1. The Legislature declares that the proper objective of state financial aid to public education is to ensure each Nevada child a reasonably equal educational opportunity. Recognizing wide local variations in wealth and costs per pupil, this State should supplement local financial ability to whatever extent necessary in each school district to provide programs of instruction in both compulsory and elective subjects that offer full opportunity for every Nevada child to receive the benefit of the purposes for which public schools are maintained. Therefore, the quintessence of the State’s financial obligation for such programs can be expressed by combining money raised pursuant to state law at the local level with state money to provide a certain basic level of support to each pupil in this State, adjusted to account for variation in the local costs to provide a reasonably equal educational opportunity to pupils and for the costs of providing a reasonably equal educational opportunity to pupils with certain additional educational needs. This formula is designated the Pupil-Centered Funding Plan.

2. It is the intent of the Legislature, commencing with Fiscal Year 2019-2020, to promote transparency and accountability in state funding for public education by accounting for all state financial aid to public schools and projected local financial aid to public schools, both on a per pupil basis and on a per program basis, and expressing the total per pupil amount of all such support.

3. It is the intent of the Legislature to accomplish the transition to the Pupil-Centered Funding Plan without causing an unexpected loss of revenue to any school district which may receive less money under the Pupil-Centered Funding Plan than the district received during the fiscal year ending on June 30, 2020. Except as otherwise provided in subsection 4, if a school district would receive less money under the Pupil-Centered Funding Plan than the district received during the fiscal year ending on June 30, 2020, it is the intent of the Legislature that the school district instead receive the same level of funding that the district received during the fiscal year ending on June 30, 2020, and be given the flexibility to reapportion money between its adjusted base per pupil funding and weighted funding in a manner similar to the apportionment of such money in the fiscal year ending on June 30, 2020, to ensure that each pupil in the district receives a reasonably equal educational opportunity.

4. It is the intent of the Legislature to ensure that no school district that receives a modified allocation of money as described in subsection 2 receives less funding in a school year than the school district received in the immediately preceding school year unless the enrollment in the school district continues to decline for a period of 2 years or more. In the event of such an enrollment decline, it is the intent of the Legislature to determine an appropriate method to mitigate the effects of a continued decline in enrollment, which may include, without limitation, appropriating money to the school district as if the number of pupils enrolled in the district equaled the average number of pupils enrolled in the district over a rolling 3-year period.

(Added to NRS by 1967, 889; A 1973, 1419; 1997, 1859; 2007, 1199; 2015, 3706; 2017, 3231; 2019, 3260, 4210, effective July 1, 2021)