House, Senate Pass Historic Overhaul to Education Funding Formula

For the past year teachers and school leaders in Revere have been actively lobbying the state legislature and governor to begin taking steps to overhaul the state’s education funding formula to ensure equity for all students, especially those in low-income areas.

Because the state has not updated its education funding formula since 1993 to reflect districts’ real health insurance and special education costs, the amount of aid being provided to cover those costs is too small.

To compensate, many districts like Revere end up using money that would otherwise have supported core education programs—including Regular Ed. Teachers, Materials & Technology, and Professional Development. This also results in dramatic cuts in other areas of education.

The problem for low income school districts is there is a growing equity gap between schools in   Revere and schools in more affluent areas of the state. When faced with such shortfalls, high-wealth districts can often draw on additional, local revenue. Lower-wealth districts, however, are generally unable to do so and the consequence is that they spend less on resources that are critically important to the quality of education students receive.


This week Speaker Robert DeLeo and Sen. Joseph Boncore joined their colleagues in the House and Senate to unanimously pass historic legislation to invest $1.5 billion in the Commonwealth’s public education system.

Known as The Student Opportunity Act, the legislation invests funding to support the needs of English learners and school districts that serve high concentrations of low-income students in order to help address persistent disparities in student achievement.

Under the legislation, school districts across the Commonwealth will benefit from updates to the existing funding formula, along with increased state investment in other vital education aid programs such as transportation, guidance and psychological services, school buildings and special education. 

“This legislation makes a profound and lasting investment in Massachusetts schools, and I’m proud of the House’s leadership and collaborative efforts to move this bill forward,” said Speaker DeLeo. “We’re building on our ongoing efforts to support our most vulnerable students, including our English learners and low-income students. Thank you to Chair Peisch for her steady and thoughtful work on behalf of students across the Commonwealth.”

Sen. Boncore said this bill reestablishes the legislature’s commitment to public education for every child, no matter their zip code or income level.

“By recalculating metrics, this bill invests in low-income communities and prioritizes the needs of the Commonwealth’s most vulnerable students,” said Boncore. “I am proud to support a bill that ensures our schools receive the Chapter 70 funding they need.”

The bill fully implements the recommendations of the Foundation Budget Review Commission (FBRC) to ensure that the school funding formula provides adequate and equitable funding to all districts across the state.

The bill will provide an estimated $1.4 billion in new Chapter 70 aid over and above inflation when fully implemented over the next seven years.

Key updates to the foundation budget that will benefit Revere are:

• Estimates school districts’ employee health care costs using up to date health insurance trend data collected by the state’s Group Insurance Commission (GIC), and includes for the first time an amount for retiree health insurance costs.

• Increases special education enrollment and cost assumptions to more accurately reflect district enrollment and costs

• Increases funding for English learners (EL) that is differentiated by grade level to reflect the greater resources required to educate our older EL students.

• Addresses the needs of districts educating high concentrations of low-income students by:

• Providing additional funding based on the share of low-income students in each district; districts educating the largest percentage of low-income students will receive an additional increment equal to 100% of the base foundation;

• Returning the definition of low-income to 185% of the Federal Poverty Level, as opposed to the 133% level that has been used in recent years.

• Improves data collection and reporting, specifically around use of funding, by:

• Establishing a Data Advisory Commission to help improve the use of data at the state, district, and school levels to inform strategies that strengthen teaching, learning and resource allocation to ensure greater financial transparency, including tracking funding for low-income students and English learners.

•       Provides additional state financial support to help public schools and communities deliver a high-quality education to students:

• Increases foundation rates for guidance and psychological services that will support expanded social–emotional supports and mental health services.

“It is really exciting to think about the new opportunities this additional funding will bring to the children of Revere,” said Revere School Superintendent Dianne Kelly. “We are very thankful for the difficult but necessary work our elected official put into updating the antiquated Foundation Budget. Basic things we have been missing like manageable class sizes, a full complement of extra-curricular activities that augment students’ interests, adequate staffing for interventions in and extensions of required coursework, adequate staffing to support social and emotional wellness, and adequate staffing to support family and community engagement will be priorities for us.”

Kelly said she looks forward to working with the Revere School Committee, school leadership teams, the Revere Educators Leadership Board, and the Parent Organizations to determine highest-leverage strategies for meeting student needs. 

“Final approval of this bill will certainly signal the start of an exciting new phase for public education in the state of Massachusetts,” she added.