The Maine Department of Education will hold a series of listening sessions this week to hear from local school officials about the state's school funding formula.
Representatives of the Department and the Maine Policy Research Institute will meet with superintendents, teachers and other stakeholders to talk about how the funding formula aligns with current needs at schools across Maine.
Lewiston Superintendent of Schools Jake Langlais said he believes the formula should include some kind of metric that weighs a community's capacity to raise additional tax dollars.
"I really think that the model asks too much of lower income communities. Lewiston Public Schools is the highest receiver in the state of Maine but we also have by far the highest level of need because of community and demographics and poverty," he said.
Langlais said Lewiston's limited commercial base and low income demographic place a burden on taxpayers to support vulnerable students in the district. He said it took three votes for the community to pass this year's budget.
The Department will present its findings on the funding formula to the legislature in March.
