The Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction (OSPI) is requesting a $138.5 million (0.4%) increase in general fund–state (GFS) appropriations for the 2026 supplemental. (The proposal would cost $343.7 million in 2027–29.) Though modest compared to the amount of enacted GFS appropriations for K–12 in 2025–27 ($31.050 billion), the request includes some major new spending. Additionally, it would reinstate some programs that were cut by the Legislature this year.

The request includes $111.5 million in 2025–27 and $296.7 million in 2027–29 from funds subject to the outlook (NGFO) for materials, supplies, and operating costs (MSOC). For this purpose, the enacted 2025–27 operating budget increased NGFO appropriations by $78.9 million in 2025–27 and assumed $134.9 million for 2027–29. Nevertheless, according to OSPI, “the amount provided continues to fall short of the true cost. State funding inflationary increases for MSOC have not kept pace with rising prices.”

Before this year, statute allowed the Legislature to determine the annual increase for MSOC (which is part of basic education) in the budget. This year, the Legislature enacted ESSB 5192. The bill set the per-student MSOC amount at $1,614.28 for school year (SY) 2025–26 (a 5.3% increase over the prior year). It also specified in statute that the MSOC per-pupil allocation will be adjusted for inflation annually, based on the implicit price deflator (IPD) for the previous calendar year. Thus, the 2025–27 budget increased the per-pupil MSOC allocation by 2.6% in SY 2026–27 (consistent with the March 2025 forecast of IPD). Under the OSPI request, the allocation in SY 2026–27 would instead increase by 9.0%. As the chart shows, since SY 2017–18, the growth in per-pupil state MSOC allocations has increased by more than IPD.

Other significant requests from OSPI include:

• $10.0 million in 2025–27 and $20.0 million in 2027–29 for “targeted elementary math supports.” Of the $10 million, $8 million would be used for “grants to school districts to support local planning, implementation, and educator professional learning” and $2 million for “licensing and statewide infrastructure for digital tools to support student learning.”
• $7.8 million in 2025–27 and $14.0 million in 2027–29 for foster care student support. (This funding was cut in the biennial budget.)
• $5.0 million in 2025–27 and $9.4 million in 2027–29 for the Imagination Library of Washington. (Previous funding for this program was also cut in the biennial budget.)

(Previous posts on the 2026 supplemental budget requests are available here.)