A Constitutional Amendment Is Coming to Your November Ballot: What It Means for Schools
During the last legislative session, the Minnesota Legislature passed a bipartisan bill placing a constitutional amendment on the November ballot to change how the state's Permanent School Fund (PSF) distributes revenue to public schools. The PSF, established in 1858, generates revenue from timber, mining, land leases, and other activities on school trust lands, with assets invested by the State Board of Investment. Currently, distributions to districts are based primarily on interest and dividend earnings. The proposed amendment would instead base annual distributions on 4.5% of the fund's three-year rolling average market value.
What does this mean for public schools?
If approved by voters, the amendment is expected to increase annual distributions to Minnesota public schools. This funding would:
- Benefit every public school district and charter school in the state on a per-pupil basis
- Provide additional support for students without raising taxes
- Provide greater predictability for budgeting and planning
- Allow for continued local control over spending decisions
What role can you play as an education leader?
Minnesota law allows districts and district employees to provide factual, balanced, educational information about ballot questions in their official capacity, but public resources may not be used to advocate for or against a ballot measure. The general rule of thumb: educate, don't advocate. In practice this means staff can:
- Explain the history of the fund and how it generates revenue
- Explain the proposed constitutional amendment
- Share official ballot language
- Explain how funds are distributed to districts
- Share factual district-specific estimates and financial impacts
- Answer questions using factual, objective information
- Encourage civic participation and share voting information
Get additional guidance on what you can do as education leaders here.
The amendment will appear on the ballot this November 3. Voters should be aware of an important Minnesota voting rule: if a voter completes their ballot for other races but leaves this ballot question blank, it is automatically counted as a "No" vote.
For more information on the ballot initiative click here.