Lansing Rally for Education Draws About 200

A rally on the steps of Lansing's Capitol building seemed to have low turnout, according to those present.

Parents and educators who attended, however, said it was important to speak up, to show up and to continue fighting to preserve Michigan's education funding.

Fewer than 200 people attended the rally, but several local faces made the trip to speak their minds.

Sheila Paton, a co-chairwoman of the Plymouth-Canton Community Schools' Legislative Action Network, addressed the crowd, urging people to continue fighting for funding.

Anita Barschat, chairwoman of Northville's Legislative Action Network, also spoke.

State lawmakers want to take money previously set aside for kindergarten through 12th grade public education and use it elsewhere. Some of the money would be diverted to universities and community colleges. Another portion would be used to help reduce the state's $1.6 billion in debt.

While the figure hasn't been finalized -- Senate and House budget bills are being reconciled this week -- school districts across the state are looking at losing nearly $450 per pupil in state aid.

That translates into a loss of more than $15 million for, the third-largest district in the state. The change in state funding has led to Plymouth-Canton officials to propose $18 million in cuts, including letting 269 employees go and closing . The proposed budget also called for increasing class sizes by 2 students in each grade.

Judy Mardigian, Plymouth-Canton school board's treasurer, said the district faces "the biggest wholesale class size increases that I can remember since I got involved 18 years ago."

Mardgian said she got involved in education during a fight to reduce class sizes more than 18 years ago, at a time when fourth and fifth grade classes had between 34 and 37 students. Current figures cap kindergarten at 26 per kindergarten; first through third grades at 29; fourth and fifth grades at 30; and middle and high school classes at 33.

"This is the tsunami we saw coming," said John Jackson, Plymouth-Canton's school board president, after Michigan Representatives approved a bill cutting funding by $426 per student. He said the overall impact of the cuts will be "huge … Once again, Lansing has imposed cuts and not provided tools to help such as retirement reform which, by the way, is going to go up and be tacked on to top of this cut.  This is a sad day for our children and the State of Michigan."

Jackson had said he planned on being at the funding rally with other school officials and parents.

The rally was sponsored by the Parent-Teacher Association of Michigan.

Paton had said before the rally that she hopes to see a big crowd, but said the event is a bit of a "Catch 22" for teachers, who were scheduled to be in class. She said many parents are supportive but had said they could not make the trip.

"Honestly, I don't think the vast majority of parents recognize what this is going to look like if these funding cuts take place," she said at the time.

Paton is hopeful that recent news that the state's financial situation might be better than expected-- with a possibility of an additional $500 million in revenue--might ease some of the pressure on schools.

Still, she said, state funding cuts are being combined with pressure by lawmakers for education reforms which she said "are just not reasonable.

"I think there's a lot of things they can do that would make sense and not go against their current philosophy," Paton said.

Michigan Rep. Kurt Heise (R-Plymouth), who has two children in Plymouth-Canton schools, voted against the House bill, but said cuts are inevitable. He said he would like to minimize the severity of cuts to the schools he represents (Wayne-Westland, Plymouth-Canton and Northville), but said that it will be an uphill battle.