Educating Maryland’s children is one of the most important responsibilities of our state government, and this year has tested policymakers’ commitment to providing public schools the resources they need. Responding to unprecedented fiscal challenges, Gov. Wes Moore in January proposed deep cuts to schools to begin in the coming school year. The General Assembly reined in this proposal significantly and ultimately enacted a smaller set of funding cuts, with the majority beginning in the 2026–2027 school year. While lawmakers substantially improved on the governor’s plan, this year’s legislation represents the first long-term scaling back of an ambitious 2021 school funding reform, the Blueprint for Maryland’s Future. Maryland’s continuing fiscal challenges now pose a choice: Either raise the revenue necessary to support world-class schools in Maryland, or continue to chip away at education funding, just as we did in the years following the Great Recession.
Public School Funding Snapshot
- As implementation of the Blueprint for Maryland’s Future school funding reform continues, this year’s budget includes a 5.0% increase in state school funding per pupil, adjusted for inflation.
- Inflation-adjusted state funding per pupil increased in 22 of the state’s 24 school systems, ranging from a 0.2% increase in Garrett County to a 25.7% increase in Calvert County.
- In two school systems, state funding per pupil increased in nominal terms but did not keep up with inflation: Charles County (–0.7%) and Somerset County (–1.3%).
- Note: The large increase in Calvert County reverses a large drop in last year’s budget, because a temporary spike in utility-related property value briefly shifted a larger portion of funding responsibilities onto the county. Over the last two years, Calvert County’s inflation-adjusted state school funding per pupil declined modestly on net (–0.9%).
Lawmakers Reject Some Cuts, Scale Back Others
At the start of this year’s legislative session, cuts to public school funding played a major role in Gov. Moore’s plan to close looming budget deficits. The governor proposed $143 million in cuts for the budget year that began July 1 (FY 2026), growing to $817 million by FY 2030 – totaling $2.5 billion in reduced state funding over five years:
The core provision of the governor’s plan was a phased-in reduction to the base funding allocated for every student, known as the “foundation” portion of the public school funding formula. Compared to previous law, the reduction would have grown from a 1.8% cut in FY 2026 to a 6.6% cut by 2030. These cuts were scheduled to slowly phase out, with full funding restored in the late 2030s.
These cuts were linked to a legitimate problem in Blueprint reform implementation. Many school districts have struggled to hire and retain enough teachers to facilitate a planned increase in collaborative planning time, leading some experts to recommend delaying collaborative time requirements. However, the governor’s plan was a misguided response to this problem – taking away resources is unlikely to help school systems hire and retain teachers more effectively.
Because of the way Maryland’s school funding formula is built, cuts to foundation funding automatically trigger further reductions in resources for students with additional needs. Reduced support for English learners and students in low-income families accounted for one-fifth of the governor’s proposed cuts.
The governor’s plan exempted special education funding from these automatic cuts but would have still harmed students with disabilities through cuts to the other funding streams. The governor did not include exemptions for the other targeted programs.
The governor’s plan included two other major cuts. First, the plan delayed implementation of the innovative concentration of poverty program, meaning that schools facing the greatest challenges would receive fewer resources in the next few years than envisioned in the Blueprint legislation. Second, the plan cut funding for community partnerships to meet students’ behavioral health needs by 69%.
Finally, the proposed reductions to school funding requirements would have rippled out to county responsibilities as well, leading to an estimated $326 reduction in local education funding over five years on top of the $2.5 billion in state cuts.
Fortunately, lawmakers significantly scaled back the governor’s proposed cuts. This year’s enacted education law fully restores core formula funding for the current year (FY 2026). The law then reduces the per-pupil foundation amount by 1.8% in FY 2027, growing to a 3.4% cut by the end of the decade. Altogether, the legislature restored nearly half of the foundation funding cuts in the governor’s plan.
The legislature also exempted all core targeted programs from formula cuts, meaning schools will still receive additional resources to serve students in low-income families and English learners, in addition to students with disabilities. Lawmakers also rejected all cuts to concentration of poverty funding. The legislature scaled back cuts to behavioral health partnerships from $450 million over five years to only $180 million. The enacted law reduces local funding responsibilities by $113 million over five years, about a third as much as the reduction under the governor’s plan.
However, lawmakers added “trigger” language to broaden the conditions in which education cuts automatically take place:
- Under previous law, if the Board of Revenue Estimates reduced expected general fund revenues by at least 7.5% at its December meeting, as compared to the March estimates that the final budget is based on, the following year’s formula increases would be capped at the rate of inflation, meaning that none of the additional resources planned under the Blueprint would become available.
- Based on projected FY 2026 revenues, the general fund estimate would have to drop by about $2 billion to trigger this cap.
- Under the updated law, if projected combined revenues for the general fund and the Blueprint for Maryland’s Future Fund decline by at least 3.75% of the general fund total, the following year’s formula increases are canceled altogether – meaning that inflation-adjusted funding per pupil will actually go down.
- Based on projected FY 2026 revenues, the combined general fund and Blueprint Fund estimate would have to drop by about $1 billion to trigger flat funding.
- Because the broadened trigger does not even include inflation adjustment, any cut triggered after full implementation of the Blueprint plan will be baked into future inflation adjustments, resulting in a permanent funding cut.
Looking Ahead
Lawmakers’ actions to rein in Gov. Moore’s proposed cuts were the right choice, but that does not mean all is well.
The 2021–2022 inflation spike has already significantly eroded the Blueprint’s planned reforms. Based on contemporary inflation expectations, lawmakers originally intended for the FY 2026 per-pupil foundation amount to have almost 13% more purchasing power than the FY 2021 amount. Due to higher-than-expected inflation, the actual increase is only 2%. While the Blueprint was intended to significantly increase schools’ resources, they are just barely keeping up.
This year’s enacted law – while much less harmful than the governor’s proposal – represents the first major retreat from the Blueprint’s promises since lawmakers enacted the reform in 2021. By FY 2030, only one-third of the Blueprint’s planned increase in inflation-adjusted foundation funding will have actually occurred.
Ideally, lawmakers should cancel this year’s cuts, adjust funding upward to account for the 2021–2022 inflation spike, and build in real-time inflation adjustment going forward (on top of the real increases envisioned in the Blueprint).
At very least, the General Assembly and Gov. Moore should commit to avoid any additional cuts beyond those made this year. With multibillion-dollar deficits still only a few years out, the only way to protect our investments in Maryland’s children is sufficient revenue. This year’s tax reforms were a major step in the right direction, but there is work left to do. Adopting measures from the Fair Share for Maryland Act would strengthen the state’s fiscal position and help ensure than children from Ocean City to Cumberland and beyond will get the excellent education they deserve.