INTRODUCTION 

RIBBE is a non-profit, non-partisan alliance of businesses and business organizations committed to taking action that improves Rhode Island’s public K-12 system. The organization’s top priority is ensuring that every student is provided a high-quality education to meet the demands of Rhode Island’s future competitive economy. By providing an informed business perspective, RIBBE advocates for a high-quality elementary and secondary education system in Rhode Island that better prepares every student to meet the demands of our future economy. 

For decades, the collective business community in Rhode Island has been deeply involved in preparing our students for the workforce and advocating for best practices within the state’s education system. However, in 2023, amidst the first real worsening of student outcomes in more than 20 years of tracking, RIBBE was founded. The organization’s creation came about after demand by elected officials, education leaders, and other advocates for the business community to form an official organization to help improve a system in crisis. 

As an organization, we are committed to guiding principles that put students first: 

● Equity: Businesses believe that every student - no matter their gender, race, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, income, or ability deserves equitable access to resources and opportunities to ensure that they can reach their full educational potential. 

● High Standards and Accountability: Businesses believe that students do their best when all stakeholders – including parents, educators, state and local leaders, labor, and management – are held accountable for students achieving high standards. 

● Innovation and Modernization: Businesses believe that students learn in different ways and that we need to push past the status quo to create opportunities for innovation and modernization in curriculum, approach, and infrastructure. 

● Support: Businesses believe that students deserve teachers and educators who are fully committed to student success and that students benefit when their teachers have access to high-quality training and professional development. 

● Workforce Readiness: Businesses believe that every student should graduate with the skills, knowledge, and credentials that are necessary for success in college or a career, recognizing that most jobs being created in Rhode Island require more than a high school diploma. 

Education State of Play 

Today, there are more than 130,000 public school students enrolled in K-12 across the state of Rhode Island’s 66 Local Education Agencies (LEAs). The McKee Administration has set ambitious goals to improve public education and compete with our neighboring states. While the state has made modest progress in recent years, the need for greater urgency to improve our schools remains. 

On the most recent Rhode Island Comprehensive Assessment System (RICAS), despite a three percentage point increase year over year, less than one in three students (30%) met grade level expectations in math. And it’s a similar story when it comes to English—a two percentage point boost from 2022 resulted in only one in three (33%) students meeting expectations. 

Rhode Island Career and Technical Education (CTE) programs have grown substantially in both quality and quantity in the last several years. The number of CTE programs statewide has grown from 155 to 278 since 2016 (79% increase), while the number of students enrolled in CTE programs has more than tripled in the same period (from 4,892 to 17,133). 

But, students can’t take advantage of this improved programming if they are not in school. 

Alarmingly, the proportion of Rhode Island students who are chronically absent—having missed at least 10 percent of school days—was 29% in the last full school year (2022-23). This year, 23% of students are currently on track to be chronically absent. While heightened by the pandemic, even beforehand, nearly one in five Rhode Island students was chronically absent, and Rhode Island had one of the highest chronic absenteeism rates in the country. 

For Rhode Island’s K-12 system to be successful, all schools need adequate funding. Rhode Island’s Funding Formula for Education began to be phased-in in FY 2012 and in its first ten years a greater proportion of state aid was directed towards urban core districts that have both high proportions of economically disadvantaged students and less ability to generate funds through local property taxes. However, with recent changes to the formula, that trend has reversed; while districts in Rhode Island’s urban core received nearly 60% of all increased funding in the formula’s first ten years, they have received less than half in the last three years. 

Rhode Island’s future prosperity requires that all students have access to a high-quality education. Multilingual learners (MLL) now comprise about one in eight students statewide, and it has never been more important that we focus on improving outcomes for these students. 

Historically, Rhode Island’s MLLs have faced a wider achievement gap than their peers in other states, and the Ocean State has directed less funding to support its MLLs. Last year, state categorical funding for MLLs was increased from $5.0 million to $19.4 million, but of the 31 states and Washington D.C. that provided MLL funding through a multiplier based on a per pupil amount, RI’s new multiplier of 15 percent remained the fifth lowest. 

Research has shown that, after a student’s background, nothing better indicates student success than the quality of their teachers. To better support student learning, we must support teacher learning. Professional development is a requirement of educator recertification in Rhode Island, but the state has not always supported critical professional development. In

2019, for instance, the state passed important legislation requiring all schools to adopt high-quality curriculum and materials for math and English language arts. It did not, however, provide the funding districts needed to provide professional development for the instructors tasked with successfully implementing the new curriculum. 

2024 LEGISLATIVE PRIORITIES 

As the pace of the Rhode Island General Assembly session picks up, RIBBE is weighing in on proposed investments and legislation that can propel Rhode Island students forward, preserve a steady state, or threaten the incremental progress our state has made in recent years. 

Our calculus for weighing in will always align with the guiding principles we agreed to when forming this organization. We strive to support proposals that will strengthen Rhode Island’s workforce and improve our economy, and we pledge to voice our objective concerns about proposals which we believe will have adverse impacts on students’ learning outcomes and their preparations for college or a career. 

School Funding: 

RIBBE SUPPORTS Governor McKee’s FY 2025 budget proposal to raise the amount for MLLs from 15 percent to 25 percent of the core instruction amount, thereby increasing aid by $16.6 million above the enacted amount. 

RIBBE SUPPORTS Senate Bill 2594/House Bill 7907, introduced by Senate Committee on Education Chair Cano and Representative Felix. This legislation would similarly raise the amount for MLLs to 25 percent of the core instructional amount but goes further than the Governor’s proposal by covering all MLLs (rather than only those in the most intensive programs) and would provide for greater flexibility in spending than under either the current model or the governor’s proposal. 

RIBBE IS CONCERNED by Governor McKee’s FY 2025 budget proposal to limit the growth in the funding formula’s core instructional amount to 3.9 percent (rather than its scheduled increase of 6.2 percent). This cap may negatively affect those districts with the greatest need which rely on state aid more than wealthier districts. Also, because the funding formula provides bonuses based on the core instructional amount for students in poverty and multilingual learners (student populations that are larger in urban core districts), reduction of the core instructional amount may have significant downstream effects. 

Career and Technical Education: 

RIBBE SUPPORTS the Governor’s FY 2025 budget request to fund 1.0 additional FTE at RIDE to help to plan, support, and monitor RIDE-approved CTE programs. Currently, there are two FTEs at RIDE focused on this work.

RIBBE IS CONCERNED by the lack of additional categorical funding for CTE programs in Governor McKee’s FY 2025 budget proposal. The state categorical fund that helps schools make initial capital investments in developing or transforming their CTE programs has not been increased since FY 2017, and Governor McKee’s FY 2025 budget proposal does not call for an increase on that $4.5 million appropriation. Categorical aid to CTE programs should be increased to reflect the increase in need and because CTE improves our education system. 

Student Chronic Absenteeism: 

RIBBE SUPPORTS Governor McKee’s Attendance Matters initiative and applauds the governor and Commissioner Infante-Green for taking the offensive in curbing chronic absenteeism. 

RIBBE SUPPORTS Senate Bill 2533/House Bill 7290, introduced respectively by Senate Committee on Education Chair Cano and House Committee on Education Chair McNamara. School and classroom leaders are best positioned to improve student attendance, and this legislation would help ensure the comprehensive response we need at the local level by requiring each local education agency to adopt a program to monitor absenteeism data and identify students who are at risk of being chronically absent. 

RIBBE SUPPORTS Senate Bill 2527, introduced by Senate Committee on Education Chair Cano. The legislation would require RIDE to establish a two-year attendance tracking and outreach pilot program in two high schools. 

Teacher Professional Development 

RIBBE SUPPORTS the Governor’s proposed $15 million investment to support professional development for educators. This funding, as proposed, would support math and ELA coaching for teachers and will be distributed to districts with the greatest academic need. 

CONCLUSION 

Rhode Island businesses have long agreed that our schools must provide every student with access to a high-quality education that prepares them for college and career. Through RIBBE, Rhode Island’s business community is demanding better results for every student, no matter their district. 

We focus on advocacy, accountability, and national best practices. Our initial agenda centers around the urgent crisis of student absenteeism, supporting the transformation and innovation of career and college pathways, and the state’s lingering gaps in student achievement. 

More information about RIBBE’s work is available at rhodeislandbbe.org.