LINCOLN — After an emotional, four-hour debate that extended into Tuesday night, Nebraska lawmakers gave initial approval to a to attend private schools.

The vote was 31-12 to advance Legislative Bill 1402 from first-round debate, which came after the bare minimum, 33 senators, voted to halt a filibuster against the bill.

Two senators, Myron Dorn of Adams and Teresa Ibach of Sumner, voted for cloture but were “present and not voting” on advancing the actual bill.

While opponents of the bill called it unconstitutional and a way to block a public vote on school choice, advocates said students who struggle in public schools, especially those in low-income families, deserve the option of a private or parochial school through what amounts to a school voucher.

“Every child should have access to a high-quality education, not by chance, not by privilege, but by right,” said State Sen. Justin Wayne of Omaha, a former member of the Omaha Public Schools Board.

The main sponsor of LB 1402, Elkhorn Sen. Lou Ann Linehan, said students from low-income families, who get priority for the Opportunity Scholarships, don’t have the same choice of switching to a private or parochial school as do children in a more affluent family.

“Why is it that we in the Legislature don’t feel that kids should have a choice?” Linehan said, pointing out that the $10 million cost of the bill is a tiny fraction of what’s spent on public schools.

‘Blatantly’ unconstitutional

LB 1402 comes up for second-round debate on Wednesday. If it passes, it is expected to be challenged, either by a referendum to put it on the fall ballot or by a legal challenge that it violates on the “appropriation” of public funds to non-public schools.

Lincoln Sen. George Dungan said LB 1402 is more constitutionally suspect than the Opportunity Scholarship Act passed by the Legislature a year ago.

Last year’s law allowed taxpayers to earmark up to half of their state income tax liability to “scholarship granting organizations” that then handed out grants to children to attend private or parochial schools, thus likely not a direct appropriation.

“This is blatantly a (state) appropriation,” Dungan, an attorney, said of the new bill.

Linehan disputed that, citing a 1984 ruling by the Nebraska Supreme Court that upheld a state program that granted scholarships to students who could then choose to attend a public or private college.

‘Straw man’ argument

“The straw man argument that this is unconstitutional doesn’t hold water,” said Dunbar Sen. Julie Slama, who is also a lawyer.

But Dungan, as well as Omaha Sen. Wendy DeBoer, disagreed, saying the money doled out by LB 1402 — unlike the scholarship funds of 1984 — can only be used for private education.

Passage of LB 1402 would nullify a referendum petition drive led by the state teachers’ union that gathered more than 117,000 signatures to place last year’s bill on this year’s November ballot. Just how passage of this year’s bill would play out — whether it would lead to the removal of the referendum from the ballot, for instance — has not yet been determined.

The head of the Nebraska State Education Association called Tuesday’s vote “a slap in the face” to those who signed the petition so that voters would have the final say on school choice.

“It is deeply troubling that Sen. Lou Ann Linehan and her out-of-state billionaires continue to try to deny Nebraskans’ right to vote on this issue,” said Jenni Benson, president of the NSEA and a leader in Support Our Schools, which organized the referendum.

The petition drive was hotly contested, with competing claims of improper tactics to collect signatures and block people from signing. to collect signatures and employ “blockers” to discourage signers.

A group financially backed by charter school proponent Betsy DeVos, a former official in the Trump administration and member of a billionaire family, was a major funder of the school choice forces.

A year ago, the State Legislature’s passage of the Opportunity Scholarship Act ended Nebraska’s status as one of only two states that didn’t offer some type of school choice. North Dakota is the other state.

1,000 scholarships expected

Under that law, more than 1,000 students are expected to receive Opportunity Scholarships averaging $5,000 each to attend a private or parochial school.

This year, however, Linehan introduced a new version, LB 1402, in large part to avoid an expensive campaign battle over the referendum placed on the November ballot to nullify last year’s law.

The new bill also eliminated the income tax break on donations to scholarship granting organizations, which Linehan said was wrongly portrayed as helping the wealthy.

Under the new bill, the state treasurer would set up a program to provide scholarships to eligible students to attend “qualified” schools. That would eliminate the middle man, the scholarship granting organizations, and aim the money directly to students.

Cost dropped to $10 million a year

On Tuesday, the senator offered more amendments intended to expand support for LB 1402. The fiscal impact of the bill was reduced to $10 million a year, instead of $25 million, and an “escalator” clause was dropped that would have allowed spending on private schooling to rise to $100 million a year.

One supporter of LB 1402, Omaha Sen. Christy Armendariz, argued that with math and reading scores suffering in public schools in her district, something needs to be done.

“We’re tripping over ourselves about what school building they’re in? We should be doing everything we can,” Armendariz said.

But opponents of LB 1402 said there were no guarantees students would do better in private schools or avoid bullying there.

Omaha Sen. Megan Hunt said private and parochial schools can discriminate, unlike public schools, by denying entrance or expelling LGBTQ students.

Bellevue Sen. Carol Blood argued that Nebraskans are asking to decide the issue of school choice at the voting booth, just as they decided the issues of capital punishment and Medicaid expansion.

“Then it’s resolved once and for all,” Blood said.

But Wayne said he considers LB 1402 a “pilot project,” that can be rescinded by future legislatures if it doesn’t work out.

Linehan agreed, adding that in other states, the battle over school choice is a “continual fight.”

“It’s not a one and done deal,” she said.

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The bipartisan sponsors of a new bill to target chronic absenteeism want to model a piece of advice from novelist Jean Shepherd: “In God we trust, all others pay cash.”

In a proposed two-year pilot program, Republican state Rep. Bill Seitz and Democratic Rep. Dani Isaacsohn, both of Cincinnati, said cash transfers would be sent to kindergarteners and ninth graders to jumpstart school attendance which has long suffered in the state, but that was exacerbated by a global pandemic.

“This is the number one issue we are facing in education,” Isaacsohn told the House Primary & Secondary Education Committee this week. “It is an absolute emergency and we need to act like it.”

According to the , prior to the pandemic, kindergarteners considered chronically absent – missing 10% or more of a school year for any reason – registered at 11%. In the last school year, the rate ballooned to 29%.

Those chronically absent from their freshman year of high school represented 15% of students before the COVID-19 pandemic set in, but has now risen to more than 31%.

“That is not just Ohio. There has been a cultural shift all over the country away from regular, 90-plus percent school attendance,” Isaacsohn said.

One part of the new pilot program, if approved, would provide a total of $1.5 million over two years to give qualified school districts enough for up to two schools to distribute transfers to students or their parents/guardians. Seitz told the committee it will be up to the district to decide how the distribution of funds works, whether it be a biweekly transfer of $25 for each student, quarterly transfers of $150, or annual payment of $500.

A second part of the program would create a base award of $250 for graduating students from qualifying high schools, with an additional $250 to $750 for students with GPAs of 3.0 or above.

School districts would qualify if they receive federal Title 1 funding and rank in the lowest 20% of traditional public schools in graduation rate, as the bill is currently written. Any district hoping to be included in the pilot program would still have to apply.

Rural school districts and urban school districts must be included, Seitz said, and both types “must exhibit chronic absenteeism in the highest quartile based on the most recent state report card ratings.”

“So, we’re going to pick sort of the worst of the worst on attendance and see if we can move the needle,” Seitz told the committee.

With Ohio’s keeping students in school and helping them graduate, Seitz said the program comes after several other local-level efforts to bring students in.

“We’ve tried pizza day and we’ve tried playground hours, and we’ve tried all kind of foo-foo stuff,” Seitz said. “Doesn’t seem to work.”

The sponsors received criticism from some Republican members of the committee who worried paying students for something they should be required to do might send the wrong message.

“I don’t see this as rewarding good behavior, I see this as rewarding bad behavior and encouraging the entitlement mentality that a lot of our young people are receiving,” said state Rep. Beth Lear, R-Galena.

State Rep. Josh Williams, R-Sylvania, questioned paying students “to follow the law,” even as truancy laws and parental consequences exist in the state, and even pondered the long-term effects of the concept of financial incentives to abide by the law.

“Are we going to get to the point where we’re paying rapists not to rape,” Williams asked the co-sponsors. “Are we really going to start that trend where we’re going to go in and invest to prevent people from committing crimes?”

Seitz said the “deterrent effect” of laws against crimes like rape have the desired effect, but that isn’t the case for those fighting against chronic absenteeism.

“The deterrent effect of a truant officer is about zero, because most districts don’t even have them, or if they do, they can’t even begin to do the job,” Seitz said.

State Rep. Sean Brennan, D-Parma, a former teacher, agreed that creating an incentive to allow teachers to have their impact on students in the classrooms only serves to help where truancy enforcement – or lack thereof – doesn’t.

“The truancy laws and attendance laws we have in Ohio quite frankly just don’t have a whole lot of teeth,” Brennan said.

The state could benefit as well if the program works, since students who are chronically absentee and those who fail to graduate not only hurt their financial potential, but also the state’s, sponsors said.

“They have lower lifetime earnings, therefore they’re paying lower taxes, they have higher rates of incarceration and interactions with the criminal justice system, higher utilization of public benefits,” Isaacsohn said. “So this is a situation of let’s pay now, so we don’t have to pay later.”

If the pilot program’s data shows success in improving absenteeism and graduation rates in the state, Seitz also said money for future programs could naturally work itself out with less of a need to fund the state’s dropout recovery schools.

The bill will have public hearings for both opposition and proponent comments in the House Primary & Secondary Committee before it goes up for a vote.

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In Tennessee, that would mean a loss of roughly $1.8 billion — close to 20% of the state’s over $9 billion surplus.

“We’re really the first state that can say no and financially not even miss a beat,” said Rep. Scott Cepicky, who chairs the state’s House Education Instruction Committee and worked with Speaker on a bill to create on the issue. Sexton first raised the idea at a speech in February. 

Lawmakers, Cepicky said, are motivated by a combination of “overburdensome” federal regulations and concerns that the Biden administration is advancing a liberal agenda on issues ranging from gender identity to the teaching of American history. 

“It was pushing the whole [critical race theory] down our throats and the sexual indoctrination of our kids,” he said. “Tennessee is just not going to put up with that because we don’t have to.”

Gov. Bill Lee has said he would consider the idea. 

In Oklahoma, meanwhile, state Sen. David Bullard recently made similar remarks, introducing a bill that would — almost $800 million — over 10 years. The legislation has yet to move out of committee, but conservatives, who continue to call for abolishing the education department, say the idea is one that could spread to other red states. Education advocates say that would especially hurt vulnerable youth who are the primary beneficiaries of federal funding: low-income students and those with disabilities.

Gini Pupo-Walker, executive director of Education Trust-Tennessee, which focuses on reducing education inequities, called the idea “bonkers.” 

“It would require so much work to unravel all the ways we’re connected to federal funds,” she said.

While states have threatened to reject education funds in the past, none has ever followed through, and some are skeptical it will happen now.

“Culture wars are one thing. Giving up real money is something else entirely,” said Michael Petrilli, president of the right-leaning Thomas B. Fordham Institute. “It would be political suicide to turn down hundreds of milions or billions of dollars for local schools.”

Besides, the rules dictating how states use those dollars are far less stringent than they once were, said Petrilli, who served in the George W. Bush administration during the No Child Left Behind era. That’s especially true of pandemic relief funds — the largest infusion of one-time federal aid states have ever seen. 

Former Education Secretary Margaret Spellings, who led the Education Department during this period, was especially blunt about recent developments. 

“It is pretty much the frickin’ wild west out here now,” said Spellings, who leads Texas 2036, a nonprofit focused on the state’s future. “Anyone can do anything. It’s the era of local control.” 

‘Federal intrusion’

School districts receive less than 10% of their funding from the federal government, but in large, urban districts with a lot of poor students, the amount of Title I money is significant. Davidson County in Tennessee, which includes the Metro Nashville Public Schools, receives over $50 million in Title I funds for its low-income students. Tulsa Public Schools in Oklahoma receives $22.5 million.

In a strongly worded statement, the U.S. Department of Education suggested states contemplating such legislation should consider its effect on students.

“Any elected leader in any state threatening to reject federal public education funds should have to answer to their local educators and parents in their community about the detrimental impact it would have on their community’s education system,” the statement said. “Our students need more — not less — to support their academic recovery and address the youth mental health crisis.”

For some, the current debate stirs a sense of deja vu. Almost 20 years ago, NCLB’s passage — which set up strict new testing and accountability requirements — led to a standoff between the , and offered a vivid example of the difficulty in cutting federal ties. 

State lawmakers objected to NCLB’s requirement to use end-of-year test scores to determine which schools didn’t make sufficient academic progress, subjecting them to consequences ranging from school choice options for families to state intervention. 

Utah leaders instead wanted to test students twice — in the fall and spring — and base accountability measures on growth over time in reading and math. Former Rep. Steve Mascaro the department could “take the stinking money and go back to Washington.”

“NCLB was, in my mind, and in the minds of many Utah legislators, the biggest federal intrusion in public education ever,” former Superintendent Patti Harrington told ����Ӱ��. “Educators were in a well-deserved uproar about the law.”

Ultimately, the department allowed Utah’s proposal, and the state never stopped receiving federal funds.

“We got to a place where the plan was negotiated to the satisfaction on both sides,” Spellings said.

She suggested that Education Secretary Miguel Cardona reach out to lawmakers in Tennessee and Oklahoma to ask what they’re “aggrieved about.”

In Tennessee, Cepicky said the prohibiting discrimination on the basis of gender identity and sexual orientation is part of it. The U.S. Department of Agriculture issued a saying the order extends to school meal programs.

But the state considered the interpretation an example of government overreach and sued the administration last summer in federal court, along with 20 other states. 

Tennessee risks losing federal funds anyway if it that would restrict defining sex in state law to one’s gender assigned at birth. The Senate has already approved the bill, which would bar transgender students from changing their . According to the legislature’s , the proposed definition would affect roughly $1.3 billion in federal education funding because it would conflict with President Joe Biden’s prohibiting discrimination based on gender equity and sexual orientation in federal programs. 

Two other states, Montana and Oklahoma, passed . The Education Department did not comment on the Tennessee proposal. 

While Tennessee currently has enough money to cover a potential loss in federal funds, some education advocates said that will change when the state’s surplus dries up. 

“My concern is to make sure that everything is fully funded and we don’t get put on the chopping block,” said J.C. Bowman, executive director and CEO of the non-union Professional Educators of Tennessee.

Cepicky said the state plans to first ask the department to offer the funds in the form of a block grant, with the promise that any savings realized by delivering education “the Tennessee way” would be returned to the federal government. That’s already the way the state handles its Medicaid program, . 

In the likely event the department refuses, the next step would be a letter outlining the state’s plan to transition off federal funds in three years — an action that he said would create a “domino effect.” 

“If Tennessee gets out, what kind of pressure does that put on Florida and DeSantis? What kind of pressure on Abbott in Texas?” he said. “They are scared to death in Washington.”

Bullard in Oklahoma didn’t return calls seeking comment. While his bill hasn’t moved, the idea has support from at least one member of the state’s Congressional delegation.

Quoting Thomas Jefferson, Oklahoma Rep. Josh Brecheen addressed the issue last week during the House debate on the Republican Parents Bill of Rights. 

“We need to follow the advice of our founding fathers,” he said “Put this back in the hands of our state, and they can determine what is happening in the classroom.” 

“​​In the midst of the pandemic — even without a learning disability —  you can’t get a 6-year-old to sit in front of a laptop,” said Tamara Miles, Faith’s mother. “Her attention span is not that long.”

Now in third grade, Faith is among the nearly 3,900 students in the Metro Nashville Public Schools — and thousands more throughout Tennessee — who risk failing the state reading test this spring.  That means they could be impacted by a — taking effect this year — that requires proficiency to move onto the fourth grade.

Pressure has been building on state lawmakers to amend the law as testing season approaches next month. Parents, advocates and educators say it’s unfair to base the decision on one assessment, especially for students who were in kindergarten when the pandemic hit. But state officials and Republican legislators argue it’s wrong to promote students who aren’t ready.

“We’re living with this COVID two years for the next 12 years of our life, trying to get these kids caught up,” Rep. Scott Cepicky, chairman of the House Education Instruction Committee, said last week during a hearing on the issue. “We cannot keep doing this and condemning these kids to a life of possibly poverty, incarceration, drug abuse, alcoholism, teen pregnancy, gang violence.”

Legislators are currently considering Cepicky’s amendment to tweak the law to allow students who score in the “approaching expectations” range to advance to fourth grade if they score in the 50th percentile on a literacy “screener” test. The law already offers opportunities to retake the state test as well as summer school, tutoring and ultimately, an appeals process. But some district leaders are still opposed. 

“Some of our parents will not take advantage of the resources that you’ve set in place,” Clint Satterfield, director of the Trousdale County Schools, told lawmakers during another hearing last month. “They will choose to take retention and that is sad. That’s an unintended consequence.”

Cepicky’s amendment would also require students who are retained in K-3 to receive tutoring. That the law didn’t already include such a provision, he said, was one of its “shortcomings.” The Senate Education Committee passed similar legislation, but it would require students to receive tutoring in fourth grade if they pass the screener test.

J.C. Bowman, executive director and CEO of Professional Educators of Tennessee, called the proposed amendment a “positive step” because it bases retention on more than a single test score. But with such a short timeline, he said districts need to ensure parents understand all the options.

Seeking ‘adequate growth’

State lawmakers approved the 2021 legislation — officially called the Tennessee Learning Loss Remediation and Student Acceleration Act — alongside a complementary law that overhauls how the state teaches students to read. Districts must now use a phonics-based curriculum, and the state has spent the last two summers training teachers in the so-called “science of reading.” 

But Sonya Thomas, executive director of Nashville Propel, a parent advocacy group, questioned why schools didn’t have children repeat kindergarten instead of waiting until third grade.

“At that point, school districts knew who was behind,” she said, “What have they been doing since then?”

As the law currently stands, students who score in the “approaching” range — and don’t reach proficiency when they retake the test — can attend summer school or participate in tutoring in fourth grade. In summer school, they must have 90% attendance and make progress in reading.

Those who score “below expectations” have to participate in both tutoring and summer school. But some question whether six weeks of summer learning camp will be enough to prepare students for the demands of fourth grade.

“It’s not just like we’re going to eat popsicles and play outside,” said Jean Hesson, elementary supervisor for the Sumner County Schools. But she said it’s also unrealistic to expect a student who is two years behind to reach grade level just because of summer school. “We would love to see adequate growth.”

Director Satterfield said even if families take advantage of all the opportunities for extra help, their children might still be too far behind.

“Are we really going to fail those students?” he asked the committee.

Retention research

Lawmakers in other states have been asking similar questions. Retention opponents in Ohio, including the Ohio Education Association, unsuccessfully pushed for of that state’s law last fall. In Michigan, however,  both the House and Senate have passed that ends third grade retention Gov. Gretchen Whitmer is expected to sign. 

When the Michigan law went into effect last school year, only 1% of students eligible for retention were ultimately held back, from Katharine Strunk, a Michigan State University professor tracking the law’s implementation. She argues that the costs of making students repeat a grade outweigh the benefits and that retention predominantly affects low-income and minority students. 

But former Mississippi state chief Carey Wright and former literacy director Kymyona Burk told Tennessee lawmakers that retention was one important trigger that led to what some have called a In 2019, Mississippi was the only state to show gains in fourth grade reading on the National Assessment of Educational Progress. 

They highlighted a recent Boston University showing students who repeated third grade in 2014-15 had higher English language arts scores in sixth grade. ExcelinEd, an advocacy organization where Burk is now senior policy fellow for early literacy, commissioned the report. 

“Retention will have a far greater positive impact than moving along a student who just isn’t ready,” they wrote in a recent op-ed for ����Ӱ�� about the research.

Another found that Indiana fourth graders who repeated third grade scored higher on state math and reading tests than third graders who barely passed. Retained students continued to outperform those who weren’t retained through seventh grade and were not more likely to have problems with absenteeism or behavior.

Some experts acknowledge that retention can lead to short-term gains, but warn it has  serious consequences later. 

In a chapter for a on education policy and literacy, Gabriel DellaVecchia, a researcher at the University of Michigan, reviewed evidence from linking retention in Texas to higher high school dropout rates — especially among Black and Hispanic girls.  

“If their grades go up in sixth grade, but they hate school so much that they drop out the moment they turn 16, it is difficult to label the policy as a success,” he told ����Ӱ��.

He added that when states like Tennessee provide tutoring and summer school,  in addition to improving reading instruction, it’s hard to isolate the benefits of retention itself. 

“Those same supports could just as easily be provided to a fourth grader,” he said, “without removing the child from their peer group or stamping them with the stigma of being retained.”

Even those with students not yet in third grade have been following the debate.

“It’s like the biggest talk in the city,” said Teaira King of Nashville, whose daughter, 6-year-old Journi Wilson, attends Purpose Preparatory Academy, a charter school. 

Based on her own experience, King agreed that schools shouldn’t promote students if they can’t read. But she’s  not in favor of retaining students if all they get is a repeat of previous instruction. 

She didn’t realize she was a struggling reader until she got to college. She eventually dropped out.

“I don’t want my kids to feel the way I felt when I graduated and I couldn’t read,” she said. “I wasn’t ready for the world.”

If Speaker Kevin McCarthy agrees to their demands, that would wipe out most of the administration’s budget request for education, including a $2.2 billion increase for schools serving poor students and almost half a billion dollars to address student mental health needs.

With the slogan, “shrink Washington and grow America,” leaders of the said Friday they want to avoid hitting the — the limit on how much the federal government can borrow to pay its bills. They also propose to rescind COVID relief funds not yet scheduled to be spent. Biden’s budget, meanwhile, includes $90 billion for education, a 13.6% increase over fiscal year 2023.

“We are clearly a long way away from the finish line and middle ground,” said Lindsay Fryer, president of Lodestone D.C., a Washington lobbying and consulting firm. “Talks of addressing the debt limit and overall budget levels are sure to add interesting dynamics to appropriations conversations that could prolong this [budget] process for quite a while.”

Even with Democrats controlling Congress during the first two years of his presidency, Biden wasn’t able to deliver on some of his major education proposals and negotiations stretched until December. But now he has to contend with a Republican majority that wants to scale back government spending — the question is how much. Republicans have just a five-vote advantage in the House, meaning that McCarthy — who didn’t become speaker until he bowed to concessions from the Freedom Caucus — will need their support to pass a budget through the chamber.

The administration, on the other hand, wants to raise the $31.4 trillion debt limit to avoid what most economists say would be a . In his budget last week, he pledged to reduce the national debt by $3 trillion with taxes on those earning over $400,000 million a year.

Despite the likely standoff later this year, advocates for schools and early learning programs were still generally pleased with Biden’s proposals.

“I’m celebrating,” Julie Kashen, director and senior fellow at The Century Foundation, said about the proposal for the to spend $600 billion over 10 years for child care and preschool. She called it “a significant commitment to meeting the needs of children, families and communities.”

The Department of Education’s budget also includes a new $500 million program to help school districts expand universal preschool for students eligible to attend Title I schools. 

Aaron Loewenberg, a senior policy analyst at New America, a left-leaning think tank, said he was encouraged by the proposal. But he’s also realistic about its prospects.

“With a prolonged fight over the debt ceiling looming and House Republicans demanding billions of dollars in funding cuts,” he said, “the administration’s new pre-K proposal will have a hard time passing Congress.” 

Biden wants to restore the expanded that was part of the American Rescue Plan — $3,000 for those 6 and older and $3,600 for younger children. U.S. Census data shows the monthly payments nearly in half in 2021, and that it helped them afford rent, groceries and school supplies.

Proposals for other major programs include: 

• $20.5 billion for Title I, a $2.2 billion increase over 2023
• $18.2 billion for special education, including grants for preschoolers, infants and toddlers
• $428 million to increase the number of counselors, school psychologists and social workers
• $368 million for community schools — more than double the $150 million in the 2023 budget
• $1.2 billion for English learners, including $90 million to increase teacher diversity by recruiting and training more multilingual educators 
• $178 million for the Office for Civil Rights, which last year saw a record number of

But the administration proposes to keep funding for grants to support new and expanding charter schools at $440 million — the same level since 2019.

That “amounts to a cut” when factoring in inflation, said John Bailey, an adviser to the Walton Family Foundation. 

The National Alliance for Public Charter Schools wants to see funding bumped to $500 million. Enrollment in charters climbed 7% during the pandemic — “evidence that parents were looking for something more and better for their children during a time of crisis,” Nina Rees, president and CEO of the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools, said in  

The president’s budget was also a “real disappointment” to afterschool providers, Jodi Grant, executive director of the Afterschool Alliance, said in a statement. The budget keeps funding for the 21st Century Community Learning Centers program at $1.3 billion, the same as last year. 

While the budget McCarthy ultimately proposes might not include cuts that are as deep as those proposed by the hardline Freedom Caucus, it’s unlikely to include a lot of increases for education either. 

As negotiations move forward, Noelle Ellerson Ng, associate executive director for advocacy and governance at AASA, the School Superintendents Association, said she’d like to see Democrats prioritize the increase for special education. 

Others want to see the expanded child tax credit make it into the final budget.

“It prevented a lot of children and families from falling below the poverty line,” said Cary Lou, a senior research associate at the Urban Institute. 

But with McCarthy already saying cuts to are “off the table,” that means everything else, including funding for schools and children, is vulnerable, he said. McCarthy has signaled that he might not have ready for at least another month, adding to uncertainty over appropriations for next year, Lou said. “Multiple unknowns make it a bit more of a high-wire act.”