School Report Cards and Testing Anomalies

The Department of Education and Workforce(DEW) released the new school report cards for the 2025-2026 school year. Far from five stars but there was some encouraging news. However, there is much more work to be done. Senate Education Chairman Andrew Brenner joins The President's Podcast to talk about the results, testing anomalies, and a new formula he created that focuses on the taxpayers' return on investment.

Funding for K-12 schools accounts for the majority of the state's two-year operating budget.

Nearly 31% of Ohio's General Revenue Fund(GRF) is spent on K-12 schools. The GRF consists of taxes collected by the state. Examples would include Income and Sales taxes and a few other sources of revenue collected in the form of tax dollars that go into the GRF,

Over the last decade all the money spent on K-12 schools, referred to as All Funds spending grew dramatically. That would be GRF and other funding sources including federal dollars.

In fact per pupil spending increased 45% over the last decade to $18,320.

Some districts spend twice that and have little to show for it when it comes to a return for the taxpayers' investment.

The call to spend more money was clearly rejected by the taxpayers who demanded significant property tax reform and the General Assembly delivered that over the last year while still lowering the income tax burden on Ohioans by reducing the final three income tax brackets to a single flat tax of 2.75%.

The cost of replacing the state's school funding with income and sales taxes would require astronomical increases.

The sales tax would need to climb from 5.75% to 12.25% and the flat income tax would climb from 2.75% to nearly 7%.

So clearly the allegations of not spending enough money for public schools is a convenient yet hollow political attack used by left.

Watch our indepth and insightful discussion on spending, graduation rates, chronic absenteeism, and a new metric Senator Brenner believes will help bring additional clarity to the school performance.

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