A sweeping state review of existing K-12 school district audits released Wednesday raised the prospect that more than half of 3rd graders might be held back in coming years, and elicited questions from top state leaders over simply how effective a $2.6 billion increase in state financing for education will be.

The 154-page report, revealed during a Wednesday conference of the Executive Branch Audit Committee, also raised concerns about moneying for free lunches lapsing and a state education firm lacking power to command responsibility. It follows Republican Gov. Joe Lombardo and Democratic legislators spent much of the 2023 legislative feuding over education policy, consisting of how best to track how districts will spend the largest K-12 spending plan in state history.

No single part of the audit was more controversial than a finding by auditors that "trainee accomplishment [is] not always based on dollars spent"-- a point that stirred sharp debate among the committee, which includes Lombardo, the state's five executive officers and one member of the general public.

Auditors discovered that the Clark County School District (CCSD) had actually underspent compared to the likewise sized districts in Miami, Chicago and Los Angeles-- however nonetheless, tracked just Miami in 4th grade mathematics and reading accomplishment, and directly went beyond trainee achievement rates in better-funded Los Angeles and Chicago school districts.

Lombardo called the section of the audit "a little disturbing," including that "$ 2.6 billion put into the education program for the state of Nevada, however yet this audit says that's, for absence of a better term, a waste of money."

Reacting to Lombardo's concern, Chief Auditor Craig Stevenson cautioned that the absence of a connection between financial investment and accomplishment noted in the report "is not to state that more cash invested doesn't necessarily lead to better outcomes."

" It truly pertains to how you invest that cash," Stevenson said.

The problem still struck a partisan chord. Chief Law Officer Aaron Ford, a Democrat, called the phrasing "misleading" and pressed Stevenson on why, if funding and achievement were not correlated, that financing and graduation rates were still correlated in the audit report.

" I see those as rather contradictory," Ford said. "And I wonder how the report juxtaposes these 2 inconsistent declarations within these 3 pages."

Controller Andy Matthews, a Republican, asked auditors how the state could even know if changes in trainee accomplishment outcomes had any relationship to financing, "instead of merely coincidental."

" How could we understand that absent that recognized connection?" Matthews stated.

Stevenson later on clarified that he did not think the audit report was indicating the $2.6 billion "will not move the needle."

" I believe it's stating that we need to make sure that we are targeting this investment towards certain things," Stevenson stated, singling out reading and mathematics as "critical performance components."

Coming from an executive order issued last February, the state's umbrella audit was tasked with examining existing third-party audits from the 2022 fiscal year in each of the state's 17 school districts, in addition to the Nevada State Public Charter School Authority.

In a declaration, Lombardo stated Thursday that his administration would utilize the findings to shape the "Acing Accountability" initiative, as well as new education reforms.

" I strongly think that our extraordinary financial investment into K-12 education warrants unprecedented accountability and financial obligation," Lombardo stated.

Auditors discovered that many rural school districts regularly stopped working to comply with state auditing requirements. By law, districts are needed to report spending every quarter, however only 4 counties-- Clark, Washoe, Humboldt and Nye counties-- did so in 2022.

District monetary supervisors told auditors they were either uninformed of the requirements or thought they were no longer necessary. "compliance with this statutory requirement is not kept track of," auditors stated.

Read by Grade 3 retentions loom

In summarizing their findings during a meeting of the audit committee Wednesday, auditors likewise found the Read by 3 program was underperforming statewide and that brand-new literacy targets were likely not ambitious enough.

As Lombardo's workplace and legislators have actually sought to rebuild the state's Read by Grade 3 program-- consisting of appropriating $140 million in brand-new financing in 2015-- auditors found less than half of Nevada third graders were proficient in reading, with reading ratings on a steady decline given that the 2018-2019 academic year.

With the revival of a step in 2023 that would keep back students who are not competent beginning in 2028, auditors stated a bulk of students might be kept back in the third grade-- "potentially resulting in impractical class sizes."

At the exact same time, auditors stated, the Nevada Department of Education's new literacy objectives-- to enhance literacy efficiency rates by 10 percent by 2025, from roughly 33 percent skilled to 43 percent-- were most likely too low. Other states, they stated, have set goals twice as high or greater, such as 88 percent by 2027 in Virginia or 100 percent in Ohio.

Still, they likewise mentioned a widespread worsening of literacy problems by existing teacher lacks, and gotten in touch with brand-new laws that would permit the state education department to better coordinate licensed teachers as devoted literacy professionals.

To that end, Lombardo's office revealed a $6 million allowance of leftover federal COVID aid dollars on Thursday aimed at supporting Read by Grade 3 facilities, consisting of two programs developed to train Nevada teachers on reading science and reading guideline.

Even as brand-new state efforts have actually sought to update and streamline K-12 responsibility procedures, auditors broadly dented the brand-new initiatives as "siloed," doing not have either an understanding of how brand-new outcomes will be examined or who is responsible for carrying out new changes.

To that end, the audit called on the creation of a host of brand-new legislation widening the powers of the Nevada Department of Education (NDE) and increasing its funding, consisting of a step that would allow the NDE to straight intervene "chronically underperforming schools" and offer the agency brand-new enforcement tools-- tools Lombardo compared to "a hammer."

" I think that when we discussed some of the intervention tools ... that's really what we're referring to is giving them the authority to have a hammer and enforce these things," Stevenson stated. "And not just get a letter that says yeah, we'll take some restorative actions, but then there's no impact if they do not take those corrective actions."

Free lunches set to lapse

Individually, auditors contacted local legislators to consider "all alternatives" to expand the availability or extend of complimentary school breakfast and lunches once the federal America Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) money funding universal totally free school lunch ends in July.

The suggestion comes in part, auditors stated, due to the fact that research has actually shown access to "healthy meals" reduces health issues and decreases the likelihood that trainees drop out of school. Widespread totally free school meals, they said "has actually been shown to reduce child food insecurity, get rid of social preconception associated with complimentary meals, and advantage households most in need through savings on groceries.

Democratic legislators had sought to approve $43 million in new financing to continue the program throughout the 2023 legislative session, but Lombardo banned the measure, mentioning possible food waste and a need to return to the "normalcy" of the pre-pandemic duration.

With the expiration of COVID-era meal subsidies looming, auditors gotten in touch with schools to tap other federal aid programs that offer trainees meals at no cost-- a relocation already taken by CCSD throughout the 2022-2023 school year, which used a U.S. Department of Agriculture repayment program to cover all of its more-than 300,000 trainees.

"I know it's not why we're here, but this is among the first times I've ever seen CCSD do something that was legally truly, really smart," said Treasurer Zach Conine, a Democrat.