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SANTA FE — A state task force is proposing a new funding formula for New Mexico's public school districts that could boost education spending by a third.

Task force members say the formula, to be presented to the Legislature, would put more money into the schools and maintain equity across districts.

Critics have said the current formula, created in 1974, does not pay for some basic school needs, such as counselors or nurses.

The revised formula would add money depending on the makeup of individual districts and would take into account the percentage of poor children, children who are learning English, special education students and other factors.

"This (proposed formula) is very transparent, very simple," said Dennis Roch, assistant superintendent of Tucumcari schools and a task force member.

Researchers, working with a panel of educators, estimated it would cost $4,871 per student to fund a basic educational program sufficiently, up from New Mexico's current level of $3,600.

Their study shows that overall, New Mexico schools were underfunded by as much as 15 percent during last school year, or about $320 million.

The idea of defining schools' basic needs and figuring out how much money it will take to fund them should be common sense, said Mike Griffith, a policy analyst with the Education Commission of the States.

"We do this for everything else, but we never do it for education," he said.

A critic of such studies, however, says there's little evidence that equates more money to better education.

Eric Hanushek, a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, said studies across the country have inevitably meant a call for more money. But districts that have gotten more have done little to change their operations, he said.

"If you just provide more money to these schools, they'll continue what they've been doing, just more of it," Hanushek said.

State Education Secretary Veronica Garcia said she's concerned about districts receiving more money without accountability measures. Her staff did not participate in the task force, but she said members now will work with the task force on issues of accountability.

"I think it just depends on what winds up being required and what's left to local control," Garcia said. "It's not clear. Is this a blank check?"