Panther Valley School District Superintendent David McAndrew Jr. believes a report passed by a commission reviewing how Pennsylvania funds schools could help transform public education.

“It would allow schools to hire more reading specialists, counselors, and teachers,” he said after the Basic Education Funding Commission approved the report Thursday afternoon.

“It will also allow us to align curriculum and make sure are facilities are updated. It will allow our children to reach their God given potential,” McAndrew said.

One of the key recommendations in the report said the state should immediately begin to close a school funding gap of more than $5 billion, phasing in the increased aid over seven years.

The multi-year timeline is the letdown for McAndrew, who has said throughout this process that time is of the essence for children the funding would benefit.

“I wish the time frame would move up from seven years,” he said. “Our kids deserve these benefits immediately.”

The vote on the report was backed by Democrats and members of Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro’s administration. Republicans, including state Sen. David Argall, and one Democrat on the commission opposed it, resulting in an 8-7 vote.

The report differs somewhat from what Panther Valley and the other school districts that won a landmark court case want from the state. The districts’ lawyers proposed a $6.2 billion increase in state aid to be phased in over five years.

A separate Republican report, which Argall supported, was defeated along party lines when the commission met Thursday in a Capitol hearing room.

“This commission heard from hundreds of people from across Pennsylvania asking us to either eliminate or significantly change our unfair and archaic school property tax system,” Argall said. “To me, that is the most important piece of the education funding puzzle.”

The Democrats’ report contains only recommendations and does not require Shapiro or Pennsylvania’s Legislature to act.

But Democrats hope it at least provides a blueprint for this year’s budget, and for budgets every year after that, to respond to last year’s court decision that found Pennsylvania’s system of funding public schools unconstitutional.

“This is the end of the beginning,” commission co-chair Rep. Mike Sturia, D-Lancaster, said after the vote. “There’s still a whole lot of work to do.”

Teacher unions and lawyers for the districts that won last year’s court case cheered the Democrats’ report.

The Republican report said districts should define the instructional changes needed to boost student achievement and did not put a dollar figure on how much more, if anything, should be spent on K-12 education.

Underfunded districts are more likely to have larger class sizes, outdated buildings, textbooks, technology and curriculum, school officials say. Many underfunded district are fast-growing, disproportionately poor or have student bodies that are heavily minority.

The reported poverty rate in the Panther Valley School District is about 80%, school officials said recently.

Panther Valley’s enrollment has also been trending upward for the past three years, and last year, it was in the top five school districts in the state in percent increase growth. Enrollment climbed from 1,866 last year to 1,949 this year.

The next step in the funding process may be on Feb. 6, when Shapiro must deliver his second annual budget proposal to lawmakers.

The bipartisan commission was required by law to meet to provide recommendations to lawmakers on how to update a formula that is supposed to guide how roughly $8 billion in state aid is distributed to the state’s 500 school districts.

However, Republicans and Democrats on the commission disagreed over what recommendations the commission should provide in response to the court decision.

The Democrats’ report calculated a dollar target for what each school district should receive to provide a constitutionally adequate and equitable education to students.

Current funding falls short by $5.4 billion, the approved report said, or about 18% of what districts spend. Of that amount, $5.1 billion is the state’s responsibility and $291 million is the responsibility of the low-tax school districts, the report said

The recommendations also say the state should resume spending at least $300 million a year to support the upkeep of school facilities and send an additional $955 million a year to school districts that have disproportionately high taxes, in theory to provide tax cuts in those districts.

McAndrew said that the governor agreed with this report.

“Over the next six months, we will be watching closely to confirm our legislators are working to enact these critical changes in funding public education,” McAndrew said.

“I believe that the current system of an over reliance on local property taxes to fund school is antiquated and outdated,” he said. “This proposal would not only be beneficial for our students, but also our local taxpayers.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.