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A wave of major budget cuts is hitting public schools across the state - a situation officials from four of Montana's largest districts attribute to declining enrollment, inflexibilities in the state's school funding formula, and a funding cliff facing schools as pandemic-era federal relief money runs out. District leaders from the Helena, Great Falls, Bozeman and Missoula public schools, meeting with reporters in Helena Friday, also said increased property values and the...
Over the past year, we've fielded many reader emails about charter schools in Montana. The curiosity is understandable - one of the two charter school laws passed by the 2023 Legislature is currently tied up in district court, and the other has already generated 19 public charters in nearly a dozen communities. But one recent email posed a question we hadn't yet covered: exactly how much state funding did the Montana Legislature direct toward these new educational...
State leaders from across Montana's K-12 and higher education systems convened on the University of Montana campus this week for a discussion on an array of new laws, regulations and initiatives approved throughout 2023. As Dylan Klapmeier, education policy advisory to Republican Gov. Greg Gianforte, noted, the past 12 months have seen the realization of numerous goals set by Montana's Board of Education last December. Those advancements include a host of measures passed by...
Gracie Johnson didn't want to be a pilot. At least, not when she first walked into her eighth-grade science class at Billings' Ben Steele Middle School. Her teacher, Patrick Kenney, quickly tapped her for a student project building an experimental aircraft at a private hangar, and while she found that work interesting, Johnson initially resisted Kenney's encouragement to step into a cockpit for a test flight. Eventually she agreed. "It just spiraled from there," Johnson told...
Earlier this month, Montana's Board of Regents approved a series of tuition increases for resident and nonresident students on university system campuses over the next two years. For in-state students, that means the cost of higher education will grow 4% per year in 2024 and 2025. For out-of-state graduate and undergraduate students, the increase will be roughly 6%. As Deputy Commissioner for Budget and Planning Tyler Trevor told regents during their May meeting, the primary f...
The 2023 session has a long way yet to go, but as of late last week, the special committee tasked with probing election integrity in Montana has all but completed its work. After returning from this month’s transmittal break, the Joint Select Committee on Election Security had just one lingering item left on its docket: finalizing a proposal addressing enforcement of state election laws. Agreement proved a bit more difficult than members anticipated. Democrats thought the duty of enforcing those laws should fall to the c...
A panel of four state legislators last week reached an impasse over who should become Montana’s next commissioner of political practices. Now, the task of narrowing the field to a single candidate falls squarely on Gov. Greg Gianforte, whose office has yet to provide a glimpse of any frontrunner. The goal of the Legislature’s COPP nomination committee on Dec. 28 was to screen the pool of applicants vying to replace Jeff Mangan and agree on at least two names to forward to Gianforte for his consideration. In all, five can...
Preliminary enrollment figures released by the Office of Public Instruction Thursday show a slight increase in Montana's K-12 student population this fall - the second consecutive year of gains following a significant dip during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. According to the latest headcount, conducted in public schools across the state on Oct. 3, Montana's statewide enrollment has reached 149,879 students. That's a 681-student increase from OPI's official enrollment...
The 2022 general election is Tuesday, Nov. 8, and as absentee ballots have already gone out, odds are that scores of Montanans are already busy filling in their votes. If you're not registered yet, are planning to vote at the polls, or are still confused about what election laws may or may not be in effect right now, Montana Free Press has endeavored to make things a little easier with our 2022 Election Guide. And since the legal landscape has been such a moving target this...
Olivia DeJohn laughs as she chalks up having found a classroom she loves so early in her teaching career to serendipity. She teaches second grade at Missoula's Paxson Elementary School, a job she quips "fell into my lap." She did her student teaching at Paxson while getting her master's degree at the University of Montana and, as a result, was asked to serve as a long-term substitute for an educator who had to go on leave. "Originally when I heard second grade, I was like,...
Under an order issued Tuesday by the Montana Supreme Court, Election Day voter registration will once again be prohibited in the state. The order overturned a district court injunction from March that blocked portions of four new election administration laws affecting voter identification requirements, ballot collection and voter registration. Montana Secretary of State Christi Jacobsen had requested a stay from the state’s high court earlier this spring as part of an ongoing lawsuit involving the four laws passed by R...
Gov. Greg Gianforte has officially ended the state's long-standing practice of allowing citizens to register to vote on Election Day, a change he said will help preserve the integrity of Montana's elections, but that critics have decried as a blatant attack on voter rights. Under House Bill 176, which Gianforte signed into law Monday, Montana voters will now be required to register no later than noon on the day before an election. Gianforte also signed Senate Bill 169,...
HELENA — Last month, Montana Free Press added a roundup of pertinent information for primary voters to its 2020 election guide. In the weeks since, a pair of legal cases have necessitated some updates. Here’s what’s happened so far. On May 1, five tribal governments and two Native voting rights organizations filed a motion in Yellowstone County District Court seeking a temporary injunction against Montana’s Ballot Interference Prevention Act. BIPA, which was approved by Montana voters on the 2018 ballot, established a stric...
