Kentucky’s Board of Education is asking lawmakers to maintain current K-12 funding levels ahead of next year’s legislative session while also increasing support for key services that districts offer.

“These are essential educational services that the districts are really bound to deliver,” said Gary Houchens, a board member and associate professor at Western Kentucky University.

Lawmakers will consider a two-year budget during the upcoming session, and the board is lobbying for full reimbursement for local district pupil transportation costs, expenses required by a sweeping education reform law and the cost of providing full-day kindergarten, according to a news release from the Kentucky Department of Education.

Houchens said because the state doesn’t offer full funding for these services many districts are left to spend money “that’s not going directly to the classroom.”

In addition to increased support for district services, the board is also campaigning to appropriate money to an emergency loan fund for districts facing a change in how the unmined coal tax is calculated and lowering revenue collections, according to the Kentucky Department of Education.

Currently, insolvent independent school districts can merge but not county schools districts, which the board is also working to change.

“Our focus is to provide a quality education by working with districts to manage their financial situation,” Education Commissioner Stephen Pruitt said in the release. “However, as a Commonwealth, we ultimately have to consider whether a district has adequate resources to provide a quality education to its students in this fiscal environment.”

With Kentucky’s first charter schools expected to open as early as next fall, the board is also urging for a permanent funding formula for charter schools.

Houchens said the current funding mechanism, which allows students’ funds to follow them to their charter school, would not be applicable by next summer.

“At this point we don’t actually know what the funding mechanism is going to be for charters,” he said.

During the session, lawmakers could also take up the issues of tax and pension reform, and the board approved a statement supporting Gov. Matt Bevin and the General Assembly in “determining revenue options that provide and sustain sufficient resources for the educational goals of the Commonwealth as well as finding solutions for long-term sustainability of the pension systems.”

The board has also approved regulations pertaining to charter schools and the state’s new system for evaluating schools and districts. The regulations will now move through the legislative regulatory review process, according to the release.

“We got lots of feedback, which we really appreciated,” Houchens said of the accountability system regulations.

For example, under a category that evaluates access to supportive services for children, the board opted to remove the ability for schools to be recognized for providing library media specialists and family resource and youth service centers because they are already commonplace.