Gov. Tina Kotek talks to reporters in January. 

There’s a gap between what Oregonians want in K-12 education and what they get.

Gov. Tina Kotek is making some changes in the way the education budget is calculated to add more money. Districts will get 49% of their funding in the first two years of the budget cycle and 51% in the second. Now, it’s 50/50. That will boost education funding in the future because it will increase the base for calculating how much schools should get, since it is based on the second year of the budget cycle.

The second change is to use 10 years of salary data rather than 20 years when making calculations for the modeling for staff salaries. That will increase the base amount of the education budget by about $240 million.

And the third change is to include local changes in property taxes in the second budget year for funding. That isn’t done now.

If you add up all three changes, it’s about another $512 million in funding for education.

Of course, people are already asking where that money will come from. Does it eat away at another part of the budget? Are there going to be new taxes to pay for it?

There are other issues about the state education budget that also need addressing — other than just more money. For instance, shouldn’t counties, such as Deschutes, get more per student funding because of the higher cost of living here?