Proposition 320 is a ballot measure that calls for larger school districts in Arizona, including all districts in Maricopa, Pima, and Pinal counties, to devote at least 60% of their budgets to classroom spending.

Tonight we hear from those for and against prop 320 speaking in support, Matt Binder, director of education policy at the Goldwater Institute and in opposition, Jimmy argued with Arizona's for quality education.

Good to have you both here.

Thank you so much for joining us.

I want to start with you, prop 320.

Did I get it right?

What exactly does this call for?

Yeah, it' a very straightforward measure.

It says we're going to prioritize student funding.

We're going to put dollars into the classroom.

So school districts will spend at least 60% of their operational dollars on classroom instruction.

Those who aren't at that level have a very gradual roadmap to get there.

It says increase the amount of spending on instruction by half a percent each year, the allocation.

So not in terms o you have to put new dollars in, but just when you're looking at your budget, make sure you're prioritizing what's actually going to the classroom and not getting diverted elsewhere.

The phrase direc instructional expenses is used.

What exactly does that mean?

Yeah.

So the state auditor general puts that together and basically says this is categories of instruction, including teachers and textbooks, direct stuff in the classroom.

It's those things, things that you kind of think of.

Core instruction includes special education.

Teachers in most cases, includes the things that that students are most in need of receiving that direc classroom instruction inspires.

Okay, Jimmy, why is this a bad idea?

Well.

That this punishes schools for providing kids the resources that they need.

When you drop your kid off at campus for a day at school and they walk through the doors of the campus, you expect as a parent that the security there is going to be good, that the school resource officer there is keeping them safe.

That is not included in direct instruction.

When your kid has type one diabetes or needs to go see the school nurse, that' not included in this definition.

When your kid is just sitting in the classroom and the air conditioning is blowing, that counts against schools in this definition.

And that's that's not right.

How do you respond to that?

Yeah.

Look.

Those are hugely important things outside of it.

This isn't saying 100% goes to classroom instruction saying 60% nurses, counselors, school resource officers.

Those things can all be you have that other 40% of your budget to put on that.

The problem is, when we see school districts who are spending things on unused, empty buildings, we had a school district spend $500,000 sending their staff and board members to a conference in Vegas.

You had the tourism districts try to pitch an $80 million domed stadium.

I got shot down, but it gives you an example that we're seeing too many dollars not going to where they want.

Is there a way to get those dollars going to where they should be, or at least in a better way, as opposed to something like this enshrined in the Constitution?

Yeah.

So this, this and this is a state law.

This is this is not this is a statutory fix here.

So this is essentially saying you're not we're not micromanaging your budget.

We're not saying you need to spend this much on textbooks versus teachers We're just saying instruction.

That core mission of the schools, you can still budget and figure out how much do you do for all these other important measures.

But it's again, to say every dollar that the schools get, they should be asking first, how can this be used to help students in the way that's most important?

The it looks like the districts have been paying like 52 or something about those lines.

Lowest percentage since tracking began in 2001.

Time to make a change.

No.

And the fact is, schools spend close to 7 in 10 dollars on classroom spending.

And classroom spending is different here.

Classroom spendin is special education educators.

It's nurses.

It's instructional support to ensure that teachers are getting the resources that they need.

Again, what this is going to do.

And Matt brought up facilities, and I think the judge that ruled in a 119 page judgment, siding with school district, saying that the state was underfunding school facilities by 2.2 billion, is quite convincing for me that we are not underfunding facilities.

But let's just take that aside.

This proposition has nothing to do with school facilities because buying, selling land, buying and selling buildings, that's a non-operational expense.

And what we're talking abou is operational spending, please.

Yeah.

So two things.

One, it's worth noting you brought this up.

We're down to $0.52 on th dollar going toward instruction.

It used to be 59%.

We've gone from 59 to 52.

You actually still have school districts toda that are at 58, 59, 60% or more.

And Jimmy makes a great point about the schools, in addition to all their operational dollars, they get money for land and buildings, but we see districts spending operational dollars on the maintenance, on the upkeep, on air conditioning, for vacant buildings, for underused facilities.

The auditor general has repeatedly said districts like Scottsdale are spending so much money on these underutilized facilities cost the equivalent of thousands of dollars per teacher.

That could be getting rerouted back to the teachers and used for classroom instruction.

And instead we're seeing the schools again, using it on things like administration.

You have school districts like Tucson Unified spends $200 more per kid, Roosevelt, $50 more per kid on administration than some of their peers.

So there's a lot of opportunity to cut the fat and say, let's reorient this back toward student instruction.

How do you respond.

To that?

We spend as a state, on average, 35% less than the national average on administration.

And the school districts that are impacted by this specifically spend sometimes 1,020% less than the state average.

So this is not a question of administrative blow.

What this is going to do is impact the things that kids need to be successful.

When you think about things like math and reading coaches that really help improve academic success, those are the types of things that are going to be cut, because when we're looking at school budgets and we're looking at all the things that go into it, we're talking about massive cuts to these things that kids need.

Yeah.

And obviously statutory here, not the state constitution.

But the fact is shoul there be any required spending for specifically classroom needs.

Should the state should government be involved with that at all?

Yeah.

Well, we're talking about the state, right?

These are school districts.

These are arms of the government.

And we asked that question.

Voters 25 years ago passed a ballot measure, prop 301, out of a sales tax that we all pay.

And it was to put hundreds of millions of dollars into the classroom sight fund for classroom instruction.

The state auditor general came out and said the opposite of what voters asked for happened.

The schools took that money, put it toward instruction, and took all the other dollars and moved it away.

The other general said this is in violation of state law.

So for year we've we've actually increased funding for these schools where it's $16,000 per kid in these districts.

And yet that money is not seeing or not translating to increases in teacher pay.

It's not translating to higher outcomes for the students.

So yeah, I think it's absolutely fair to say let's put some accountability in there.

Anything that helps with teacher pay, why would that not be a good idea, considering that as a major factor for the teacher shortage here in Arizona?

Ted, we want teachers to be paid more, but we have the lowes funded schools in the country.

If you want to increase teache pay, let's talk about solutions that actually add resources to the classroom and not simply talk about reallocating and taking away resources that help teachers.

And that's why I'm happy to work with with Matt and anybody who wants to put forward a prop one, two, three that adds ne additional dollars to schools.

If this is such a great idea, why is it larger districts only and not smaller districts?

Why the delineation there?

Yeah, I mean, I think this is to say, hey, for those districts, that is a particularly obvious example where they have those means, they have those economies of scale.

Again, there's no reason tha a district like Tucson Unified, you actually see smaller districts in Arizona, even in rural areas, hitting this 60% measure.

So again, this is something that obviously could then be translated to additional opportunities.

But you know, to his point, I think there is an interest i saying how can we maximize pay for teachers.

And again I mentioned the fact we've we've increased spending in Arizona, even adjusting for inflation.

We're spending 50% more than we did decades ago.

Teacher pay is flat adjusted for inflation.

We did the 20 by 20 teacher pay plan under Ducey the classroom siphon.

All these things have gone to increase funding.

And yet our teachers are not getting more of that.

Last word on this.

Why is that happening?

Said we've increased all this funding and yet we're dead last in the country.

If we want to actually increas teacher pay, let's put forward a real solution that increases it like prop one, two, three.

You agree with one, two, three.

We're supportive of an option to increase funding for all students.

Not to say we're going to pick and choose winners and losers here.

And we've been supportiv of opportunities for increasing prop one, two, three funding that is open to all students.

That provides additional opportunities.

Gentlemen we have to stop it right there.

Matt Bainbridge and again Jimmy Wood, good conversation.

Good to have you both here on prop 320.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.