This year, the RISD must send more than $50,000,000 back to the state as mandated by the current "Robin Hood" system of school finance. This equates to nearly $1,000,000 in lost funds for every school in our district, and it means that students in RISD will receive $1,800 less per student in education funding after recapture than the annual state average. Today, these are the cold hard facts of school finance for J.J. Pearce High School in Richardson, Texas.

This funding crisis negatively impacts our school in the following ways:

• There is no additional money to purchase state-of-the-art equipment for instruction.
• There is not enough money to purchase curriculum or pay for instructors for leadership, or SAT/ACT college prep courses, all of which would assist our students in attending the college of their choice.
• There is not enough money for teachers to attend professional development courses or conferences that help keep them up-to-date in their fields.
• There is not enough money to pay sponsors to support student participation in extracurricular competitions.
• There is not enough money to provide academic enrichments and experiences that give students opportunities to expand their horizons and set them apart from students at other high schools.
• There is not enough money to award "Grants for Good Ideas" for teachers to use to enhance academics in their classrooms.
• There is not enough money to keep class sizes smaller so that our teachers have more time to work with students on an individual basis.