A new law that raised age requirements for kindergarten will save the state $50 million in education spending next year.

That's just about all the good news about the state's public education budget.

Lawmakers attended a briefing on education spending Wednesday and there was plenty of bad news. The projected budget deficit next year, as much as $2 billion out of a $21.5 billion budget, will require a hard look at the few areas of education that the state can cut -- teacher salaries and class sizes.

Education accounts for some 54 percent of state spending. The bulk of that money, $8.19 billion, was spent on public education in the current fiscal year. 

The state allots money to schools using a formula based on attendance. The number of children in schools has grown steadily since at least 1999. The coming year will be the first time the attendance number has dropped, according to the legislature's Fiscal Research Division. 

The reason for the drop, said analyst Kristopher Nordstrom, is that the state now requires kindergarten students to be 5 years old on or before Aug. 31. Previously, students could turn 5 in September.

The one-year savings produced by that change will equal $50 million, Nordstrom said.

The federal stimulus package would provide $1.1 billion to the state for education. But there are strings attached, Nordstrom said. To get the federal money, the state would have to spend as much on education as it did in the fiscal 2006 year. That amount is 16 percent lower than the current education budget.

Eddie Davis can't get anyone on the Council of State to pay attention to him.

Davis, president of the N.C. Association of Educators, is seeking a seat on the Council of State as a candidate for superintendent of public instruction. He is running in the Democratic primary against incumbent June Atkinson.

But his problem has come since he began trying to get the Council of State to pass a resolution marking the 50th anniversary of the integration of public schools in North Carolina.

Davis said in a letter released today that no one on the Council of State is responding to his call.

"To say the least, I am highly disappointed, particularly because I have worked with most of you on a multitude of issues over a wide span of years," Davis wrote to Gov. Mike Easley, Lt. Gov. Beverly Perdue, state Treasurer Richard Moore and other members of the Council of State.

Davis said in his letter that he wondered if they were not responding because he is a candidate for public office and that his actions are considered "overly political."

"If that is the rationale," he wrote, "then to totally ignore a constructive concept that comes from a political candidate, thus, creates a political statement in and of itself."