State lawmakers to debate slew of education-related proposals

With Indiana’s latest forecasts showing a cooling economy, uncertainties around a new round of education funding loom ahead of the 2025 budget-setting legislative session, which is set to start Wednesday.

Also up for debate upon lawmakers’ return to the Statehouse are proposals that seek to further boost private school vouchers, adjust teacher certification requirements, and expand the state’s charter school networks.

Recent budget plans earmarked roughly half of the state’s $44.5 billion biennial spending for K-12 education; the most recent budget, adopted in 2023, dedicated a historic $21 billion to schools.

This time around, however, Indiana’s budget regulators and legislative leaders warn that less state revenue compared to years prior—and a growing Medicaid costs—could tighten education spending.

That bleak outlook comes as schools are already trying to cope with inflation increases and the end of federal pandemic relief funding.

State legislators are expected to spend the next four months hashing out how much money to make available for K-12 base funding, as well as allocations that could affect teacher pay, summer school, math and literacy tutoring, and extra resources for English learners and students with disabilities.

Questions largely to revolve around funding

Republican legislative leaders have not said for sure whether base funding for K-12 schools would increase or decrease in the 2025-27 budget.

While Senate President Pro Tem Rod Bray and House Speaker Todd Huston said education continues to be a “priority,” they emphasized that passing a balanced budget likely means less overall spending across a majority of line items.

House Minority Leader Phil GiaQuinta agreed.

“When they say there’s no money, there may not actually be any money this year,” GiaQuinta said of budget uncertainties.

Adding to the education funding questions are continued legislative attempts to limit property tax referendums, which Indiana school districts increasingly use to supplement state dollars for salaries, programming, construction and safety improvement projects.

During the 2024 session, Republican lawmakers—eager to pass property tax relief measures proposed a bill to restrict school operating and school safety referenda to general election years, but the language failed to pass.

While it’s not clear if the measure will return in 2025, incoming Gov. Mike Braun marked property tax relief among his legislative priorities and included in his plan the same restrictions to limit property tax referendums to only general elections.

Braun has also proposed a cap on property tax increases at 2% for certain residents and at 3% for others.

Republican Sen. Travis Holdman, who heads the Senate’s tax-focused committee, said to expect “a whole plethora of bills dealing with the property tax” to be filed this year.

Bray, however, cautioned that any wide-reaching reforms are likely to require multiple legislative sessions.

Democrats have long cautioned against any major changes, citing concerns for school districts, specifically.

“Whenever we fool around with these things, we’re affecting local governments and their ability to do the things they have to do,” GiaQuinta said. “We want to make sure we appropriate state dollars to education so that governments don’t have to keep raising property taxes.”

The extent to which school districts are required to share property tax dollars with charter schools could be revisited in the 2025 session.

Indiana lawmakers gave charter schools major funding boosts in the current state budget after advocates ramped up lobbying efforts in the 2023 session to extend more benefits to the traditional public counterparts. A new law also forces school districts in four Hoosier counties to share referendum funding with charters.

A newly formed group representing Indiana’s growing public charter school sector recently said it will renew the push lawmakers to make traditional public schools share local property tax revenue.

House Bill 1136, authored by Rep. Jake Tashka, R-North Liberty, seeks to go a step further, giving the state the authority to dissolve public school corporations and turn them into charters if more than 50% of students in a given district do not attend the traditional public schools in that area.

A legislative fiscal analysis estimates the bill’s provisions could dissolve five school corporations and transition 68 schools to charters by 2029. The affected districts include Indianapolis Public Schools, Gary Community School Corporation, Union School Corporation, Tri-Township Consolidated School Corporation and Cannelton City Schools.

Roughly a dozen other Hoosier districts are at or near the 50% threshold.

Charters are public schools, but they’re not run by school districts. Instead, they’re headed by nonprofit boards and are overseen by their independent authorizers.

The state’s largest teachers union opposes the bill, which the group argues would “strip away” locally-elected school board governance, “replacing it with a state-appointed board and eroding the foundation of democracy in public education.”

“Rather than supporting schools and addressing critical issues like poverty and underfunding, HB 1136 would unfairly target districts based on student transfers—an issue mostly rooted in broader socioeconomic challenges beyond the control of schools,” said Indiana State Teachers Association President Keith Gambill. “If heard, lawmakers should reject HB 1136 and instead focus on policies that strengthen Indiana’s public schools, address staffing shortages and ensure equitable resources for all students.”

State leaders, advocates make to-do lists

Indiana Education Secretary Katie Jenner said to “definitely” expect bills affecting school safety, another key piece of Braun’s education agenda.

“We’ve had to learn from the horrific tragedies in other states. And so what can we do to learn from that? There are some lessons you’re going to hear discussed during the session,” Jenner told the Indiana Capital Chronicle in December.

Jenner said school and community leaders currently have to make “a number of different calls” to the state education and homeland security offices to put “proactive” measures in motion.

She said Braun’s proposed Office of School Safety, “where all of us as state agencies would support” local efforts, is likely on the horizon.

“That would allow, at the local level, one point of contact to call,” Jenner continued. “We also can be a lot more proactive at identifying potential threats, but the goal is to keep our schools as safe as possible.”

Braun has additionally made clear his intention to expand private school vouchers to be fully universal.

Income guidelines for Choice Scholarships were expanded so much in 2023 that the program already reaches more than 95% of the state’s population.

Republican Rep. Bob Behning, chair of the House Education Committee, said in December that the GOP supermajority is on board.

“I’m not going to apologize that our caucus will be very supportive of universal vouchers,” Behning said. “I think letting parents make that choice as to what’s best for their son or daughter is the best way to move forward.”

Less, clear, though, is whether a “school choice” overhaul bill floated by Sen. Ryan Mishler in 2024 will get traction in the next legislative session.

The top GOP state senator’s proposal — which did not advance when previously introduced — would have created a grant program to allow all Hoosier families, regardless of income, to choose where their students get educated.

Doing so would bring an end to Choice Scholarships, special education-only Education Scholarship Accounts, or ESAs, and the newly-established Career Scholarship Account, or CSA, Program.

Instead, Mishler suggested merging those programs into a new “Indiana Funding Students First Grant Program” for students ages five to 21, permitting all Hoosier parents to apply for an annual grant that can be used for “qualified” education expenses. That includes tuition and fees, exam fees, services for students with a disability, transportation, payments for tutoring, and costs associated with extracurricular activities, apprenticeships or other programs.

Indiana’s teachers, meanwhile, have called for improved pay and benefits—including 12 weeks of parental leave for all public school employees—though the union did not recommend a specific minimum salary. Baseline educator pay in the state currently sits at $40,000.

ISTA representatives said higher salaries and better benefits will help attract teachers and fill hundreds of statewide vacancies.

Braun made increased teacher compensation and guaranteed parental leave priorities in his platform, too, but he also has not proposed a minimum salary.

Republican legislative leadership has kept mum about their willingness or ability to approve those requests, and instead have pointed to the latest data showing the average teacher salary in Indiana during the last school year was recorded at $60,557—up from $58,531 the year prior.

ISTA, Democrats and multiple advocacy groups are additionally pushing for Indiana’s compulsory school attendance age to drop to six—meaning kindergarten would become a requirement for Hoosier kids—and for universal access to pre-K. The state’s Republican supermajority has so far resisted such efforts.

“We’ve invested in early pre-K. We’ve done a lot of different things to try and support families, and young families, and we’ll continue to do that,” Huston said in November. “But I think we also have to set a level of expectation that is … the state’s not going to be funding all universal pre-K.”

What’s already been filed?

Multiple education bills have already been proposed in both chambers.

Among them is a measure to reduce the state’s hotly-debated literacy endorsement for teachers, which requires educators to complete a new, 80-hour science of reading training before they can renew their license.

Jenner said that while “there will be a lot of bills filed,” targeting the endorsement, “I do not see that changing.”

Sen. Jean Leising separately brought back her bill to mandate cursive writing in school curricula. Cursive writing hasn’t been required in Indiana’s public schools since 2010—something Leising, R-Oldenburg, has been working to change for years.

She’s filed similar bills in the last decade to no avail but pared down her 2023 measure to require schools to report to the state education department about whether cursive writing is part of their curriculum.

Of the 1,770 schools that were since surveyed by the state, 91% of state-accredited non-public schools are teaching cursive writing, while only 52% of public schools reported teaching it.

Another bill, filed by Rep. Michelle Davis, R-Whiteland, would ban transgender girls in the state from playing on women’s college teams.

The bill seeks to force state colleges to designate athletic teams as either “male,” “female” or “coeducational.” Under the legislation, a “biological” male athlete could not participate on a female team.

Language in the bill would also require schools located outside of Indiana that compete against Hoosier teams to notify the opposing team of any biologically male athletes participating in female sports. State colleges would additionally have to establish “grievance procedures” to deal with violations of these rules.

Schools that do not comply could be sued, according to the bill. It’s not clear if or when the measure will be heard in the House Education Committee, where it’s been assigned.

And while not yet filed, state and legislative leaders said to still anticipate bills that could bring more transparency to textbook and curriculum fees; expand teacher participation in the state’s Literacy Cadre program; incentivize schools to offer more work-based learning opportunities and implement newly-revamped high school diplomas; increase summer school funding; reduce school counselors’ workloads; encourage transportation sharing between traditional public, charter, and private schools; and require greater accountability for schools that don’t report violence against school staff.

Senators and representatives have until Jan. 9 and Jan. 14, respectively, to file new legislation.

Whether any bills will receive committee hearings—or advance in the legislative process—is still to be determined and ultimately decided by Republican leadership.

The Indiana Capital Chronicle is an independent, not-for-profit news organization that covers state government, policy and elections.