The Oklahoma State Department of Education asked lawmakers Tuesday for a nearly $474 million budget increase.
From that, $333 million of would go toward $5,000 teacher pay raises and covering increased health care costs. State Superintendent Joy Hofmeister said Oklahoma teachers’ average $45,000 in salary and benefits is not good enough.
"We are last in the region, and we are 48th in the nation. I think this is about respect: Respect for teachers, respect for the work that they do in our classrooms," Hofmeister said. "And it’s about investing in the people who are going to really make the difference for children."
The education department’s total budget request is $2.9 billion. The cost of giving all eligible educators health insurance is up nearly 70 percent since 2010. Meanwhile, public school funding through the state formula remains more than $100 million dollars below what it was 10 years ago.
Hofmeister said any claims per-pupil spending has increased — as one Republican House member claimed in August — are false.
"We are operating on the same basic dollars as 2008 with 50,000 more kids, and you just saw what happened to health care. Hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars in increase. So, that is stripping away the funds that used to be appropriated for instruction that can’t be," Hofmeister said.
Almost $54 million from the requested increase would go into the state aid formula so per-pupil funding keeps pace with student growth. The rest would go toward things like teacher training, remedial reading programs and alternative education.
"What we’ve put in this is what is required to maintain that public education system, but we go further and we want it to be competitive," Hofmeister said.
Hofmeister said the budget request is in line with the department's eight-year education plan, Oklahoma Edge.
