To restore faith in education, use trusted strategies to reach students

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution asked educators, policymakers and advocates to share what they deem the most important priorities for the upcoming 2025 General Assembly. Their answers are included in a collection of guest columns. This is the latest of these columns.

For some time, public support for K-12 education has been eroding. In a recent national survey, only 16% of adults expressed the belief that public education is headed in the right direction. The top three reasons the public gave for its cynicism: schools not prioritizing core academic content, teachers injecting their personal views into classroom instruction, and schools lacking sufficient resources to promote student learning.

While schools have labored under public skepticism and unrealistic expectations since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, public education is not broken.

Far from it.

For example, despite unprecedented pressures placed on schools by the pandemic, student achievement in Georgia increased on 16 of 20 statewide assessments administered in spring 2024. The graduating class of 2024 beat the national average for the seventh year in a row on the SAT college admissions exam.

Dana Rickman

That said, public education in Georgia still has its fair share of challenges. For example, going into the current school year, Georgia’s students continue to experience pandemic-related academic and mental health challenges. Teachers and education leaders across Georgia need continued high-quality professional development to deepen their knowledge and skills as Georgia focuses on new curricula and innovative teaching approaches. Many school districts continue to struggle with teacher shortages.

In the upcoming edition of our “Top Ten Issues to Watch” report, the Georgia Partnership for Excellence in Education calls on state leaders to adopt a future-oriented vision for public education, a vision where today’s investments yield long-term dividends for individuals and the communities where they live. For state leaders, specifically members of the Georgia General Assembly, a new vision begins with a shift in mindset, focusing on the outcomes of investments, rather than their individual costs.

Foundational to shifting toward a future-oriented, outcome-focused mindset is determining what investments produce the greatest gains. To start, we recommend the Georgia General Assembly, working with education and civic leaders, evaluate programs and strategies to assess the quality, effectiveness and impact of public education and workforce investments.

From there, the Georgia Partnership offers three recommendations for state leaders to shift their thinking toward a long-term investment strategy for public education.

First, the Georgia General Assembly should revise the K-12 funding formula. Key considerations should be dedicated state funding to many of the high-impact strategies pursued during the pandemic, which address the effects of poverty on instruction, as well as an increase in counseling, school safety and physical and mental health supports.

Examples include:

• Introducing a funding weight for low-income students and districts with high concentrations of students living in poverty.
• Boosting state funding for school counselors, psychologists and social workers by lowering the staff-to-student ratios for these positions.
• Providing categorical funds to extend learning through after-school, summer and high-dosage tutoring strategies.

Second, the General Assembly must address several unknowns related to implementing the requirements of the Georgia Early Literacy Act. With the recent loss of federal pandemic relief funds and subsequent financial gap in districts’ budgets, the Georgia Partnership recommends the following:

• The General Assembly provides state funding to support district implementation of the new requirements related to curriculum, professional development and the hiring and training of reading coaches and interventionists.
• The General Assembly provides resources for agency leaders to work with subject-matter experts and state nonprofits to support district and school leaders’ efforts to evaluate program effectiveness and use data to initiate changes in instructional delivery.

Finally, we recommend the General Assembly develop a comprehensive and well-funded strategy to strengthen Georgia’s pipeline of educators and education leaders. The Georgia Department of Education and many local districts have designed and executed initiatives to address different aspects of this challenge, but funding and reach are often limited. We recommend state leaders:

• Restore professional development funding to 1.5% of the base teacher salary.
• Conduct a comprehensive review of professional development needs and funding to ensure the state’s formula reflects the costs of quality educator training.
• Fund district pilots focused on advanced teacher roles and innovative staffing models.
• Provide student loan forgiveness for new teachers entering hard-to-staff fields.