Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, July 26, 1990 TAG: 9007260313
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-6 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: By Associated Press
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Medium
Members of the Governor's Commission on Educational Opportunity also said that the effort to alleviate disparity between the state's wealthiest and poorest school districts probably will cost taxpayers money.
"My own personal feeling is more state and local dollars will be required," said Waynesboro Mayor Thomas Gorsuch, a commission member.
The commission took committee reports before hearing a presentation from school officials in Kentucky, which raised taxes and overhauled its school system after it was declared unconstitutional by the state's Supreme Court.
Other states, including Texas and New Jersey, have had school funding formulas declared unconstitutional.
Seeking to avoid a lawsuit in Virginia, Gov. Douglas Wilder named the commission to study how to ease differences between poor, rural school districts and wealthy, suburban ones. The commission's report is due in February.
Gorsuch, chairman of the commission's fiscal equity committee, said the state needs to update its standards of quality, which are minimum requirements that all 136 school divisions must meet.
Many school divisions are using local tax money to provide more programs than the minimum state requirements, he said.
"Even the less wealthy divisions spend more than the [standards]," Gorsuch said. "In almost every division across the state, large expenditures are being borne by localities."
In 1988-89, school divisions had nearly 8,000 more teachers than the minimum state requirements, he said.
"The existing needs and programs must be recognized," Gorsuch said.
Even though the state has increased its share of school funding, local governments still have to pay more for education because the state has cut its share of fringe benefit costs, Gorsuch said.
Gorsuch said the only recommendation made by the committee so far is to oppose any cap on local spending for education.
Elaine P. Witty, a Norfolk State University professor who heads the committee studying pupil needs, said few state programs are provided for 4-year-olds, particularly those at risk of failing in school.
Head Start, the federally funded preschool program, has been expanded, but still meets only a fraction of the need for early childhood education, experts say.
In 1988, about 21 percent of Virginia 4-year-olds were considered at risk of failing in school. Sixty-one percent of school divisions did not provide any preschool programs except for mildly handicapped children, she said.
State funding for local preschool programs would be a particular boon for Roanoke, where 47 percent of students come from low-income homes and are considered disadvantaged.
Roanoke is only district in the Roanoke Valley that provides preschool programs for non-handicapped low-income youngsters.
Roanoke school officials say they are expanding the district's preschool program to 11 schools, but still can't meet the need, and that state funding for such programs is long overdue.
In addition to preschool programs, Witty said her committee also will look at family involvement in the schools, dropout prevention, student tracking, student health and the need for English as a second language program.
Judith Ball, York County school superintendent and chairwoman of the program equity committee, said her panel will study how to make early childhood programs effective and whether to reduce class sizes for kindergarten through third-grade pupils and for at-risk students.
She said her committee also will study whether state minimum requirements for schools are adequate.
Staff writer Patricia Lopez Baden contributed to this report.
by CNB