Teachers say they feel politically attacked as education funding hangs in limbo

Vital education funding faces another year without renewal, and state lawmakers can’t agree on a plan to revive or replace it.

Arizona’s state Legislature is three months into session, but lawmakers have not complied with a court order requiring legislators to fix the state’s unconstitutionally inadequate funding system for public schools, or renewed an expiring education funding stream. 

Instead, the Republican-controlled state Legislature is prioritizing bills that micromanage school instruction, threaten educators with criminal or legal penalties, and force national political issues into Arizona schools and classrooms, education advocates say. Teachers also say they need to know that they can sustain themselves and their families on their salaries and see the government investing in their careers. 

“We are done with being politically attacked, we are done with being scapegoated for things that we are not in control of and we are demanding real investment in our schools today,” said Marisol Garcia, president of the Arizona Education Association, in a March 18 news conference.

Proposition 123 is a voter-approved constitutional amendment that passed in 2016 and used revenue from the Arizona State Land Trust as a key source of public education funding, but it expired last year. 

Prop. 123 accounts for about $300 million in school funding each year. Once it expired, lawmakers backfilled the money with the state general fund instead of sending a ballot measure to voters to renew it.

Extending Prop. 123 is an opportunity to fund public schools that works and has been successful, Garcia said. 

But, it doesn’t seem likely that voters will have a chance to renew the measure this election season.

On March 20, Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs pulled out of state budget negotiations with Republican lawmakers over a disagreement on Prop. 123 renewal.  

In a statement, Arizona Senate and House Democratic Leaders Priya Sundareshan and Oscar De Los Santos said state Republican lawmakers abandoned bipartisan efforts to renew Prop. 123.

“Arizona Legislative Democrats have been clear about our priorities. Renewing Prop. 123 is about supporting hundreds of thousands of students in critically underfunded public schools, preventing school closures, supporting educators, and ending the cycle of temporary budget fixes as the original measure expires,” according to the statement.

Republican legislators need to show their support for public education with action, said Delia Lyding, a 19-year education veteran and elementary school math interventionist in the Kyrene Elementary School District. She added that more than 90% of Arizona students attend  public schools.

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“I have worked in the public education sphere for nearly 20 years, and we’ve never been appropriately fully or adequately funded,” Lyding said. “My students go without, and every year they go without more and more, so I would just ask Republican legislators to work with us and not against us.”

Without the continuation of Prop. 123, schools will receive less funding—because rehauling Prop. 123 would just continue existing funding, not allocate any new funds to schools, Lyding said. Without it, districts and schools will need to sustain programs with less money, she added.

At the beginning of this month, a judge ordered state lawmakers to properly fund school construction and maintenance in Arizona, giving them eight months to change the public school funding system—though Republican state lawmakers filed an appeal.  

Six months before the order, the same judge ruled that the state of Arizona’s public school funding system is unconstitutional and inequitable. 

“We are living with the consequences of the legislature’s continued failure to invest in public education,” said Anastasia Jimenez, president of the Phoenix Union Classified Employee Association, representing educational support professionals. “Every year that lawmakers delay meaningful school funding, our staff pay the price, the burnout is real, the impact is real, and this year we’re facing reductions in force or RIFs that have shaken families and communities, because when you don’t fund schools, districts are forced to cut people, not needs.”

Arizona’s teachers have been living and working in this reality for years, and many said they are becoming discouraged with the reality they are living in. 

“We’re taught and we regurgitate that if you work hard, this country rewards you for it, but it seems like teachers are conveniently left off of that slogan,” said Emmett Burnton, a history teacher in Deer Valley Unified School District and Arizona’s 2025 teacher of the year. 

“Why would you enter a career that you can’t sustain yourself on, let alone a family? We are losing not just future teachers, we are losing future leaders when we do not respect what teachers provide for a community, when we do not invest in teachers,” he said.

What is the Republican-led Legislature focusing on instead? 

House Bill 2575 would make educators legally and financially liable for classroom instruction that is perceived to include references to antisemitism or antisemitic conduct and its broad definitions could suppress instruction and education on the Holocaust, some civil rights advocates say. It has passed through the House and Senate Education Committee with a Republican majority

Senate Bill 1435 and Senate Bill 1567 would ban “sexually explicit” materials from public schools and libraries, and would threaten librarians, teachers, and other school staff with felony charges if a student or underage library patron can access sexually explicit material. Both passed through the Senate and House Government Committee with a Republican majority.

House Bill 2040 would require schools to provide instruction about adoption and adoption resources in its sex education curricula, but provides no funding to allow school districts to purchase vetted instructional materials. It passed through the House and Senate Education Committee with a Republican majority.

Senate Bill 1572, would require every public school district to observe “Celebrate Freedom Week” and to devote the majority of instruction on Sept. 25 to civics education, regardless of the individual education needs of enrolled students. It provides no funding to support educator training or implementation. It passed through the Senate and House Education Committee with a Republican majority.