POCATELLO — Pocatello-Chubbuck School District 25 has officially come out against an education reform plan backed by State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Luna, arguing it adds new costs at a time when the state can’t cover existing expenses.

    School board members, who hosted a special meeting Tuesday to discuss the plan, even took exception with the name of Luna’s plan, called “Students Come First.”

    “The legislation itself is insulting in its title, thinking that any one of the school boards in this state would not put children first,” board members wrote in the document they authored outlining their position on the plan.

    They noted past policy changes, including core standards and heightened graduation requirements, involved considerable input and time for research. Luna’s proposed legislation, they argue, wasn’t based on sufficient input or extensive research. They suggest implementing pilot programs to test various aspects of the plan, which could be used to measure success or as a basis for modifications.

    Luna introduced the plan Thursday in the form two bills. It’s been largely popular among major business groups but has drawn sharp criticism from teachers, school district officials and parent-teacher organizations.

    Specifically, the plan would invest heavily in technology — every ninth grader would be issued a laptop computer beginning next school year — and pay for it

partly by increasing class sizes and reducing the number of teaching positions statewide by 770 over two years.

    The plan also calls for basing teacher pay in part on performance, offering new teachers two-year rolling contracts instead of tenure, and allowing parents to have input on teacher evaluations. It would allow colleges and universities to operate charter schools and salary negotiations between districts and teachers would be held annually in public meetings. The two bills have been sent to print by the Senate Education Committee, commencing the public comment process.

    Jason Hancock, of the Idaho State Department of Education, lauded the plan as a way to keep good teachers in Idaho classrooms and to equip students to excel in an increasingly technological world.

    “We're trying to get our kids ready for that world,” he said.

    School District 25 board members, however, pointed to a list of examples of lost funding or funding shortfalls by the state including: technology, maintenance dollars, lottery funding, gifted and talented student funding, teachers’ supply allotments, textbooks, transportation funds, field trips and the teachers’ salary schedule, among other areas.

    “How will the reforms in the proposed legislation be funded in perpetuity? How will the funding for this be guaranteed when current funding isn’t guaranteed?” the District 25 board members questioned in their statement. “Meanwhile, the

Legislature has yet to determine the level of funding for the 2011-12 school year. The reform-based legislation does nothing to address the cost increases that school

districts will be forced to absorb just to open their doors next fall with or without various staffing levels. When will the state begin to realize that school boards are faced with annual cost increases and have to find ways to cover them?”

    The board also took exception with the plan’s pay-for-performance language, noting studies have shown such practices usually fail due to the lack of sustainable funding and objective measures upon which to make pay-for-performance decisions. Furthermore, they argued performance-based pay promotes competition rather than collaboration among staff members.

    The board believes the Luna plan would also erode local control for educating children and place “most decision making in the hands of the Legislature and the state superintendent of public education.”

    “Trustees are the locally elected officials who operate local school districts and maintain labor relations with their employees and the community,” they wrote. “They bear the local responsibility for the political and educational success of the system."