As members of the Joint Budget committee, your work is so important for our state, our students, and our educators. As educators and educator supporters, today we sign this petition to ask you to prioritize K-12 education funding in the upcoming budget by pledging to, at a bare minimum, hold the budget stabilization factor flat for the upcoming budget year. While we know that budget decisions will be difficult, we also know that our education system cannot endure any further cuts.

Education funding took a major blow following the 2008 recession, and those cuts still have not been fully restored. Creating the budget stabilization factor, and the resulting underfunding of our schools, has caused huge negative impacts to our schools. There has been an increase in class sizes, a shortfall in academic and mental health supports for students who need them, understaffing, and daily situations in which facility and material needs go unmet as schools wait for funding to be restored. Our K-12 education system cannot continue to fulfill its obligation to our students with continuously decreasing resources.

We know Colorado’s students have suffered because of these budget cuts. Any further cuts to the education system will be catastrophic, and you have the power to prevent these cuts. Even though they have never been able to attend a fully funded education system in Colorado, students who are in school now are the future of the American economy. We owe it to them and we must invest in their education now to make sure that our state and country can thrive.

These uncertain times have proven how important K-12 Education is for our society. The intangibles that students receive from educators are impossible to list in totality. Students form relationships with educators that last a lifetime and impact every aspect of their current and future lives. In some cases educators are the only positive and constructive adult relationships that students have. Teachers and support staff are mentors, therapists, friends and protectors of students. The time, love, and emotion spent by educators to positively impact students is measurable.

Unfortunately, even with educators working their hardest to meet their students’ needs in this distance learning environment, these times have created greater educational gaps, increased mental health needs, and students cannot afford to go back to a school system with even fewer staff and resources. Schools and educators are critical to the physical, mental, and emotional well-being of students. Cutting funding to schools will hurt students more now than ever before.

Our ask is this: commit to prevent further cuts to public education by keeping the budget stabilization factor flat in the upcoming budget year.