Why Education Is the Issue That Defines This Race
I have spent my life in classrooms. I have taught college students at DePauw, taught women rebuilding their lives at the Indiana Women's Prison, and for 38 years now, the Greencastle Summer Enrichment Program I founded has served low-income children in our community. Education is not a policy position for me. It is my life's work.
So when I look at what is happening to our local schools, I cannot stay quiet.
Governor Braun's property tax reform — SEA 1 — is projected to cost Indiana schools $744.4 million over the next three years. That is not a number I pulled from thin air. A survey of 148 Indiana school corporations found that 95% expect the law to negatively affect their funding this year, and 99% expect it to get worse in the years ahead.
Here in District 44, we have seven school corporations serving thousands of students across Putnam and Montgomery Counties. Greencastle, Crawfordsville, North Putnam, South Putnam, Cloverdale, North Montgomery, South Montgomery — these are the schools where our kids learn, where our neighbors teach, where our communities gather on Friday nights. They are not abstractions. They are the backbone of our towns.
When the Statehouse raises the business personal property tax exemption from $80,000 to $2 million, that revenue has to come from somewhere. And right now, it is coming from our schools. Rural superintendents across the state are warning of staff layoffs, school consolidation, and impossible choices between passing referendums or cutting bus routes.
This is happening at a time when Indiana already has roughly 1,300 unfilled teaching positions. More than half of our districts have teachers working outside their licensed areas. Over a third rely on full-time substitutes. Our school social worker ratio is one counselor for every 1,829 students — when the recommended ratio is 1 to 250.
I am not running for office to talk about education in the abstract. I am running because I have seen what happens when you invest in people — and what happens when you do not.
At the Indiana Women's Prison, I watched women who had been told their entire lives that they were not worth investing in earn college degrees and walk out with a plan. The research is clear: education programs reduce reincarceration by 43% and save taxpayers $4 to $5 for every dollar spent. That is not soft-hearted. That is smart policy.
The same principle applies to our local schools. Every dollar we invest in a child's education today is a dollar we do not have to spend on remediation, social services, or lost potential down the road. Our Career and Technical Education programs — Area 30 Career Center, West Central Indiana CTE in Crawfordsville — are preparing students for real jobs in our communities. Ivy Tech in Crawfordsville is giving people a path to a better career without leaving home.
These programs work. And they are at risk.
I am asking for your vote because our kids and our schools deserve a representative who understands education from the inside — not as a talking point, but as a calling. I will fight to protect our school funding, raise teacher pay, expand mental health services for students, and defend the local control that lets our communities decide what is best for their own children.
This is not somebody else's fight. This is our fight. And I intend to show up for it.
Paid for by Committee to Elect Kelsey Kauffman