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Opinion | If legislators won’t fund our schools, it’s up to us ‘Invest In MI Kids’
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Every new school year brings perennial anxieties for students, teachers, and parents alike: Will my teacher like me? Will I have the same lunch period as my friends? The school supplies cost HOW much?? (I see you, parents!) As a former teacher of 18 years, I deeply understand the excitement and worries of a new school year, along with the money families and teachers alike spend every August. But this year in Michigan, political games on top of chronic underfunding are adding an unnecessary layer of back-to-school anxiety.
District administrators are also enduring sleepless nights. The deadline to pass a state budget has come and gone, and our Legislature has failed to successfully negotiate a budget for our public schools. Local districts’ fears are compounded by potential cuts to special education and Title I funding coming from the federal level. We know there will be less money to cover student needs, but we have no idea how much less. Now, regular anxiety around a new school year has intensified for many families.
Can families count on free lunch? Will we have to cut programs? Will we lose teachers if we can’t settle a contract that at least keeps pace with inflation?
We don’t know.
But there is a solution, and by working together, we could have a chance to vote for it in 2026.
The people have decided to stop waiting for our legislators to end the political gridlock: We are taking school funding into our own hands with the Invest in MI Kids ballot proposal initiative, which began collecting signatures on August 15.
Invest in MI Kids is a proposed constitutional amendment to fund K-12 schools in Michigan with a 5% surcharge on annual taxable income over $1,000,000 for joint filers and over $500,000 for individuals. This initiative would generate over $1 billion in revenue annually for public schools. These funds would be constitutionally protected and directed toward three key areas: classroom instruction, educator support, and career and technical education.
If passed, the Invest in MI Kids proposal would provide stable revenue for schools starting in January of 2027 — regardless of any political shifts. This matters because unfortunately, districts’ reasonable financial anxiety is not a one-year problem caused by a particularly stagnant Legislature. On top of the budgeting madness and national cuts of 2025, Michigan public schools still face a $4.5 billion shortfall caused by years of disinvestment in our children.
Even after Governor Gretchen Whitmer signed historic school budget increases in 2023, Michigan remains in the bottom tenth in the nation in funding that reflects inflation and adjusts for the “weights” of needs for students from low-income backgrounds. From 2002 to 2015, inflation-adjusted funding for Michigan’s public schools declined by 30%. Michigan was 50th among the 50 states in funding growth. Funding has trended upward since, but it remains well below funding levels of the early 2000s in real dollars.
In other words, even if the Michigan House and Senate can agree on a budget, and even if it’s generous, Michigan’s schools will still be woefully underfunded. The School Finance Research Foundation found that Michigan districts will need $23 billion just to maintain adequate facilities through 2033.
The Invest in MI Kids proposal is the first step in reversing the decades-long trend of starving our schools and creating a stable revenue base for all Michigan school districts. This funding is the floor, however, not the ceiling. Voters will still need to be vigilant to elect pro-education legislators and then hold them accountable for their stewardship of this revenue and their passing of adequate, timely budgets.
With all of this chaos at the state and federal levels, it’s clear that we need to put permanent solutions in place. Public school districts, the families they serve, the staff they employ, and the children they teach all deserve adequate, reliable funding. We can’t wait any longer–now is the time to demand more for our communities.
Earlier this month, as so many deal with the anxiety and expense of back-to-underfunded-school, thousands of petition circulators hit the streets. We are collecting signatures to get this essential proposal on the ballot, and we need you! Find us at InvestInMIKids.org to sign the Invest in MI Kids petition to get stable, equitable public education funding on the ballot in 2026. Investing in our communities and our kids today is a long-term investment in a bright future for our state.
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