How Alaska Public School Funding Levels are Calculated in 2023

The State of Alaska has a complex way of providing equitable funding to Alaska’s public schools through the Foundation Funding Formula (AS 14.17.410). It is a layered approach that starts with the amount of students enrolled during the annual count period due in a report to the State of Alaska on November 5th.

The Average Daily Membership (ADM) is adjusted through a number of steps that apply for school size, district cost, special needs, vocational & technical, intensive services count and correspondence students to make the adjusted ADM that calculates the entitlement.

See more detail here:

https://education.alaska.gov/schoolfinance/foundationfunding

If you click on this link, look at the document titled, Public School Funding Task Force document. This 7-page document has the process outlined in a step-by-step narrative and also a helpful table. Nome Public Schools is used as an example for the table that shows how their schools State Aid and Quality Schools sum to equal the total entitlement.

As a long calculation the State of Alaska DEED Foundation Funding Formula starts with a number based on enrollment then adjusted for school size. The 8 school sizes categories are based on numbers of students enrolled in the school 1) 10-19.99, 2) 20-29.99, 3) 30-74.99, 4) 75-149.99, 5) 150-249.99, 6) 250-399.99, 7) 400-749.99, 8) over 750 and are adjusted by adding 39.60 to a formula. See the chart in the link for more detail. An example given in the Nome example is for a projected ADM of 330 students school size calculation is 326.10+(.97x(330-250))=403.70. This school size adjustment is where schools with 10 students or less do not receive an adjustment and districts struggle to keep these schools open.

The school size adjusted total is combined with the other schools in the district and then district cost factor is applied as well as the special needs, career technical education, intensive service, correspondence to active at the adjusted ADM. Once this is calculated then it is multiplied by the base student allocation to get the BASIC NEED.

The Basic Need is reduced by the local contribution and the eligible federal Impact Aid to calculate the total State Aid. Eligible schools also adjust for Quality Schools. So State Aid + Quality Schools = Total Entitlement.

The State of Alaska provides each district a spreadsheet to ensure proper calculations in a workbook and technical assistance.

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