WYOMING EDUCATION FINANCE ISSUES REPORT An Analysis of The Modified Census Based Special Education Program EXECUTIVE SUMMARY In May 1997, MAP recommended to the State of Wyoming a "Cost-Based Block Grant" for school finance. That recommendation has subsequently been adopted. As part of its proposal, MAP recommended that the State of Wyoming eventually move towards the adoption of a modified "census-based" funding mechanism for special education. This report attempts to initiate a discussion about how such a mechanism might be implemented. The May 1997 report noted that a specific design of a modified census-based funding mechanism for special education could not be developed until the State "implement[s] procedures that allow tracking special education specific costs to each handicapping condition. When these data are available, MAP recommends adoption of a modified, census based formula." These procedures are not yet in place, and data are not yet available by which specific historical special education costs in Wyoming can be determined. When these data are available, the Wyoming Department of Education will develop detailed proposals to implement the modified census-based recommendation. In the absence of these data, the present report makes a number of estimates and assumptions in order to illustrate what these detailed proposals might look like. The eventual proposals of the Department of Education, however, may look very different from the illustrations in this report, as they will be based on actual data. | |
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