TALLAHASSEE - The Florida House passed a $69.2 billion spending plan Thursday that boosts funding for classrooms, but also cuts payments to hospitals, steers school construction dollars to charters, and relies on higher tuition rates for college students.

With a month left in the lawmaking session, the House budget that passed largely along party lines remains out of sync with the Senate's spending priorities on a few major issues - such as health-care and environmental spending.

It also holds a host of minor differences, from when to cut off foster-children from state assistance, whether to shutter a North Florida prison, or to allow the University of South Florida-Polytechnic in Lakeland to become a stand-alone university now.

The House would boost funding for classrooms by $1.1 billion, while the Senate plans to go further in increase funding by 1.2 billion - a year after imposing a $1.35 billion cut to per-pupil funding. It banks on a 15-percent tuition hike on university students, which GOP lawmakers called a product of the economic-hand they were dealt.