It began with a simple resolution by the Rowan County Board of Education on Sept. 17, pointing out the unfunded costs of Senate Bill 1 and the state’s new assessment system.
Rowan County school board Chairman Bill Redwine told the Morehead News, “Our local legislators know how I and our entire board feel about this issue but (House Speaker) Greg Stumbo, (Senate President) Robert Stivers, and (Governor) Steve Beshear need to hear loud and clear that people are struggling to perform all of the mandates without any of the money."
After the story was picked up by the KSBA eNews Service, Redwine shared a copy of the resolution with KSBA, as did Superintendent Marvin Moore with the Kentucky Association of School Superintendents (KASS). Shortly thereafter, boards in Jessamine County, Morgan County and Owsley County passed similar messages to state leaders.
Since then, a truly grassroots effort has resulted in more than 40 local school boards and superintendents adopting their own resolutions. All have sent the resolutions to their local representatives and senators, but several have sent the position papers to the governor and House and Senate leaders as well.
KSBA and KASS have encouraged all of the state’s 173 school districts to take similar action, especially to educate legislators on the impact of state funding cuts and the lack of adequate funding to cover expenses related to testing and other mandates.
As of Oct. 29, here are the districts whose leaders have reported final action on their local resolutions: (Note: Several have reported planned actions, which will be noted in the next edition of Boardcast in two weeks. Further updates will continue to be made.)
Ashland
Barbourville
Bellevue
Boone
Bowling Green
Breathitt
Cloverport
Corbin
Danville
Elizabethtown
Erlanger-Elsmere
Fayette
Floyd
Frankfort
Gallatin
Garrard
Green
Hardin
Harlan County
Jessamine
Lawrence
Lee
Lincoln
Magoffin
McCracken
McCreary
Menifee
Montgomery
Morgan
Murray
Newport
Owensboro
Owsley
Raceland-Worthington
Rowan
Scott
Simpson
Somerset
Taylor
Walton-Verona
Warren
Washington
Whitley
Wolfe
KSBA’s Governmental Relations team has shared a model resolution, which can be localized, with all superintendents and boards. Additionally, in collaboration with KASS, KSBA is collecting the final board resolutions acted upon to date. Examples of those resolutions are available by contacting Brad Hughes [email protected]) at KSBA.