Latest news with #EducationMinnesota
Yahoo
04-07-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Rochester Public Schools is waiting to see the outcome from the $7 billion of federal funds in limbo
Jul. 3—ROCHESTER — Although The U.S. Department of Education has withheld nearly $7 billion in funding from schools across the country, it's not yet clear what kind of impact that will have for Rochester Public Schools. On June 30, the U.S. Department of Education sent a notification to state agencies, notifying them that the release of the funding was still under consideration. That update began sounding alarm bells for schools and education advocates alike. "This is not just a budget cut — it's an assault on the rule of law and our commitment to every child's right to a quality education," said Monica Byron, president of Education Minnesota, which is the statewide teachers union. "By withholding funding that Congress has already approved, the Trump administration is playing politics with our children's futures." According to the publication EducationWeek, the federal funding that has been withheld from schools amounts to $6.8 billion. RPS Communications Director Mamisoa Knutson said the district is monitoring the situation and "waiting to see what that means" for local programs. Although federal funding doesn't provide the bulk of Rochester Public Schools' budget, it still represents millions of dollars for the district. In 2024-25, federal funding comprised 4% of the district's budget, which amounted to $17.08 million. The Minnesota Department of Education provided a copy of the notification it received from the federal government to the Post Bulletin. According to MDE Communications Director Sam Snuggerud, the federal government issued an individual notice for the funding associated with each program. However, the notifications only differed in the name of the program. They read: "Given the change in Administrations, the Department is reviewing the FY 2025 funding for the [Title I-C, II-A, III-A, IV-A, IV-B] grant program(s), and decisions have not yet been made concerning submissions and awards for this upcoming academic year. Accordingly, the Department will not be issuing Grant Award Notifications obligating funds for these programs on July 1 prior to completing that review. The Department remains committed to ensuring taxpayer resources are spent in accordance with the President's priorities and the Department's statutory responsibilities." Even before the federal department issued the notice, state agencies were beginning to worry about the delay in the funding. On June 26, The Minnesota Department of Education sent a letter to its federal counterpart, asking when it could expect to receive information on the matter. MDE Commissioner Willie Jett's letter listed a number of programs that rely on the funding. They include those that aid English-language proficiency, support teacher development and retention, and provide academic enrichment opportunities "outside of school hours for students who attend low-performing schools." "At this writing, Minnesota has not received critical information for school districts to obligate federal funding in time for a July 1 deadline," Jet wrote in his June 26 letter. "While the most recent state tables posted on ED's website include updated figures, these programs are notably absent. Without this information, and with July 1 approaching, it is not possible for schools, districts, and the Minnesota Department of Education (MDE) to complete the steps needed to begin obligating these funds as scheduled."
CBS News
10-06-2025
- Politics
- CBS News
St. Francis school district scraps book banning policy, will return titles to shelves
A lawsuit stemming from a book banning policy in the St. Francis school district has been settled, and the books will return to shelves. In March, Education Minnesota-St. Francis and the American Civil Liberties Union of Minnesota filed lawsuits after the district adopted a policy that removed librarians and teachers from the book approval process and replaced them with a website called "Book Looks." The website, which shut down in late March, was affiliated with Moms for Liberty, a group at the forefront of the conservative movement targeting books that reference race and sexuality. The website ranked the books from zero to five, with zero being "for everyone" and five being "aberrant content." If a book with a rating of three or above was challenged, the policy dictated that it would be removed from shelves, the ACLU said in its lawsuit. More than 30 books were removed from libraries and classrooms, including "The Bluest Eye," "Slaughterhouse-Five," "The Kite Runner," "Brave New World," "The Handmaid's Tale" and "Night." The school board accepted the settlement during its regular meeting on Monday. The education union agreed to drop the lawsuit and did not seek any financial damages. A new book policy in St. Francis will include input from teachers, librarians and student representatives. A review committee can only remove a book with a supermajority vote, and the school board can only overrule the review committee after publishing a report and acting in a public meeting. The new policy must also stay in place for at least three years. "We achieved this settlement because parents, students, our community and even Minnesota authors stood with educators to defend the freedom to read in public schools," said Education Minnesota-St. Francis President Ryan Fiereck. "The students' stories and commitment to fixing this terrible policy were particularly inspiring." WCCO has reached out to the St. Francis Area School Board for comment.
Yahoo
10-06-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
St. Francis schools to put banned books back on shelves
() St. Francis Area Schools will place banned books back on library shelves and rewrite its library policy to comply with state law, according to a settlement reached in a lawsuit filed by the teachers union. The district had banned hugely popular and celebrated books including 'The Handmaid's Tale,' 'The Perks of Being a Wallflower,' 'The Bluest Eye' and 'The Kite Runner,' among others. The settlement requires them to be returned to library shelves. Education Minnesota sued the district in March on behalf of students, teachers and parents, alleging that the district was violating state law by banning books based on their ideas, stories and characters. The American Civil Liberties Union also filed a separate lawsuit. In 2024, the Democratic-Farmer-Labor-controlled Legislature passed a law touted as a ban on book bans. The law does allow for books to be removed from shelves based on practical reasons, 'legitimate pedagogical concerns, including but not limited to the appropriateness of potentially sensitive topics for the library's intended audience,' and to comply with other state or federal laws. But school districts cannot remove books based solely on its viewpoint or the messages, ideas or opinions it contains. St. Francis Area Schools relied on a website called — which has ties to the right-wing group Moms for Liberty — to determine which books were subject to removal from school shelves. (Booklooks has since shut down, but a third-party organization is maintaining the website's catalog.) The St. Francis case provides a free speech victory following years of repression of books, especially those with themes about race, sexuality and gender. 'I think the book ban movement … it really has little to do with protecting children. It has everything to do with targeting books with diverse viewpoints that may not be in line with the reviewers' political or religious beliefs,' 'Kite Runner' author Khaled Hosseini told the Reformer in March. In the settlement with the teachers union, St. Francis Area Schools agreed to put the books back on shelves and create a new library materials policy that guarantees input from parents and qualified media specialists.
Yahoo
20-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Minnesota Legislature approves pension changes for teachers
May 20—ROCHESTER — The Minnesota Legislature has passed legislation that will allow Minnesota teachers to retire a little earlier, if they so choose. While it still needs the signature of Gov. Tim Walz, the bill, among other things, includes reform for teacher pensions, lowering the age at which educators can expect to begin their retirement. "This is a big victory for Minnesota teachers," said Denise Specht, president of the statewide teachers union Education Minnesota. "What we're doing with this bill is an opportunity to retire at the age of 60 with 30 years of experience." According to the Teachers Retirement Association, educators become eligible to retire as early as age 55. However, the size of their pension would be reduced by a percentage for every year between the time of their early retirement and the normal retirement age of 65. The TRA, however, stipulated that the reduction to their pension would be smaller if they were at least 62 years old with 30 years of service. With the passage of Monday's legislation, teachers are now able to take advantage of that same benefit two years earlier at the age of 60. Although there's still a reduction in the pension for retiring early, the penalty for doing so has also been reduced from 6% to 5% for those who qualify with their age and years of experience. Teachers and their school districts contribute to teacher pensions. As part of the new legislation, $40 million was also dedicated to the Minnesota Teacher Retirement Association, which is the organization that manages teachers' pension accounts. Teachers across the state have been advocating for pension reform for years. In 2023, the Legislature lowered the normal retirement age from 66 to 65. Teachers hired before July 1, 1989, have a career "Rule of 90," which allowed teachers to retire once their age and their years of teaching experience equaled that number. There has been an effort to amend legislation surrounding teachers' pensions in recent years, since teachers who began teaching after the change to the rule in 1989 are now reaching retirement age. Rochester Education Association President Vince Wagner said that although the new legislation is progressing in the right direction, there are teachers who would like to see even more reform to the system. "By no means are we done talking about pensions," Wagner said. "It's a step forward." Monday's legislation is the end result of teachers advocating for pension reform for years. "This victory could not have happened without the tens of thousands of educators who came together in union to write, call and rally for a retirement benefit that's fair, flexible and sufficient," Specht said in a statement. "This is what educators can accomplish when we work together." In addition to teachers' pensions, the bill also impacts public safety personnel. According to a press release from the Minnesota House of Representatives, personnel represented by the Public Employees Retirement Association police and fire, there will be "a three-year cost-of-living adjustment delay once they retire. A year would be taken off in the bill. They would also get a one-time 3% cost-of-living increase in 2026 and 1% annually thereafter. These changes come with a $17.7 million cost in each fiscal year. "At a cost of $2.3 million per year, every state patrol retiree would get a 1.25% annual cost-of-living increase — up from 1%," the release said.
Yahoo
17-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Where things stand with just over 48 hours left of the Minnesota legislative session
Hundreds of Education Minnesota members gather in the Capitol Rotunda on May 17, 2025, to rally in support of improved pensions, pay and health care. Photo by Andrew VonBank/House Public Information Services. With just over 48 hours prior to the Legislature's mandatory adjournment midnight Monday, lawmakers are still struggling to resolve a few key issues as they aim for a two-year budget to fund everything from roads to schools, parks, health and social services. Several large budget bills have yet to be negotiated between the 67-67 divided House and the Democratic-controlled Senate — health and human services, education, a potential infrastructure package and a tax bill — i.e., the most complex and contentious. The lack of movement on these bills makes a special session all the more likely. Legislative leaders say they anticipate a one-day special session prior to Memorial Day, though it could be longer. Lawmakers have to pass a budget by June 30 or the government will shut down. Among the major sticking points: cutting MinnesotaCare for undocumented immigrant adults. Some rank-and-file, progressive Democrats broke with their leaders and Gov. Tim Walz and protested the budget agreement over the proposal and harshly criticized Democratic leadership for acquiescing to one of the Republicans' top priorities. House DFL Caucus leader Melissa Hortman, DFL-Brooklyn Park, appearing Friday on TPT Almanac, said Democrats will need to compromise given the divided government. 'People need to bend. They need to understand they won't get everything they want,' Hortman said. Rep. Cedrick Frazier, DFL-New Hope, who is also co-chair of the progressive People of Color and Indigenous Caucus, told reporters Saturday that the POCI Caucus doesn't plan to shut down the government over cutting MinnesotaCare for undocumented adults. 'We care about all the Minnesotans, and we're not willing to shut the government down, but we're willing to make sure we work very hard to ensure the Minnesotans get what they need,' Frazier said. Other contentious debates include potential changes to the state's new paid leave and earned sick and safe time programs and cuts to taxpayer aid for private schools. Walz has proposed cutting $109 million in aid that helps private schools with transportation, counseling and textbooks. The state has allocated this funding to private schools for decades, but Walz and Democrats are proposing the cuts amid a projected multi-billion dollar budget deficit beginning in 2027. On Thursday, House Speaker Lisa Demuth, R-Cold Spring, gave reporters the impression that private school aid would not be touched and presented this as a win for Republicans. 'We also know that we have made great strides in protecting the funding for non-public education. We are protecting our schools,' Demuth said. 'We are protecting our students so they can learn in the best way forward.' But cuts to private school aid are still in play, as far as a key DFL senator is concerned. Sen. Mary Kunesh, DFL-New Brighton, said that funding for private school aid wasn't part of the global budget agreement, and protecting public education is a priority for Senate Democrats. 'I understand the uniqueness and the value of non-public schools, but as the chair of the Education Finance Committee in the state of Minnesota, my priority is to fund public schools at the best rate and in the best way possible,' Kunesh said in an interview with the Reformer. A source with the House Republican caucus told the Reformer that there's 'no scenario where we will agree to' any cuts. Kunesh, who also serves as an assistant majority leader, said that the cuts to private schools are part of her education budget, and she anticipates this issue to be a sticking point in budget negotiations between members of the House and Senate — also known as a conference committee. 'We just have to remind those members also that we have that obligation to public schools first,' Kunesh said. In between the Senate and House floor sessions, Rep. Dave Baker, R-Wilmar, and Sen. Judy Seeberger, DFL-Afton, held a small press gaggle near the Capitol rotunda to tell reporters that significant changes to the state's paid leave and earned sick and safe time programs are still on the table, despite their absence from the legislative leaders' budget agreement. Legislative leaders agreed to reduce the paid leave payroll tax cap that the Department of Employment and Economic Development could implement each year from 1.2% to 1.1%. But since paid leave will launch in January with a 0.88% payroll tax split between employers and workers, the reduction does nothing to change the program as currently constituted. Baker said Demuth has given him her blessing to keep trying to implement paid leave changes in conference committee, though he didn't say what he would specifically look to change. Throughout the session, Baker has attempted to exempt small employers from the paid leave requirement. 'We're just trying to get (paid leave) right-sized a little bit,' Baker told reporters.
