Every year it’s the same.

As school districts prepare to pass budgets for the next school year, they brace for news from Salem. Will there be enough money in the State School Fund to maintain staffing levels and academic offerings? Will new laws bring new mandates — and new costs? Will school boards have to balance budgets without final funding numbers from the state?

At the same time, superintendents, teachers, and students flock to the Capitol to lobby legislators to support education. Districts big and small face budget deficits this year — and they’ve been sharing that news with school communities.

It’s a stark reality — Oregon’s educational outcomes show students need support, but with revenue falling short of rising costs, schools are forced to make cuts year after year.

With a short school year, attendance challenges, low test scores, and stalled graduation rates, education leaders see inadequate funding as one reason Oregon lags behind other states.

In Salem-Keizer, one of Oregon’s largest school districts, leaders are preparing for $23 million in cuts.

Like many districts, declining enrollment is driving its money troubles.

In Oregon, school funding is based on student enrollment, with some students receiving more funds based on additional needs.

“No one can afford to ignore this problem,” said Andrea Castañeda, Salem-Keizer’s superintendent. “Everybody needs to figure out their incremental solutions.”

In the far smaller Coquille School District on the south coast, superintendent Wayne Gallagher is making $1.8 million in cuts.

“We must remain realistic about our financial position,” Gallagher shared in a statement to families.

Portland Public Schools, Oregon’s largest district, has perhaps the largest deficit: $50 million.

“Our students are facing extraordinary and compounding barriers: fear and disruption caused by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) activity in our communities, significant financial strain driven by declining enrollment, rising costs, inadequate funding and uncertain funding levels from the federal government,” district officials shared in a document outlining 2026 legislative priorities.

For many districts, including Portland and Salem-Keizer, this year’s budget gaps are on top of cuts it has already had to make over the last few years.

This year, education stakeholders are taking a few different approaches to shore up school funding during Oregon’s short legislative session, with varying degrees of success.

Strategies to boost school funding

First, there are options aimed at making an immediate impact.

One option? Tapping into the state’s $1 billion Education Stability Fund, which receives a portion of lottery funds every quarter.

The state last used $400 million from the fund in the 2019-21 biennium to balance the budget.

Another option would be to amend the Oregon Constitution to reallocate some of the funds from Oregon’s “kicker” tax, which sends money back to taxpayers when revenue comes in higher than forecast by state economists.

Under the legislation, if the “kicker” exceeded a certain amount of money, portions would be sent to public education, community colleges, and wildfire prevention.

Senate Joint Resolution 201 remains in committee with a subsequent referral to the Senate Rules Committee.

Another bill would separate Oregon’s tax code from federal policies included in H.R. 1, also known as the “One Big Beautiful Bill.”

It passed the state Senate and remains in a House committee.

School district leaders and communities have expressed support for the bill.

“Oregon should not allow federal policy choices to undermine its commitment to public education,” PPS superintendent Kimberlee Armstrong said in a joint statement with the entire Portland school board.

“We have the opportunity for tangible revenue reform that our state needs, given how federal tax cuts are affecting our schools, healthcare and so much more,” shared the Community & Parents for Public Schools of Portland, a group for parent, student, and community advocacy in education.

What’s adequate funding?

One other approach the state is considering is wrestling with a more fundamental question: how much money is enough to cover the growing costs of public education across the state?

A little over 25 years ago, Oregon created the Quality Education Commission, a group dedicated to telling the state every two years how much money is necessary to reach Oregon’s education goals.

The framework the group uses is known as the Quality Education Model, or QEM. The commissioners acknowledge the QEM is outdated, as do legislators and associations representing school leaders and teachers.

Senate Bill 1555 would have reopened the conversation around the QEM, moving responsibility away from the Quality Education Commission, making the intervals between QEM reports longer, and connecting the goals of a “quality education” in Oregon to the statewide targets soon to be set by Oregon’s new education accountability system.

Some of the same education stakeholders who supported a change spoke out against the bill.

“I want to be clear that our position is less ‘no’ and more ‘not yet’,” shared Stacy Michaelson, who directs government relations and communications for the Oregon School Boards Association.

“The bill proposes sweeping structural changes to Oregon’s longstanding approach to education cost modeling that warrant far more discussion and stakeholder engagement than this process has allowed,” shared representatives for Oregon’s education service districts.

Coalition of Oregon School Administrators Deputy Executive Director of Policy and Advocacy, Morgan Allen, asked legislators to put together a workgroup that could come up with legislation in 2027.

The bill died in committee.

Foundations for a Better Oregon, a statewide education advocacy nonprofit, said the bill’s fate “reflects a longstanding pattern of infighting and inaction that stalls progress for students.”

“State leaders had the right idea but wrote the bill behind closed doors, never building important buy-in with school districts, educators, or community groups,” shared FBO in a statement. “And while K-12 leaders opposing the bill were right to criticize a rushed process, they let perfect be enemy of the good, choosing to resist change and ultimately preserve a broken status quo.”

Oregon schools are not the only ones waiting for money-related answers from the state.

In Washington, state superintendent Chris Reykdal said the legislature there needs to minimize cuts to educational programming like the state’s kindergarten transition program.

“I am asking lawmakers to finally prioritize basic education and education services that are not part of the state’s constitutional obligations but provide essential services, and to do no harm to community partners and local governments that offer the vital services that some families rely on to support their children and our state’s learners,” Reykdal shared in a statement on Wednesday.

Next year, both state legislatures will meet again. And without any major changes, school and state leaders will likely be back at the beginning of the budget cycle.

News Source : https://www.opb.org/article/2026/02/23/education-funding-dance-continues-as-end-of-oregon-short-session-nears/