• By Mikayla Arciaga, M.A.Ed. • IDRA Newsletter • November-December 2024 •
2025 marks the beginning of a new biennial legislative session in Georgia. Legislation can either be passed in 2025 or possibly “crossover” for a second chance at passage in 2026.
Policymakers will consider education issues, such as school safety, vouchers, classroom censorship and the rights of undocumented students. We look forward to advancing our work on the following priorities.
Affirm All Children’s Right to Free Public Education
Over the last four years, policymakers have increased efforts to undermine trust in our public schools by pushing policies that make classrooms less safe, particularly for our most vulnerable students. During the 2024 legislative session and presidential election, hostile rhetoric disparaged immigrant communities, including students.
Four decades ago, the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed in Plyler v. Doe that all school-age children in the country are entitled to a free public education regardless of their immigration status (IDRA, 2024). IDRA opposes any policies that threaten children’s basic civil right to education.
Meet the Constitutional Responsibility to Fund Public Schools
Georgia leaders have a constitutional obligation to provide fair and full funding for Georgia’s public schools. The state must take steps to bear more of the per-pupil cost of education. Since 2013, the state share of per-pupil funding has dropped from 51% to 40%.
This means state leaders are passing the buck to local communities to cover the costs of educating our students. School districts with more wealth are less strained by these costs than low-wealth districts, including rural schools.
The impact of this long-running under-investment in public education was heightened during COVID-19. While federal relief funding helped schools serve students, those funds are running out, leaving our public schools to struggle with other economic challenges layered on top of chronic underfunding (Craven, 2024).
Another way Georgia state leadership can assume a fairer share is by establishing dedicated funding to ensure public schools have the resources they need to educate students living in poverty. Georgia is one of only six states that does not provide such specific funding, again leaving local school districts to pick up the tab for specialized programming, meal programs and additional counseling support. This translates to fewer resources for children’s education and higher tax rates for communities as school districts must scramble to cover the costs of serving their students.
Standardize Accountability and Transparency for Harmful School Voucher Programs
During the last legislative session, the Georgia Legislature narrowly passed controversial legislation that established a new voucher system. This educational savings account program, the “Georgia Promise Scholarship,” provides $6,500 of public dollars to any family – regardless of family income – whose child attends a public school ranked in the bottom 25% statewide. Families can use these dollars toward the costs of private school or homeschooling.
In exchange, families must surrender federal and state discrimination protections for students’ language learning status, physical or intellectual ability, gender identity, sexual orientation, and religious affiliation.
Participating private schools are not required to accept all student applicants or even to disclose which students they are willing to admit. They are not required to adhere to any state guidelines around discipline practices. They are not required to administer the same standardized tests as their public school peers.
These discrepancies often translate to poor experiences and outcomes, particularly for historically marginalized students, such as students of color and students with disabilities (Green et al., 2024; Figlio & Karbownik, 2016; Mills & Wolf, 2017).
Many families are not aware that they have surrendered their rights until they need them.
IDRA urges the Georgia Assembly to require uniform academic and financial reporting for all private schools that participate in a Georgia voucher program, limit the administrative fees that can be collected by the private organizations that help administer these programs, and require participating private schools to make public their admission and discipline policies for any prospective parents or students. Additionally, we call on the state to investigate any incidences of misuse or abuse of the public funds used by these programs and schools.
Foundationally, legislators should reject any attempts to expand vouchers either through funding, new programs or reduced guardrails. Instead, they should repeal existing voucher programs and invest in fully funding public school districts to ensure that every student has access to a high-quality public education.
Adopt Evidence-based Discipline Practices and Policies to Make School Environments Safer
Despite overwhelming evidence that exclusionary discipline and increased police presence do not reduce violence on our school campuses, several high-ranking legislators have called for arming teachers, increasing law enforcement in schools, and increasing surveillance of students’ everyday lives (Burns, 2024; Amy, J, 2023). Cobb County School District has already procured a program that performs surveillance monitoring (Moore, 2024).
IDRA, in coalition with a wide variety of partners, has criticized the use of such programs that threaten students’ rights to privacy and make schools less safe for our students, particularly students of color (Sorensen, et al., 2023).
Additionally, Georgia is one of only 20 states that still permits educators to hit students in public schools. Corporal punishment disparately impacts Black boys, Black girls and students with disabilities (GOSA, 2023). Legislators should prohibit the use of corporal discipline in schools and adopt policies and allocate funding for schools to use evidence-based, restorative practices and trauma-informed care (Craven, 2019; Duggins-Clay, 2022).
Support Students’ Lived Experiences and Identities to Create Welcoming Classrooms
At IDRA, we know that for a learning environment to be truly welcoming, it must be inclusive of all students’ identities. We advocate classroom policies that make schools safer and more inclusive for all children, especially students of color, emergent bilingual students, and LGBTQ+ students.
These students are experiencing rising rates of bullying and harassment and are often not able to access excellent learning programs, including welcoming curricula and instructional practices.
We advocate policies that create safe learning environments that support students’ whole identities (Garcia & Montemayor, 2019). We work to protect access to diverse curricula and increase resources for schools to implement research-based practices to ensure welcoming classrooms.
The Georgia Assembly has the chance in the 2025-2026 legislative session to advance policies that make our state a leader in education across the country.
We must protect access to public schools by resisting privatization efforts and investing funds that empower schools to adopt evidence-based discipline policies and practices. These policies and practices make classrooms safer for all students, especially when they are inclusive of students’ identities.
At a time of uncertainty for many students and their families, IDRA calls on Georgia’s state leaders to ensure every student has access to a truly excellent education that is safe, inclusive and free.
Resources
Amy, J. (October 25, 2023). Georgia’s lieutenant governor wants to pay teachers $10,000 a year to carry guns at school. Associated Press.
Burns, J. (September 12, 2024). Letter from the Office of the Speaker of the House.
Craven, M. (2024). What You Need to Know About the ESSER Funding Cliff – How Schools Will Be Impacted by the End of Federal COVID-19 Relief Funding. IDRA.
Craven, M. (April 30, 2019). Use Effective Discipline, Not Zero Tolerance – IDRA Testimony Against SB2432. IDRA.
Duggins-Clay, P. (June-July 2022). Implementing Restorative Practices to Strengthen School Communities. IDRA Newsletter.
Figlio, D., & Karbownik, K. (July 2016). Evaluation of Ohio’s EdChoice Scholarship Program: Selection, Competition, and Performance Effects. Thomas Fordham Institute.
Garcia, S., & Montemayor, A. (October 2019). Making Schools Safe Learning Havens for LGBTQ Students. IDRA Newsletter.
GOSA. (2023). K-12 Student Discipline Dashboard. Governor’s Office of Scholastic Achievement.
Green, P., Baker, B., & Eckes, S. (2024). The Potential for Race Discrimination in Voucher Programs in a Post-Carson World. Peabody Journal of Education, 99(4), p403-415.
IDRA. (2024.) Plyler v. Doe – The Law in Education, webpage.
Mills, J.N., & Wolf, P.J. (2017). Vouchers in the Bayou: The Effects of the Louisiana Scholarship Program on Student Achievement After 2 Years. Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, 39(3), 464-484.
Moore, T. (October 25, 2024). Cobb schools hire secretive company to ‘scrape social media,’ detect safety risks. Atlanta Journal Constitution.
Sorensen, L.C., Avila-Acosta, M., Engberg, J.B., & Bushway, S.D. (2023). The thin blue line in schools: New evidence on school-based policing across the U.S. Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, 42, 941-970.
Mikayla Arciaga, M.A.Ed., is IDRA’s Georgia advocacy director and Education Policy Fellows coordinator. Comments and questions may be directed to him via e-mail at mikayla.arciaga@idra.org.
[© 2024, IDRA. This article originally appeared in the November-December edition of the IDRA Newsletter. Permission to reproduce this article is granted provided the article is reprinted in its entirety and proper credit is given to IDRA and the author.]
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