Bill aims to help keep school counselors

02/24/2005

Norman Draper, Star Tribune
February 23, 2005

A bill introduced in the Minnesota House aims to open up more funding to hire and keep school counselors, whose ranks have been reduced by budget cuts over the past several years.

The bill, sponsored by Rep. Randy Demmer, R-Hayfield, would allow districts to use a tax fund called the “safe schools levy” to pay salaries and benefits for counselors. That levy is now used for such costs as police liaison services, drug prevention programs, school security, and other crime prevention and safety measures.

The bill would also raise the maximum tax levy amount from the current $27 per pupil to $30. Demmer said the changes that he is proposing might allow a school board to keep a counselor it might have ordinarily had to cut.

“In a nutshell, we have some really good folks doing good things,” Demmer said. “This gives school boards another way to fund them.”

A companion bill has been introduced in the Minnesota Senate.

Most recent national statistics have shown that Minnesota ranks almost near the bottom in terms of the ratio of students to counselors, with an average of 806 students per counselor in grades K-12. That’s more than three times the ratio recommended by national experts and much higher than the national average.