Despite a gaping hole in the state budget, the Republican governor has cleverly managed to woo, and maybe win, the K-12 education establishment by putting $192 million more on its budget line in 2010-11 than was there in 2008-09. The new money would flow to schools in ways that reward student performance and teacher training, via Pawlenty's pet program, Q Comp.

His K-12 gain could be short-lived. Pawlenty's budget contains nearly $5 billion in one-time money and lacks a plausible plan for replacing those funds when they disappear in 2011.

It's to avoid pushing schools and other state services off a financial cliff in two years that DFLers in the House propose to freeze state school funding in 2010-11, and in the Senate to cut it 3.2 percent. That much fiscal conservatism wasn't easy for DFL liberals to swallow. The K-12 money bill cleared the Senate floor with only two votes to spare.

Educators are a smart bunch. Surely they've noticed that Pawlenty is offering them a tasty appetizer, but no promise of a full meal. Croonquist confirmed as much.

"We're really stuck between a rock and a hard place," he said. "We agree with the concerns about structurally balancing the budget. We don't want to be stuck in the same situation two years from now."

Still, he said, 800,000 Minnesota kids are going to show up at school next fall. If the Legislature's budgets prevail, those students will be met by fewer teachers and staff. In metro-area districts, 1,300 jobs would be lost under the Senate plan; the House's would kill 824 jobs.

"I know there's trouble down the road. But we've got to figure out how to get the job done next year," Croonquist said.

At Education Minnesota headquarters, president Tom Dooher had a similar lament.

"The governor's position looks better, on the surface. But when you peel it back, it's putting money into Q Comp, which doesn't go to every district," Dooher said.

But the alternative being offered by the Legislature looks worse to him. "Cutting K-12 is unacceptable. We're really asking kids to pay for an adult problem. Kids shouldn't have to do that."

And in the next breath: "We should be able to figure this out, without shifts or gimmicks."

In other words, raise taxes. The problem with that alternative -- other than a sure veto by Gov. No New Taxes -- is that the state's fiscal hole is now much bigger than the most liberal appetite for a tax increase.

The Senate's plan shows what's possible -- or, more to the point, what isn't -- when shifts and gimmicks are not part of a 2010-11 budget fix. The Senate would raise taxes $2.2 billion over two years. It still takes a $500 million K-12 whack (not to mention a $700 million human services cut) to erase the red ink.

And that's including the $2.6 billion in federal money that's sloshing around the 2010-11 budget. If it disappears on schedule, even the Senate's lean plan gets painfully skinny in 2011.

What then? That's the question Dooher, Croonquist and a lot of other Minnesota educators need to ask in earnest now. The next two years must be a time of transition, up and down every government line. Minnesota needs to get serious about "expect more, pay less" in education, and a lot else.

You've got ideas about how schools could make better use of online learning, or join forces with libraries or senior centers, or better use volunteers, or spin off extracurriculars to community control? Your moment to speak up has arrived.

The House's K-12 bill contains the unfunded shell of a new school-funding formula. Among its features: the diversion of a stream of state money, to be tapped by schools that put new best-practices ideas into action. House K-12 funding chair Mindy Greiling calls it "innovation revenue."

If the governor succeeds in landing more money for K-12, maybe it should all be "innovation revenue."

Lori Sturdevant is a Star Tribune editorial writer and columnist. She is at lsturdevant@startribune.com.