to increase the BSA allotment for these correspondence students to 1.0. It officially has a fiscal note of $14 million a year since it would increase the student allotment about $600 for each student currently in correspondence program. The part that most policy makers are missing is the potential for cost savings if an additional $600 incentivizes more parents to patriciate in the program.
For every student who leaves a neighborhood school and enrolls in a correspondence program at 1.0 BSA, the state will be saving about $7,200 per year per student in formula funding. It would only take an additional 1,900 kids switching (an 8% increase correspondence enrollment) to completely erase the cost of the change in the program. With a 20% increase in enrollment, the state would be saving and additional $21 million per year.
The other benefit that is often overlooked is the fact that the kids in correspondence programs have very little impact on the local, federal and capital funding for neighborhood schools – so there’s significantly higher funding, on a per student basis, for the kids in neighborhood schools who don’t have to share those other funding streams with an additional 24,000 students.
A small increase in the correspondence allotment would allow more families to participate in this program that has become so wildly popular with Alaska parents. It also has the potential for increasing the per student resources that go to kids in our neighborhood schools and additional savings for taxpayers.
Bob Griffin is a former member of the Alaska Board of Education and Early Development and a life-long learner.
