MREA applauds Governor Dayton for addressing the educational achievement and opportunity gap of Minnesota’s American Indian Students (AMI) by proposing an expansion of Success for the Future. This expansion is called for in the 2015 MREA Platform. Minnesota’s AMI students have the lowest graduation rate and the slowest growth in that graduation rate of all ethnic/racial groups. Minnesota is dead … Read More
Bills Introduced to Change School Building Debt Service Tax Bases
by Sam Walseth, Director of Legislative Action A group of legislators and farm organizations held a news conference on Thursday to introduce the HF 596 and SF 576 bills, which would change the local government tax base for all future school building debt service levies from Adjusted Net Tax Capacity (ANTC) to Referendum Market Value (RMV). This is being commonly referred … Read More
Group Recommends Merging TDE and Q Comp
Recommendations from a state work group last week call the Minnesota to combine the Teacher Development and Evaluation (TDE) and Q Comp statutes. The Minnesota Department of Education work group on “Teacher Development and Evaluation/Alternative Teacher Professional Pay System Alignment” presented their recommendations to the House Education Finance Committee. Merging the 2011 evaluation law with Q Comp would create a single … Read More
Preparing Students for ACT
In less than 12 weeks, Minnesota students will be taking the ACT. How will your school prepare them? MREA has partnered with John Baylor to provide schools with resources to equip students. Learn more about the program and discounted pricing. John Baylor has a six-week test prep program option for schools and is offering webinars on the program features. If you’re interested … Read More
MREA Budget Webinar Recording Now Available
MREA hosted a virtual meeting today to review Governor Dayton’s budget proposal released last week. MREA Director of Legislative Action Sam Walseth discussed the budget’s impact on education in Greater Minnesota as well as legislative reaction to the proposal. In case you missed today’s meeting, here are two opportunities to catch up: Hear the discussion with Sam’s commentary and the slides. View the slide presentation only. … Read More
MREA Report Shows Impact of Property Trends on Schools
Minnesota has seen significant changes in values of its agricultural production land and seasonal recreation properties. Those changes affect the Net Tax Capacity (NTC) of school districts. This report outlines the impact and results of removing agricultural production land from school building debt levies. View the print-friendly version of the report. What’s Happening Rising Ag Land Prices: The average price per acre … Read More
Four Key Areas to Address for Education Funding and Policy
The release of Governor Mark Dayton’s budget plan calls for $373 million for E-12 education. While that represents 56 percent of the projected ongoing surplus revenue, it is closer to 15 percent of all new state revenue when considering state revenues are projected to grow 6.4 percent or $2.5 billion over the next biennium. Learn more about the Governor’s Budget Plan. … Read More
Governor's Plan Budget Battle Lines Being Drawn
By Sam Walseth, MREA Director of Legislative Affairs Governor Mark Dayton’s release of his 2016-17 budget plan last Tuesday has set the stage for the budget battle that will consume the remainder of the 2015 session. The public’s role — our role — in this process is going to fade sooner than we know it. Now is the time to engage … Read More
Making Sense of Early Learning Spending
Three competing early learning proposals are emerging for this session. In the Senate… The Senate’s universal four-year-old preschool bill (SF 6, Sen. John Hoffman, DFL Anoka) would cost almost $500 million in the next biennium and almost $600 million the two years after that. This kind of middle class entitlement is simply unaffordable and defies all of the research that shows that … Read More
What Proposed Phy Ed Legislation Means for Schools
A bill on increasing physical education requirements, introduced by Sen. Susan Kent, DFL Woodbury, caught some media attention last week. MREA raised a series of concerns about SF 343 in its testimony to Senate E-12 Committee last Thursday. Nobody doubts the importance of physical education — and promoting healthy lifestyles with students. MREA questions the wisdom of the mandates contained … Read More