By Timothy P. Williams We should all be thankful that Pennsylvania lawmakers created a mechanism that uses relevant variables to determine the commonwealth’s financial commitment to each school district. The General Assembly overwhelmingly passed Act 35 of 2016, formalizing a fair funding formula based largely on student population and students’ needs. The fair funding formula was designed to drive funding to school districts in the form of basic education funding, more commonly known as BEF. By passing Act 35, Pennsylvania lawmakers embarked on a journey, finally, to equitably address funding for the commonwealth’s schools. However, the executive and legislative branches of the commonwealth have all but ignored the provisions of Act 35 over the last five fiscal years, running only a small portion of the BEF through the fair funding formula.