School Funding Made Simple

The Quality Basic Education Act was adopted by a unanimous vote of both houses of the Georgia General Assembly and signed into law by Governor Joe Frank Harris in 1985. It was a giant step forward in the financing of Georgia's public schools. The QBE Act put into place a logical and comprehensive framework for providing a quality basic education to every student in Georgia. Although it did not address all aspects of an adequate education, the new law improved the funding for what it defined as a basic program. There was a significant increase in the level of State and local support, which took into account the varying resources of local school systems.

The majority of State Funds are provided to operate public schools and are calculated using the following Quality Basic Education (QBE) formula:

(1) QBE "Earnings" + (2) Categorical Grants +/- (3) Equalization + (4) Adjustments for Special Factors

In FY2008 the State's share of this cost ($7.2 billion out of $9 billion) represented 81% of the total amount of QBE Formula Earnings. This percentage appears to exceed the original goal of 80% in the QBE Act. The crucial problem in Georgia - and a major cause of the Constitutional violation - is that the estimated cost of the basic program, as defined by the QBE Formula, is far short of what a local system would have to spend to comply with the minimum State requirements, without even considering whether the minimum State requirements are enough to provide for an adequate education. Now in FY2012 the State's share of this cost ($5.6 billion out of $8.5 billion) represents only 66% of the total amount of QBE Formula Earnings.