Albany, NY - The new state budget delivers great news for New York’s school districts, putting our public schools in a vastly better position than we would have dared to hope for last summer or fall.
It provides a $1.4 billion increase in Foundation Aid, full-funding of expense-based aids, no new cuts, and an expansion of full-day prekindergarten throughout the state.
The budget also assures that federal stimulus funding for education will supplement and not supplant state resources, enabling districts to apply that funding to safely reopening schools, maximizing in-person instruction, and helping students overcome the effects of the pandemic’s disruptions upon their learning and personal well-being.
The plan to fully phase-in the Foundation Aid formula over three years will at last fulfill a promise to the state’s schoolchildren, especially in our neediest communities.
We thank the Senate, Assembly, and Governor for their work. We also need to express our gratitude to Senator Schumer, Senator Gillibrand, our delegation in the House of Representatives, and President Biden for their efforts in Washington.
Our elected leaders in Washington and Albany came together and now have given our public schools a bright light of promise at the end of the pandemic’s very dark tunnel.