Public Education Matters

Various student voices 0:08
Public education matters. Public education matters. Public education matters.

Scott DiMauro 0:15
This is Public Education Matters, brought to you by the Ohio Education Association.

Katie Olmsted 0:26
Thanks for joining us for this edition of public Education Matters. I'm Katie Olmsted, and I'm part of the communications team for the Ohio Education Association and the nearly 120,000 public school educators OEA represents across the state. Wherever you live in Ohio, from the hearts of our big cities to the rolling hills of Appalachia and everywhere in between, what happens in the Ohio Statehouse in Columbus matters for what happens in your life and in our public school classrooms every day. That's why it's so important to have pro-public education, pro-labor leaders from both parties in our statehouse, and to continue to hear from them about the issues that have come up in legislation and that will continue to come up in the new General Assembly that's just now getting underway. OEA members who attended the fall Representative Assembly had the chance to hear from three really strong leaders on public education and labor issues in Ohio:Dani Isaacshon, a Democrat from Cincinnati, representing the 24th district in the Ohio House; Justin Pizzulli, a Republican from Scioto County, who represents District 90 in the Ohio House; and Bill DiMora, a Democrat from Columbus, who represents the 25th district in the Ohio Senate. They sat down for a legislative panel at the end of 2024 to talk about some of the big education bills as we were heading into lame duck in the 135th General Assembly. Let's listen now to a few excerpts of that really insightful conversation, moderated by OEA Vice President Jeff Wensing, beginning with this question about the future of public school funding in the new 136th General Assembly, and we start their responses with what Rep Isaacshon had to say.

Jeff Wensing 2:13
So let's talk about that. You know, we've got one more phase in of the Fair School Funding Plan in the next budget. Do you foresee that to be a major fight in the next budget, phasing in that last two year period of the of the Fair School Funding Plan? And do you also support making sure that when we do phase it in, that we have the most updated version of base costs in order to make sure we keep up with expenses and we have a fair plan implemented?

Rep. Dani Isaacshon 2:44
Yes, we absolutely need to update the inputs. All it is is it's adjusting for inflation, right? It's the whole point of the formula is that we need a formula that accounts for how much does it cost to educate a child in Ohio, and if you're not updating the inputs, then you're not honoring the formula. And so it's just a question of whether we believe in its integrity and want to continue to invest in it. And then, of course, we have to do years five and six. It's not at 100%. Years five and six would take us to 100% of the phase in. But the policy can't be judged on the merits until it's actually implemented. And implementing it means, and this was the deal that they came up with, five years ago, fully funding the Fair School Funding formula with updated inputs years five and six. Oh, and by the way, we need to honor the results of the studies we've gotten for how much does it actually cost to provide a special education? How much does it actually cost to educate economically disadvantaged students? And it's one thing to have one economically disadvantaged student. How much does it cost if 70, 80, 90, 100% of the school is economically disadvantaged, and what does that do to the increase in cost? So there's (applause) Yes, we need to. To me those two things in the well, the most expensive are the minimum we need to do to actually properly honor the integrity of the fair school funding formula. We have to also account for what are the true costs of educating students across districts.

Jeff Wensing 4:10
Thank you. Okay, so given the expansion of the EdChoice Voucher Program in Ohio, what do you think the legislature should do to address some potential competition in the disparities in funding between public schools and private schools, especially in areas where public schools are already underfunded. As we all know that when you get the EdChoice voucher, you get the state amount. Yet in some school districts, the amount they get from the state is way under that. So we've got some accountability issues as well. It seems like House Bill 407 which was a bill focused about EdChoice, both accountability, academically and fiscally, is seeming to be amended to a point where it has no more teeth and actually doesn't have any accountability. So EdChoice vouchers amounts and holding institutions accountable that do accept EdChoice vouchers?

Rep. Justin Pizzulli 5:12
Hi, Justin Pizzulli. 90th district. Do we have any folks from Scioto County or Adams County in here? We gotta one? Awesome I love you. Thank you for being here, and thank you to our teachers who pour your love and your heart and soul into your students. Wouldn't be here without you, the teachers that care. But growing up in the 90th district, way down in the south, we don't really have private schools, and so the voucher program is not necessarily one that is that talked about. We have one small Catholic school and one other school in a neighboring county. So I think up here in Columbus, when we have these conversations, sometimes like school EdChoice and the voucher program sounds like really good. It sounds like a good talking point, something like really good on paper, but in my district, it does not matter, because our best schools are our public schools. And so (applause) - Last, last GA we had a lot of money, typically, than we've ever had before. And so vouchers were expanded. But, I mean, quite frankly, in the future, I don't know that this is always going to be long term viable. And, you know, I'm going to be supporting policies that the taxpayer dollars should always be held accountable. There should be a level playing field with our public schools, and I don't like the idea that we're passing out subsidies to the rich. I think that we've we've got to make sure that people, in my opinion, who actually would need a voucher could get it if they are low income, right? But, you know, it's the people, a lot of the people who are accepting these vouchers could be able to afford the tuition already. And so I just learned the other day that one of the richest men in Ohio uses the homestead exemption. So you know that just that really puts a bad pit in my stomach, I guess, and so coming from a rural area where we're not really using them anyway, I not necessarily the biggest fan when we need to prioritize our public schools.

Jeff Wensing 7:32
We are all aware current President Huffman, future Speaker Huffman makes no secret that he wants to take tax money and build private schools where they don't exist in what he's calling a choice desert. So Representative Isaacson, do you have a follow up on that?

Rep. Dani Isaacshon 7:55
Oh, I have some thoughts.

Jeff Wensing 7:57
I thought you might.

Rep. Dani Isaacshon 7:58
Most of them, I will keep to myself.

Jeff Wensing 8:00
Yeah.

Rep. Dani Isaacshon 8:02
There's two, I think, big things going on here with school choice. One is around what it means to have an actual choice, right? Real school choice for parents is that you are choosing between an well-funded public school in your neighborhood, in your community, and other options based on your religion or group or whatever you want for your kid, and when you're making that choice, you are able to compare apples to apples and know what's going to happen in those schools and know what you're going to be choosing between. That's a real choice. It is not a choice if the government is gutting your neighborhood school, is making it impossible to teach, is over regulating and and setting them up for failure, isn't investing in transportation, isn't making sure kids can get to school, and then is funneling a bunch of resources and money to private schools that are have the addition of private tuition and state dollars, right? That is not a real choice. And by the way, we have no idea what's happening in those schools. They don't take the same test, they don't have the same audits, they don't have the same fiscal accountability. And so you're it's we don't have, we're not even anywhere close to real school choice. So that's the one piece. But the expansion piece, and I'm grateful to Representative Pizzulli bringing this up, is just it is -expanding school vouchers the way we did last year, the way that it's being proposed to do is part of the larger project of the majority party in Ohio robbing the poor to pay the rich. It is just another one of the schemes to do it. It's why we're getting rid of income taxes, the most progressive form of taxation, and they're going to the only way to pay for that is with regressive taxation on sales and property taxes. Why haven't we done anything on property tax relief? I've introduced multiple bipartisan bills in the house. There's companion bills in the Senate. Because property tax relief would address a regressive tax right? It would help people who actually need the relief. I have never gotten a complaint about state income taxes. It is not an issue for most people. It is only an issue for the absolute richest people in the state. And so expanded school vouchers, by subsidizing private education, we're not helping people choose to go to private schools. We're just subsidizing the choice they've already made. And so it's just part of the larger mission of moving money from regular people into the pockets of people who already have more than they know what to do with. And so that is, that's how it's part of that, that broader mission.

Jeff Wensing 10:43
Thank you. Back to Senator DeMora. So Senator Cirino proposed Senate Bill 83, th Higher Ed Destruction Act. It appears that is our members have worked really hard, and other people that are concerned about higher ed issues have worked really hard to get this bill stalled, and it seems going to wither on the vine in this General Assembly. Senator Cirino has warned and promised basically that he's going to bring this bill back in the next General Assembly, bigger badder and better, according to him, which means way worse for us. Have you heard something like that? And what kind of battle do you think we're in for in the next general assembly?

Sen. Bill DeMora 11:20
I mean, what Senate Bill 83 is going to do is kill higher education right now. We're already a brain drain state. Ohio did a pretty good job of keeping students that went to high school in Ohio to stay in Ohio for universities. What this is going to do is make them to leave to go to college. They already leave when they graduate college, because, you know, who wants to live in a state run by the clowns that are running it right now? But, but this is going to gut higher education. I mean, it's an anti-union bill. It's an anti-education bill. I mean to say that that you teachers and students and professionals in college brainwash their students to actually have progressive thinking minds and actually care about other people is ludicrous. But, of course, because people don't, people go to college, and I use the example all the time, some kid who went to, we'll say, a small rural school in Northwest Ohio. You've never seen an African American, never seen an Hispanic, never met an LGBTQ student before comes to Ohio State. I always do Ohio State, because that's where I went to school. But comes to Ohio State and actually meets and figures out that all this kid's done his entire life is as parents listen to News Max and Fox News, and every brown person is a is a criminal. Every black person wants to take away your money, and all that has guns and and all gay people want to make you gay. That's what they learned the entire time growing up. They actually come to some place like Ohio State and meet a brown person or a black person or LGBTQ plus person and realize that these people aren't the enemy, that they're just like me. They might have different skin color or different beliefs that might love somebody differently, but they're just like me, and they're not the evil people that my parents and these new stations have been telling me for the first 18 years of my life. And they become, become more progressive. 83 is horrible. It is going to drive students away from Ohio. It's going to gut higher education. It's a horrible bill, and I'm worried that it's going to, I mean, as as Representative Isaacshon talked about earlier, they're going to put it in the budget, and it's going to, I mean, some form of it's going to pass, because now that Huffman and McCauley are one and the same thing, you know right now. Speaker Stephens stopped this stuff, but when McCauley and Huffman are one of the same thing, we're going to get slammed on our throats, and it's going to kill the state of Ohio.

Jeff Wensing 13:24
Thank you, Senator. Yeah, please.

Rep. Justin Pizzulli 13:37
I think it's so important that we're starting this conversation now about 83 again, because it's not a matter. The reality is, it's not a matter of if; It's a matter of when 83 gets addressed next GA. And I had the honor of serving on Higher Education Committee this GA, so I brought a unique perspective, because I was the only Republican to vote no on it. And the reason,

Speaker 2 14:06
Yeah, we'll clap for that. Thank you.

Rep. Justin Pizzulli 14:11
There was a lot of things in the bill I liked. You're not going to clap for that. There's a lot of but there's a lot of things that I didn't like. And you know, for those who maybe don't know, I know, sometimes at these conferences, we just assume everyone knows the policy. But what 83 does is it tries to take on free, free speech issues and address DEI, diversity, equity, inclusion, amongst several other things, the huge sort of omnibus bill. But amongst probably the number one issue is to try to ban DEI on universities and higher education institutions. But I had a lot of pressure from my party, and the reason I voted no is because it seeks to take away the right to strike and to end collective bargaining. And as a commercial freight conductor with the railroad, I know what it was like to have my collective bargaining rights and right to strike stripped for me a couple of years ago, and it's so defeating, especially coming out of COVID, where employee morale is at a all time low. And so it's just, it's just, frankly, wrong. And I hate, hate being put in these ethical dilemmas in Columbus all the time where, you know, well, for example, let's give let's say there's a bill, let's give teachers a raise, but we're going to pay for it by taxing kids' Halloween candy. You know, it's like, why are you putting us in this situation? And they do it on a lot of times, it's done on purpose, and I just despise it. So to me, this bill is an anti-worker bill disguised as a bill to take on ideology. And so I was a vote in the last GA, and I'll be a vote, vote of no in the next GA, unless those provisions are taken out.

Jeff Wensing 14:38
All right, thank you, Representative Pizzulli. So actually, if I don't, if you don't mind, I'd like to go back to you. You'd like to kick this one off. Okay, so you may have heard there's an educator shortage in Ohio, basically all over. Classroom teachers, intervention specialists, paraprofessionals, bus drivers. You can't drive by a school or school district without seeing a big old sign out there, "We need bus drivers." Okay, so what is it that our generally General Assembly can do for us in the next General Assembly, 136th General Assembly, to help us with this process, in order to attract and retain highly qualified individuals without, like you said, sometimes there's a two sided coin. You do this. You do that without de professionalizing our professions.

Rep. Justin Pizzulli 16:24
That's a great question. Well, it's here's a really rocket science idea. How about we start paying people more money? I don't know why that's a that's a hard one. Stop pissing away retirements. Stop raising health care costs. And, you know, as a young person, you know I I'm always told I'm just young and lazy. I have to hear that all the time. There's a work short shortage. I work at the railroad, like I mentioned, where the wealthiest, literally, the wealthiest company in the entire world, can't figure out why no one wants to work at the railroad anymore, but they wouldn't even give people sick days, right? So let's start with that first of all, and then, you know, let's just also start treating people like human beings. Again, that concept has been lost somewhere. I don't know how. People get sick, people get pregnant, people feel sad. And instead of looking at them like a number that an accountant came up with behind a desk somewhere, let's look at them in the eyes and love them and treat them like a real human being. That's somewhere to start. My mom drives a school bus at Greene, and so I got to listen to all everything that she tells me, you know, her rants and raves, which I'm, I'm glad to listen to, but we need it just sounds like to me and administrators promoting policies that the administrators can get behind the staff and go to bat for their staff, because, you know, down home, there's these old stories of kids getting paddled in school, and I'm not advocating for that now, but, but I think when kids get out of line, there has to be repercussions. You know, you got to have a way to punish students to let them know they're in the wrong. And I just feel like the stories that my family members tell me they just don't feel like the administration has their back anymore. And so I think teachers and school bus drivers, they've really got to feel supported and feel like the administrators are going to go to bat for them.

Jeff Wensing 18:51
All right, thank you. Thank you. Representative Isaacsohn or Senator DeMora, any any comments on that issue in terms of educator recruitment and retention?

Rep. Dani Isaacshon 18:51
Well, I think we spend a lot of time up here, appropriately given what's going on in the state of Ohio, pretty fired up, pretty angry and upset about the direction things are going in. So I want to give a little bit of what keeps me optimistic, or at least keeps me hopeful, and it's a perfect to follow on what Representative Pizzulli just said, because what makes me feel like we can actually turn the page on public education in Ohio, start investing in our students and our teachers in the way that would reflect actually our values is going to be in trying to identifywhere's the coalition that is represents a majority of people in the state, that isn't currently being represented in Columbus. And from traveling around the state, visiting schools, hearing from students and teachers about what's going on in their buildings, it became very clear to me that in our urban districts, in some of our ring suburbs, and in our Appalachian districts and rural districts, they are facing so many of the same challenges. The students might look a little different. They might speak a little differently, but actually what they're dealing with at its root is shared. And if there's a shared challenge, there is a shared solution. And representatives from Appalachia and Southeast Ohio, like Representative Pizzulli, are in the minority in the legislature. Representatives from urban districts and from sort of nearby suburban districts, who are mostly Democrats, are in the minority in the legislature, but together, we are the majority. And it is in that coalition, it is in bringing together urban communities and rural Appalachian communities, and saying we're going to fight for our schools, because it should not matter whether you're from southeast Ohio in the corner of the state or the corner in southwest Ohio, whether you're going to learn to read by fifth grade. But it does. Right now. You don't. The numbers will tell you you don't want to be born in one of those corners, because the state's not investing in you and it's not investing in your teachers. And the surest path to a world class education is an excellent, supported, qualified teacher. And so if we're serious about living up to our values of investing in the next generation of Ohio and making this the greatest state to you know, what do we hear the governor and his staff talk about all the time? 'This is, this is the best state to raise a family.' It is not currently the best state to raise a family. It's not even close. It's not currently the best state to grow old, it's not currently the best state to buy a home. It's not currently the best state to teach or to get educated. But it could be. And to me it could be because there is a natural coalition that we need to invest in, and we can disagree on some of the cultural things. You know, that's okay as long as we agree on the fundamentals on this issue. And that's why it's so. It's why I respect and love working with Representative Pizzulli on these issues, because you can hear where he's coming from on it, and what he is fighting for is what I want for the teachers and students in my district too. And there is power in that connection, and there is power in that coalition, and eventually, we will turn the tide for public education in Ohio on the strength of that partnership. And so that is what's giving me hope.

Jeff Wensing 22:18
Thank you. Yeah. Let's hear it. Representative Isaacshon.

Rep. Justin Pizzulli 22:21
Rep. Isaacshon touched on something great. And you know, despite having, you know, old desks that were used or old textbooks, a school building built in 1900 with the third floor condemned. That was my school. Growing up through first and second grade, I still had a great education, because I had teachers who invested in me, everything. I mean, sometimes they had to dig in their own wallet and they found money and they bought us supplies, but I was still able to go to Shawnee State University, another great local education for rural schools, and get an education and be the first person in my family to graduate college because I had supportive teachers who loved me.

Jeff Wensing 23:07
Senator DeMora, want to wrap us up on this one.

Sen. Bill DeMora 23:10
I'm not as optimistic as my two House colleagues, because overall, I mean, listen, the goals of the Republican leadership in Ohio are to have a two tier system. They have the rich white people controlling the rest of us, and that's what that's what they're trying to do. They don't want public education, because educated people can actually combat what they want to do with the rest of us. Okay? And they don't want that. And as Jeff and Scott and others know, both my parents were public school teachers their entire lives. Okay? I was a public school student. I walked to picket line when I was in fourth grade because there was a strike in my students, and I refused across the picket line, and the chief said, you have to come to school as I'm not going to school, because my mom said I have to, because the straight teachers strike going on here, and I wouldn't do it. So I'm public education through and through. But unfortunately, today - both my parents love being teachers. They taught. I mean their students love them. I mean, when my father passed a couple years ago, students that he had 50 years prior to that came to his funeral, I never met these people because they said, your dad changed my life. And that's what me. That's what teacher means to most people in Ohio. And we're asking teachers to do so much more than they used to do with today's society, and they're not getting paid enough. Same goes with bus drivers. Same goes with school counselors. But the overall goal of, I mean, you saw the whole plan that the Trump and these other idiots ran on, it's to gut public education because they don't want to educate a society so they can control the rest of us. Pessimist here, but that's what they want to do.

Jeff Wensing 24:41
I appreciate and express my gratitude to all three members of the panel, not only for being here and showing up for us today, but what they do to support our members in public education in the General Assembly. Let's hear one more time. Thank you.

Rep. Dani Isaacshon 24:55
Thank you all.

Katie Olmsted 24:55
Just as a reminder, or, I guess, a producer's note on this one, this was not the entire legislative panel discussion from the OEA Fall RA. We edited a lot out to try to get it at least close to that 20 minute mark. So many of you said you preferred when we did the podcast survey last summer, and close is kind of a relative term. Let's be real. Our thanks again to representatives Pizzulli and Isaacshon and to Senator DeMora for sharing their thoughts these and a lot more with all of the OEA members who attended the RA in December. As we continue to get new developments out of the state house in this General Assembly, we will be bringing more state leaders onto the podcast to share their perspectives on these issues that are shaping the future of public education in our state, new episodes of the podcast drop every Thursday this season. Make sure you tune in, because in Ohio, public education matters.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai