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The Negative Factor
April 25, 2018
The amount of money that each Colorado student is alloted by the state each year is determined by the School Finance Act formula. Essentially, this formula takes a base amount of per-pupil funding, which is the amount that must increase each year per Amendment 23, and then takes into account additional variables to give schools more funding. For example, factors such as the size of a school district, the cost of living in the area, and the number of students in the district who qualify for free and reduced lunch could all represent ways for districts to increase their state funding (Great Education Colorado).
The negative factor is a coined term to represent a piece added to the School Finance Act formula in 2009. The negative factor allows the variables that would otherwise increase school funding to be manipulated so that the actual amount (base plus variables) spent on each district doesn’t change from year to year. The legislature calculates the required base for each school year based on Amendment 23, and then it decreases the amount that a district receives for its variables accordingly. According to the Colorado Legislative Council Staff’s Issue Brief on the negative factor, “the cost of the negative factor has grown from… $130 million, to its present value in [fiscal year] 2015-16 of about $855 million.”