Two Education Facts About Murphy’s 2025 Budget
February 27, 2024
NJEA Leaders Praise Murphy’s ‘Progressive’ Budget
February 28, 2024Murphy Touts His $12 Billion Education Budget
In a press release issued shortly after Gov. Murphy began his address, the Governor’s Office explained the education slice of the $55.9 billion state budget for Fiscal Year 2025:
The proposed budget continues Governor Murphy’s commitment to maintaining New Jersey’s status as the best-in-the-nation public school system. It completes the seven-year phase-in of the school aid formula by providing an increase of $908 million in direct K-12 aid for public schools, for a total of almost $12 billion. With this latest proposal, the State will have increased overall K-12 support to New Jersey’s public schools by more than $3.5 billion over seven years, a more than 40 percent increase, all of which helps offset local property taxes.
Further advancing the goal of universal pre-K, the Governor has proposed an additional $124 million for pre-K education, of which $20 million will be used to expand into new districts, creating over 1,000 new seats. Since FY2018, pre-K funding has already increased by over $427 million and the State has already added over 14,600 seats, pushing New Jersey ever closer to the goal of universal pre-K.
The Governor continues the work of expanding opportunities for teachers, budgeting over $15 million in investments to ensure New Jersey is able to attract, train, and retain the workforce necessary to provide a top-quality education for public school students now and in future years. This includes $10 million for student-teacher stipends to help future educators meet the costs of living while working and studying for their credentials and $5 million to fund the Teacher Loan Redemption Program.
In addition to record school funding and initiatives to train teachers, the FY2025 budget continues the Governor’s focus on providing for children by allocating more than $100 million of growth to support Cover All Kids, which provides health coverage for children.
The budget also proposes an additional $30 million to provide free school meals. In addition, New Jersey will join 34 other states to take part in the Summer EBT program, which will combat child hunger during the summer and bring in over $60 million in federal funds.
As one way to improve student literacy, the Governor is proposing a $2.5 million screening grant program to help school districts acquire tools to target resources to children who need additional help.
Photo courtesy of the Governor’s Office.
1 Comment
How will this directly impact my school district of Jefferson Township? WE HAVE BEEN HIT ESPECIALLY HARD OVER THE PAST 5 YEARS with the formulaic cuts. Our classes are very large, we keep laying off great teachers. And we cannot keep top performing teachers in our schools because they are paid in the bottom third of the state. Our taxes are already some of the highest in the state, but we don’t have enough industry to support our over burdened finances. Our kids computers are falling apart, we don’t have enough desks because they are also falling apart, and so much more. Please come visit and tell us what you are going to do with this money to help us.