TULSA, Okla. — On Wednesday lawmakers will meet for the first time to talk about education priorities for the upcoming session.
Members of the Tulsa Classroom Teachers Association tell 2 Works for You there are more costly demands in Tulsa classrooms than ever before.
The vice president said without a significant boost in funding, class sizes will grow, creating a vicious cycle for districts like TPS.
"We've made investments but we need to make more because if the investment were there now class sizes would be smaller, which would draw more families, which would draw more teachers. It's a cyclical thing on the positive side and on the negative side," Shawna Mott-Wright said.
TCTA is seeing needs go up across the district, from English as a second language to special education.
"If the students with the most needs are staying then that puts even more of a burden on the teachers, the support, the district to be able to provide resources for them," Mott-Wright said.
Going into this year, advocates hope to avoid legislation like credits for private schools, which takes dollars out of the funding formula. Mott-Wright hopes to get back to the amount of money invested in classrooms in 2007 and 2008.
"Here's what's sad. It's 2019. We're talking about 11 years ago being the standard to hit? Really? My daughter was one year old and now she's in 7th grade," she said.
Mott-Wright said there's also a lot of mobility in Tulsa, so although the budget is set, enrollment numbers could change throughout the year.
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