Providing a high-quality education for all students attending Fairfax County Public Schools in the upcoming fiscal year, which begins July 1, 2025, will require financial support through a county transfer, state and federal aid, and other revenue sources. FCPS’s Fiscal Year 2026 Proposed School Operating budget calls for $4 billion. Division Superintendent Dr. Michelle Reid presented what she called the “needs-based” Fiscal Year 2026 Proposed Budget at the Fairfax County School Board meeting on Thursday evening, Jan. 23.

Reid said the projected increase needed for FY26 compared to FY 2025 is nearly $300 million, $297.1.million. Summarizing the change from FY25: state revenue increase of $23.2 million; county transfer increase of $268.3 million; other sources increase of $6.7 million; while federal change is a projected decrease of $1 million. Reid recognized in her comments that increased costs and taxes could create “a sense of tax fatigue” on county members. Still, she emphasized the need for sustained community support, both financially and through engagement, to maintain the high-quality education that benefits the entire county, including future generations.

“Let's face it, things are more expensive today than they were a year ago, than they were five years ago, 10 years ago, and those cost escalations do create a budget impact, even just to maintain the level of support that we have needed, much less increase the level of support as we work to increase academic standards and provide those activities for our young people that are so important," Reid said.

Reid said that most of FCPS’ funding is directly allocated to instruction, and 92.5 percent of employees are designated as school-based, ranking highest among DC area districts. She said the proposed budget offered no new initiatives and that the need for high-quality educators compensated competitively is essential to retaining top talent.

The most significant change in the FY25 Proposed budget from the FY 2025 Approved Budget totaled $213.7 million, which provides Compensation Adjustments. Two changes are increases, and one is a decrease. 

• The proposed increase in Compensation Adjustments for Collective Bargaining (salaries and benefits) is $240.8 million. It includes a 7 percent compensation increase, transportation and food service salary enhancements, and health rate changes.

• The Compensation Adjustment for Retirement Rate Changes is an increase of $5.5 million. It is for “(FCERS), the 6,000 Fairfax County Public School employees who are members of the Fairfax County Employees' Retirement System, and (ERFC) Educational Employees' Supplementary Retirement System of Fairfax County, a benefit retirement plan.

• A Base Savings from turnover is a decrease of $32.7 million.

Reid spoke of funding needs “not addressed.” They include expanding middle school sports, additional funding to accelerate the maintenance backlog, lowering class sizes, altering the middle school start time, and adding more electric buses.

She detailed two targeted investment changes from the FY 2025 Approved Budget, meaning increases in the Fiscal Year 2026 Proposed Budget totaling $14.2 million.  She identified enhancing safety and security in schools to include additional security cameras, a Rap Back program (a service that sends notifications to authorized agencies when an individual's criminal history changes), a panic alert system, and security vestibules. The change from the FY25 approved budget is an increase of $9.3 million. The second targeted investment change is the increase of $4.9 million from the FY 2025 Approved Budget for Differentiated Learning Credentials, meant to help better prepare teachers by providing credentials in the Universal Design for Learning and Multilingual Learner Initiatives.

Reid reiterated as she has on other occasions, that state funding per student in Virginia, compared to the U.S. average, is “less funding per student than the 50-state average and the regional average, according to the Virginia’s Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission's (JLARC) analysis of NCES data, adjusted for costs.” The 2023 JLARC recommendations previously estimated that FCPS is underfunded by $568.7 million, approximately $3100 per student.

According to Reid, when the division thrives, so does Fairfax County. High-quality schools attract new residents, better workforce development, new businesses, increased opportunities for student upward mobility, reduced social costs, and increased property values.

She itemized four baseline adjustment increases from the FY 2025 Approved budget in the FY 2026 Proposed Budget. They totaled $65.2 million and will meet the community’s changing needs:

Change from FY25 Approved Budget

• $23.6 million increase-Recurring baseline adjustments for substitute teacher incentive, middle school late buses, esports stipends, legal services, online campus, AP/IB test fees, workers compensation, and grant adjustments

• $20.0 million increase in the impact of enrollment and changing student needs

• $12.9 million increase in transfers to other funds. Funding for major infrastructure maintenance, continued support for enhanced summer school, and debt service

Loudoun County’s Proposed Public School FY 2026 operating budget is $1.95 billion and addresses the evolving needs of staff and students.

Montgomery County’s Proposed Public School FY 2026 operating budge is $3.16 billion, and it is designed to prioritize student learning and school support resources.

Elected Fairfax County School Board members provided comments after Reid’s presentation. The following is a sampling of three comments from the 12 elected members serving four-year terms. The presentation with full comments is available at https://www.fcps.edu/budget/budget-documents. View the full budget calendar at  https://bit.ly/4gZ6lac. The meeting can be viewed on FCPS Cable TV Channel 99 (Verizon Channel 11), the FCPS YouTube Channel, and the FCPS website. To watch School Board meetings dubbed in Spanish, visit the FCPS en Español YouTube channel.

Marcia St. John-Cunning Franconia District Representative- “I just want to iterate that this is not a needs-based budget. This is a basic needs-based budget. I mean, we are at the lowest level of what our needs are.” “I seriously hope that our funding partners can hear that and that we can come up with a difference, because all of our children deserve more than just basic.”

Melanie K. Meren, Hunter Mill District Representative- “The success of our public school system is not solely the responsibility of this school division. Our funding comes from the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors who manage the Fairfax County government. It's time to work differently between our public schools and the county government. We need the county to step up to do a new way of doing business.”  Meren added, “While facility funding is not included in this operational budget, maintenance costs could have been but needed to be omitted based on limited funding. The bulk of the maintenance of our $8.7 billion in public facility assets falls to the school division.”

Seema Dixit, Sully District Representative- “If we do not meet the needs of our educators, the cost of living is really high in living in a county or working in the county and commuting, we will lose our educators.”