Unequal school funding is a phenomenon that promotes an educational structure where certain public schools receive higher financial support and resources while other schools receive lower levels. An important but overlooked dimension of the phenomenon is its potential effect on teacher job satisfaction in underfunded and well-funded schools. This…

Wisconsin's technical colleges appear to receive unusually high funding levels per student compared to other public two-year colleges nationally. Yet our review has found more than 100,000 technical college students being served in Wisconsin are absent in national data, likely inflating the funding figures. Accounting for the missing students…

Providing high-quality Career Technical Education (CTE) requires robust, sustained funding designed to be responsive to both the rapidly evolving needs of industry and the diverse needs of learners. Advance CTE embarked on an analysis of states' secondary CTE funding models. In 2014, RTI International, with the support of Advance CTE, conducted…

State funding for public higher education institutions is crucial in supporting college access and completion, particularly among students from historically under-represented groups, yet little is known about the mechanisms that states use to allocate funds and how they are affected by financial challenges. This article provides the first detailed…

The State of the States in Gifted Education report is a biennial report that has been published by the Council of State Directors of Programs for the Gifted since 1985. The current study examines financial data from these reports relating to the funding of gifted and talented education (GATE) by state-level funding authorities descriptively. We…

All states have a formula that determines how state funding is distributed to school districts. Most state formulas anticipate or require that school districts raise some funds locally and adjust state allocations based on that anticipated local share of school funding. In theory, state funding formulas attempt to provide school districts with the…

Nearly every state has flaws in how it funds public education, particularly when it comes to equitable funding for historically underserved students. While challenges vary by state, there are five common pitfalls in education finance equity: (1) Formulas do not fully account for differences in student learning needs; (2) There are too many school…

New Jersey, like many states, has long struggled with the tension of maintaining a well-funded public education system while not overburdening residents with high property taxes. New Jersey's school funding formula, 2008's School Funding Reform Act (SFRA), includes a determination of how much local funding -- raised through property taxes -- is…

School funding formulas have been applied across a number of countries for at least the last 50 years. A national funding formula (NFF) was introduced in England in 2018 and aims to provide a platform for fair funding across the country. This study explores the variations in the NFF's high needs block (HNB) funding and examines links with the use…

This mixed-methods study investigated how school districts in Missouri allocate funds to schools and the extent to which current practices promote equitable distribution of resources to meet student needs, especially for historically under-resourced populations. The study surveyed a sample of school district superintendents and chief financial…

In the United States, K-12 school finance is largely controlled by the states. Every year, hundreds of billions of dollars in public funds are distributed based on 51 different configurations of formulas, rules, and regulations to over 13,000 districts that vary in terms of the students they serve, their ability to raise revenue locally, and many…

The New York State Board of Regents' 2004-05 State Aid Proposal put forward the idea of instituting Foundation Aid as a response to concerns about the sufficiency of state education funding then being provided to local school districts. In 2007, prompted by legal action, a call for reform by the Regents, and the election of a new governor with a…

Improving equity of education funding is a key to addressing social injustices in education. Weighted student funding systems are a relatively novel approach a number of large urban and suburban districts have used to try to improve the equity of school funding. In a weighted student funding (WSF) system, the dollars distributed to schools are…

Determining the level and distribution of special education funding is an ongoing issue. Attempting to meet the extensive range of students' needs, while balancing funding coming from federal, state, and local sources leads to uneven funding burdens and questions about whether all student needs are being met. Traditionally, funding for special…

English learners (ELs) are one of the fastest-growing student groups in the U.S. K-12 system, making up about one in 10 students enrolled in public schools nationwide. Despite research showing that EL students need more resources and supports to be successful in school, funding at the federal, state, and local levels to provide those additional…