Idaho committee hears overview of K-12 funding as attendance, one-time federal dollars reshape appropriations

Jared Tetrault, deputy division manager in the Legislative Services Office Budget and Policy Analysis Division, told the Joint Finance-Appropriations Committee on March 4 that Idaho’s public school support budget is largely formula-driven and sensitive to changes in attendance and support-unit counts.

Tetrault said the state distributes most K-12 funding through “support units,” and that “for every support unit the state will fund 1.55 full-time equivalent positions.” He told the committee the state allocates salary-based apportionment for administrators, classified staff and the career ladder separately and that the Public Education Stabilization Fund (PSIF) is used to reconcile appropriations with actual distributions to districts.

The overview matters because the state’s per-unit allocations and one-time federal dollars have altered how much recurring money districts expect. Tetrault told legislators that a recent shift back to counting average daily attendance — as required by Idaho law — produced an effective drop in counted support units compared with pandemic-era counting methods, a change he said accounts for a reduction of roughly 200 support units in the current estimates. That shift, he said, has the practical effect of lowering some appropriations even when enrollment is roughly flat.

Committee members pressed for additional detail and data. Senator Ward Engle King asked why support units fell despite similar…