A press release from the office of Gov. Mitch Daniels announced the state will reduce funding to K-12 schools by $297 million in the 2010 calendar year beginning with the January payment. Information provided by the state office said the reduction will be applied evenly to all school corporations using the current funding formula. The reduction represents 2.7 percent of the total $11 billion schools receive from all sources or 3.5 percent of current state funding.

“We reduced everything else first and much more deeply, but K-12 education is half the entire budget and it became unavoidable for it to become part of the solution,” said Daniels.

He said kindergarten through twelfth grade spending is half of the state’s budget, or about $6.5 billion annually. Daniels indicated that education reductions were a last resort.

Delphi Community School Corporation Ralph Walker said Tuesday that he is unclear at this time exactly in what areas the funding decreases will be taken.

“We received word that the funding cut will be three percent,” Walker said. “We don’t know exactly yet how our funding will be affected.”

“We basically have an $11 million budget for 2010,” he continued. “We expect the loss of funding to be at least $225,000. Considering the cash balances in all of our funds, we should be alright.”

Walker said funding from the state will be received around Jan. 15.

“Then we will have an idea of how much and where our budget is affected,” he said.

“Any district can find two or three percent savings without reducing teaching staff,” Indiana Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Bennett said. “If everyone, including teachers themselves will pitch in, we’ll get through this recession just fine.”

Hoosiers are encouraged to use the Indiana State Board of Education “Citizens’ Checklist” if their school corporation suggests teacher layoffs. The checklist includes a list of efficiency measures school corporations can take to avoid reducing the number of teachers. The checklist can be found at in.gov/gov/files/2009_isbe_c hecklist.pdf for the State Board of Education checklist.