Many poor, often minority Arkansas students start school already behind. They face diminishing opportunities when they stay behind. Recognizing this, the Arkansas state legislature put in place a funding stream to ensure that all of our children have the same opportunities to achieve. Even though it is strictly state funding, we confusingly call it NSLA (or National Student Lunch Act) funding; it’s also called poverty funding.

It was put in place to close the achievement gap – to ensure that there isn’t a chasm between wanting a bright future and being able to attain it.

Over time, through both the legislative process and the regulatory process, the methods of spending NSLA dollars have grown exponentially while the opportunity gap has remained fairly, alarmingly steady. I am sure that the breadth of categories reflects at least one or two innovative ideas on how to close the gap. What we know is that over a decade of adding to the list (for innovative programming ideas or other reasons) has NOT closed the gap.

What would? Focusing in on what we know works to make sure that all of our kiddos can attain their bright future – pre-K, innovative after-school and summer programs, tutoring. Limiting the possible spending opportunities is not ours alone. In fact, in 2014, the state legislature brought in Picus, Odden, and Associates who studied our spending patterns and recommended on behalf of the legislature that the money be used for tutors, pupil support, and after-school and summer programs.

We can have limited spending choices and innovation. The innovation that takes place in my daughter’s pre-K4 classroom is fun to behold – she and her classmates are learning about programming and technology at the ripe old ages of 4 and 5. In the summer, children who are struggling with reading can be caught up – this could be with a time-tested method of reading instruction or with an innovative process using iPads or video immersion. Limiting categories doesn’t limit innovation, but having too many categories limits the effectiveness of the roughly $200 million we are spending each year.

We can foster innovation while efficiently using what we are spending to close the opportunity gap faced by so many of our kiddos. We have these efficiency tools at hand; let’s close the gap.