This story was originally published by Chalkbeat.
DENVER | After months of waiting, lawmakers began the process on Monday of moving the state’s school funding bill forward. They must pass it before the end of session on May 13.
Senate Bill 23, known as the School Finance Act, preserves the core of statewide education funding and increases state spending as constitutionally mandated. This means districts and the state would spend $10.2 billion on K-12 education, or an estimated $12,314 per student — an increase of $438 per student over this year.
Lawmakers proposed a $46.8 billion budget in the 2026-27 fiscal year after cutting about $1.2 billion to balance the budget, primarily because of increasing costs in programs such as Medicaid. But next year’s budget shortfall could be as high as $1.5 billion.
Lawmakers filed the School Finance Act in the first week of legislative session in January and well ahead of previous years. But the bill shared only a few details about lawmakers’ plans to fund schools. The full particulars didn’t become clear until a legislative analysis released last week and after budget proceedings were underway in the House and Senate.
State Sen. Chris Kolker, a Centennial Democrat and chair of the Senate Education Committee, said he and fellow lawmakers wanted to file the bill earlier than usual to encourage conversations about it.
And advocacy organizations and school district officials shared during the committee meeting they had plenty of time to talk with lawmakers about the legislation and their funding.
Jana Schleusner, Douglas County School District’s chief financial officer, said giving feedback on the finance act felt more collaborative than past years.
“School finance is a conversation that happens to districts, rather than with them,” she said. “This year has been different.”
The bill passed unanimously in the Senate Education Committee on Monday and will be heard next in the Senate Appropriations Committee. The bill will need to pass the Senate before getting heard in the House. It will then need the governor’s signature.
The bill follows changes renegotiated last year by House Speaker Julie McCluskie, a Dillon Democrat, to phase in the state’s new school finance formula. The new formula will cost a total of $500 million more a year to implement. Next year, the state will invest 30% of that total, or $150 million, toward fully funding the formula.
Colorado funds education on a per student basis, and the new formula would use a three-year average of the enrollment count next year to determine how much money it puts toward education. That’s a change from a four-year enrollment count in this year’s 2025-26 budget.
The state projects funding about 827,500 students next year, or a decrease of about 14,000 students.
Lawmakers added that they will amend the bill with a new “smoothing factor” to create parameters that ensure districts with declining enrollment don’t see big funding declines and those with enrollment growth can use their most recent enrollment count.
This is an expected change that the Colorado Association of School Executives was tasked with studying since last year’s updates to the 2024 school finance formula.
Colorado schools receive funding from the state and from local taxes.
The state’s share of funding education would increase $214 million next year to $5.6 billion, or a 4% increase over this year. How much counties and local governments would pay would decrease by about half a percent to $4.6 billion
State Sen. Barbara Kirkmeyer, a Weld County Republican and sponsor of the bill, said the state shifted money from the Kids Matter Fund, which lawmakers created last year as a reserve to fend off budget shortfalls.
“That was good news,” said Kirkmeyer, who sits on the powerful Joint Budget Committee. “So again, no cuts to K-12 funding. It’s fully funded as required under the law.”
As planned, the state would fully eliminate next year ASCENT, or Accelerating Students through Concurrent Enrollment, a program that high school students could use to stay enrolled in high school while attending college. Lawmakers decided to end the program after studies showed high costs to the state and minimal data about how it helps students.
The state’s 2026-27 budget also phases out the Teacher Recruitment Education and Preparation, or TREP, program, which wouldn’t enroll any more students in the fall. The program operates similarly to ASCENT, with the state paying for up to 250 students statewide to stay enrolled in their high school for two years after graduating while they go to college for teaching.
Jason Gonzales is a reporter covering higher education and the Colorado legislature. Chalkbeat Colorado partners with Open Campus on higher education coverage. Contact Jason at jgonzales@chalkbeat.org.