Putting Kansas Kids First.

Strengthening School and Community Partnerships

  • Kansas Kids First is a movement. It is a place for public school friends to find information, to learn about education issues, and to rally around our educators and our students.

  • ▸ We believe that politicians should stop interfering in our classrooms.

    ▸ We believe in honoring the promises made to our schools by providing adequate and equitable funding.

    ▸ We believe in putting our trust in locally elected boards of education to protect the health and safety of our students.

    ▸ We believe in allowing our educators to teach honestly and help our students think critically.

    ▸ We believe in strong school-community-parent partnerships.

    ▸ We believe that our public schools are the backbone of our communities.

    ▸ We believe in rallying around our teachers.

  • Nearly every decision made by Legislators has an impact on the classrooms in your neighborhood school. Do you know who your legislator is and where they stand on the issues that matter most to you?

    Find Your Legislator

    Education Key Votes

The latest from Kansas Kids First.

 
Featured
A K-12 budget packed with bad policy…including hidden tax increases
A K-12 budget packed with bad policy…including hidden tax increases

Open enrollment is just one of the problematic policies bundled in the K-12 budget that has to be taken up when the Legislature returns next week.

Holding the K-12 budget hostage
Holding the K-12 budget hostage

During the first week of the Legislative Session, Governor Kelly introduced a budget that fully funded schools for the third year in a row. Yet, the Legislature adjourned for their spring break – after 10 weeks in session – without passing a K-12 budget. Why? Because the supermajority of conservative legislators can’t decide how much bad policy to include with it.

The legislative effort to demoralize Kansas teachers
The legislative effort to demoralize Kansas teachers

This latest effort is simply a way to demoralize teachers encouraging them to quit and slashing the availability of a qualified corps of public school educators. It is an effort to convince parents who believe in those teachers and schools that something sinister is afoot. They promote conspiracy theories intended to sow confusion.

Featured
‘Never seen it this bad’: America faces catastrophic teacher shortage

Why are America’s schools so short-staffed? Experts point to a confluence of factors including pandemic-induced teacher exhaustion, low pay and some educators’ sense that politicians and parents — and sometimes their own school board members — have little respect for their profession amid an escalating educational culture war that has seen many districts and states pass policies and laws restricting what teachers can say about U.S. history, race, racism, gender and sexual orientation, as well as LGBTQ issues.

Caught in the culture wars, teachers are being forced from their jobs

A Florida teacher lost her job for hanging a Black Lives Matter flag over her classroom door and rewarding student activism. A Massachusetts teacher was fired for posting a video denouncing critical race theory. A teacher in Missouri got the ax for assigning a worksheet about privilege — and still another, in California, was fired for criticizing mask mandates on her Facebook page.

Analysis: How the Kansas Legislature avoids public scrutiny by hiding in darkness

The Kansas Legislature shields itself from public scrutiny through secrecy, confusing shell games and silenced opposition.

“The Legislature’s annual rites of secrecy serve special interests, not ordinary Kansans, and make it harder for voters to learn who is responsible for passing legislation adverse to the public interest,” said Max Kautsch, a 1st Amendment attorney, speaking on behalf of the Kansas Coalition for Open Government.

 

In The News

▸ Politicians should stay out of our classrooms.

▸ People must honor the promises made to our schools.

▸ Trust in our locally elected boards of education.

▸ Let our educators teach honestly.

▸ Encourage our students to think critically.

▸ Strengthen school, community, and parent partnerships.

Join The Movement.