The National Alliance Applauds Passage of SF 2368/HF 2543 by Iowa State Legislature.
Todd Ziebarth, Senior Vice President of State Advocacy and Support at the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools, released the following statement regarding the passage of SF 2368/HF 2543:
“We applaud the Iowa state legislature for their passage of SF 2368/HF 2543. The bill, initially introduced by Governor Reynolds, tackles three key issues: improving per-pupil funding fairness for charter school students, public charter schools’ access to facilities, and increasing extracurricular opportunities for charter school students.
“It is critical to achieve state funding fairness between traditional public schools and public charter schools, a challenge which many states face. This bill requires that some additional state categorical funding must follow the student to the public school, whether charter or district, he or she attends. All public school students should be entitled to a high-quality public education, and fair funding is a requirement to do so.
“Securing school facilities is also a historically challenging issue for public charter schools. This bill will create more visibility into vacant and underutilized school district facilities and prevent school districts from prohibiting sales to public charter schools.
“We will continue to work with Governor Reynolds and the Iowa legislature to ensure that public charter school students receive the full amount of public funding as their traditional public school peers.”