Investigation: Akron Public Schools' error lands district extra $800K in state funding

An Akron Public Schools administrative error caused the district to receive a larger amount of funding than it deserved from the state's new science of reading law, depriving other districts of much-needed dollars to use toward a new curriculum, a Beacon Journal investigation has revealed.

Akron was one of only two districts in the state to receive more than $1 million of the $64 million the state allotted for districts to buy new curriculum materials that align with the science of reading. The only problem was, Akron already had an aligned program in place.

All districts in Ohio received at least some money from the allotment, but the amount varied based on whether districts already had compliant programs or needed to buy new ones.

While other districts in Summit County and across the state received less than they needed to buy a new curriculum to comply with the state mandate, Akron received four times as much as it should have to pay for a program it already owned.

APS spokesman Mark Williamson confirmed the wrong information was provided to the state about what programs Akron was using, but said it was an oversight, and it was not known at the time that the state would use the information to determine funding.

What happens next, including whether the state will ask for the money back, is not clear.

Ohio Department of Education and Workforce Chief of Communications Lacey Snoke said in a statement that the department is "looking into this issue."

"The information you shared regarding potential misreporting is concerning," she said.

Akron Chief of Staff Angela Carter said the district would await guidance from the state.

"We have not received any official communication from the state and will address and proceed based on state guidance," her statement said.

State survey used to determine funding

The issue stems from a survey the state sent to districts in September 2023.

Gov. Mike DeWine's budget, passed that summer, included a mandate for districts to use a curriculum based in the science of reading, a way of teaching reading that aligns with brain science. As part of the new law, districts would have to report what they were using, and then make a change if those programs were not on a new state-approved list.

The state also promised funding for the forced change, but did not indicate initially how that would be distributed. The legislature set aside $64 million for what it called " high-quality instructional materials ."

On the survey, the state asked districts to explain what they were using for any pre-kindergarten programs, their core elementary English language arts curriculum and for any intervention programs for struggling students.

Based on those answers, mostly to the question about core curriculum, the state assigned a rating for districts, designating them either "aligned," "partially aligned" or "not aligned."

This spring, the state then used those designations to determine how much funding districts should receive, relying on district-reported information, but also asked districts to alert the state by May 17 if anything looked amiss. APS did not raise any issues about its reporting, the state confirmed.

The state's designations and funding allocations for each district are published on the state's website, but the Akron mistake was not discovered until a reporter asked questions about it.

Aaron Churchill, Ohio research director for the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, an education think tank, said there was "a system of trust," but that the state likely didn't have another option, with more than 600 school districts in Ohio.

"The Department of Education doesn't have a whole bunch of people going around and checking curriculums," he said.

But in order for everyone to get a fair slice of the pie, each district needed to report accurately what they were using, or it could skew a larger amount of funding toward one district and away from the others.

Akron bought Wonders program in spring 2022

The survey was sent to superintendents , who were permitted to delegate the task to another administrator. The state confirmed another APS administrator, not the superintendent, filled out the form.

That administrator left off the district's biggest piece of its core curriculum, a program called Wonders 2023.

The district bought Wonders 2023 , a curriculum rooted in the science of reading, in May 2022 for $1,765,957.

The district had already fully bought in on the philosophy, but Wonders was the district's first K-5 program that was fully in line with the science of reading, which heavily emphasizes phonics and teaching kids skills to sound out or "decode" words.

The district implemented the program that fall. But when asked on the state survey what curriculum the district was using for the 2022-23 school year, the administration only included Heggerty, a program used for the district's youngest students. While also rooted in the science of reading, Heggerty is not a core curriculum, as its sole focus is on phonemic awareness, or teaching students the sounds letters make.

As a result, the state assumed Akron only had Heggerty. It designated Akron as "not aligned" with the science of reading, and allocated $1,000,741 to buy a new core curriculum. The district received another $154,188 to pay for new intervention materials.

But it was the core curriculum amount that was inflated due to the inaccurate answer.

Williamson, the district spokesman, said the online survey did not offer Wonders 2023 as an option to choose in the drop-down menu, but that whoever filled it out missed that there was an option to choose "other" and to write in another curriculum.

At $1,000,741, the district received $104.58 per student in grades pre-K through 5.

At least one other district in the state by that time was using Wonders 2023 and was able to report it. That district, Trotwood-Madison City Schools, outside of Dayton, wrote in that program after selecting "other" from the drop-down menu. As a result, the district was designated "aligned" and received just $20.91 per student for core materials.

Columbus City Schools also was designated an aligned district and received $20.91 a student for core curriculum.

If Akron had received funding based on that per-student rate, it would have received only $200,096.15

Instead, Akron received $1,000,741. That's a difference of $800,644.85.

Akron Public Schools has spent $197,141 of the state money so far and ordered another $691,089 worth of science-of-reading materials, Treasurer and Chief Financial Officer Steve Thompson said.

Other districts plug funding gaps to buy new materials

Summit County had several districts that were considered not aligned or partially aligned that were required to make changes for this school year.

The Cuyahoga Falls City School District, as one example, had purchased a curriculum in July 2021 that was not based on the science of reading, only to have the state implement a mandate two years later. In order to comply with the new law, the district had to spend $449,363.87 on a new core curriculum. The district only received $152,907 from the state for a new curriculum. It also received about $30,000 for intervention programs, although those dollars were adjustable, and could be spent either on core or interventions, as long as they were spent on science-of-reading materials.

That still left the Falls well short of the amount of money needed to comply with the state mandate.

"We were under the impression that we were going to receive more moneys to do this change," Assistant Superintendent Jodie Hausmann said.

The district had leftover federal stimulus dollars it could use to plug the gap, but that meant those dollars couldn't be spent on other pandemic recovery strategies.

Other districts, like Tallmadge City Schools, that didn't have any available stimulus dollars were left to plug the gaps with general fund dollars.

Tallmadge spent $286,503 on a new curriculum, and received only about a third of that amount from the state.

Churchill, from the Fordham Institute, said the fact that the $64 million in available state finds isn't enough to fully pay for everyone's new program made it even more important for everyone to receive their fair share.

The intent of the program, he noted, was to support the schools that needed to make a change as a result of the law.

"I think that would be something that worried me, if I'm a district that did accurately report my curriculum to the state, that did need the dollars more than a district like Akron," Churchill said. "That would be frustrating to me."

As the state mandate takes effect, the Fordham Institute has highlighted how implementation will be just as important as the mandate itself.

"The high-quality instructional materials program is a critical program in implementing the science of reading statewide," Churchill said. "Having the dollars go out based on honest, accurate information is really important."

Contact education reporter Jennifer Pignolet at jpignolet@thebeaconjournal.com, at 330-996-3216 or on Twitter @JenPignolet.

This article originally appeared on Akron Beacon Journal: Investigation: Akron Public Schools' error lands district extra $800K in state funding