Fact Checker

Republican gubernatorial candidate Robert F. McDonnell says Virginia needs to pony up and increase the amount it spends in public school classrooms, arguing that administrative offices get far too much funding. Many Virginia schools say they spend enough -- 65 percent or more -- on teaching. Who's right?

The quick answer: It depends on whom you ask. The federal government says Virginia spends 61 percent on classroom instruction; Virginia school officials say they spend closer to 65 percent. The difference comes down to a narrow interpretation of whether libraries, guidance counselors and the like constitute classroom instruction.

This month, McDonnell, a former state delegate and Virginia attorney general, and Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling, who is running for reelection, unveiled the fourth part of their state education policy proposal -- a plan to boost classroom coffers by $480 million by upping the required funding amount for school instruction to 65 percent of all operating budgets.

The McDonnell campaign said it relied on the "latest spending numbers" to examine classroom spending in Virginia, federal instruction expenses from fiscal 2007. (According to those same figures, public elementary and secondary schools nationwide spent nearly 61 percent of their budgets on instruction in fiscal 2007; Virginia came in at 61.2 percent.)

But the latest spending numbers from the state, in the form of the superintendent's annual report for fiscal 2008, shows the state spent 64.8 percent of its budget on instruction. The difference is a somewhat technical disagreement over what constitutes classroom expenses.

For example, federal guidelines say teacher training, library and media services and guidance and social work counselors are "outside the classroom." Virginia includes those services in its classroom funding totals.