State funding formulas shape how much money school districts have to spend, but districts usually have considerable discretion with how they distribute funds to schools. Because of this discretion, even if districts receive funds through a highly equitable state system, there is no guarantee that districts will distribute funding equitably to…

In 1999, the Chinese government implemented a higher education enrollment expansion policy to improve education equality. Now, its positive impact on educational equality is contested. This study attempts to identify the link between city administrative level and tertiary attainment in the context of the policy. Our empirical findings indicate…

Schools are a reflection of culture and national character and should transmit these ideas through the teaching of history and government. Generally considered "civic" instruction, this subject is sorely neglected--an opinion shared by both sides of the partisan divide. A new initiative called Educating for American Democracy (EAD) wants…

This document has been conceived to facilitate reflection and guide countries in optimizing the potential of their education policy dialogue and sector coordination mechanisms. It brings into focus the possible core functions of the local education group, the main challenges to realizing these functions and the key principles for ensuring…

The funding of public elementary and secondary schools in the United States involves a combination of local, state, and federal government revenues. State and local governments generally provide over 90% of the revenue available for public elementary and secondary education on an annual basis, with the federal government providing the remainder.…

Research conducted by the National Governors Association Center for Best Practices (NGA Center), Fab Foundation and FHI 360, in partnership with more than 150 national and international experts and leaders from 28 states, found that to prepare their future workforces, governors and state leaders must develop a comprehensive agenda made up of three…

The present article contributes to attempts to re-conceptualise the top-down perspective on language policy, by analysing the role of local and city governments' agency in language education policy making. Only few studies analyse the role of lower administrative levels in language policy, other than in implementation of governmental policies, why…

With so many different types of support needed to help meet the diverse needs of young people, no one person, institution, or organization can provide everything that parents rely upon to help children and youth succeed. Numerous organizations need to play various roles, and must do so in a coordinated fashion, in order to meet the needs of…

Background: In 2009, the Obama Administration announced its intention to rapidly "turn around" 5,000 of the nation's lowest-performing schools. To do so, it relied on the School Improvement Grant (SIG) program to provide temporary funding for states and schools, and to mandate drastic, school-level reforms. Most of these reforms require…

This article provides insight into the nature and scope of home-school cooperation in Finland. Situating the study is a brief overview of the Finnish education system and a discussion of the Programme for International Student Assessment reports that place Finnish student outcomes at the top of rankings among industrialized nations for the past…

The persistence of the Great Recession provides us with the opportunity to engage in a long overdue conversation about public investments in America's children. Less than ten percent of the Fiscal Year 2010 federal budget of $3.603 trillion is allocated to children and youth. This percentage is likely to decline in the next decade if current laws…

Lacking guidance of general equilibrium (GE) theories in public economics and the corresponding proper mechanisms, China has not surprisingly witnessed an inequality in educational expenditures across regions as well as insufficiency of funds for education in poor areas. It is wrongly thought that what happens is due to the decentralized financing…

Recent developments, such as passage of the Children Act 2004, subsequent implementation of "Every Child Matters: Change for Children" and increase in funding to councils for Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS), the Local Government Association (LGA) asked the NFER to examine the funding mechanisms and priorities in…

This generation of young people is on track to be less-educated than their parents--for the first time in American history. This, at the same time the world and workplace are changing dramatically and rapidly--when students, more than ever, need high levels of skill in order to compete. Advance Illinois has developed this report "We Can Do…

In addition to describing how general revenue sharing works and what it means for state and local governments in terms of some new responsibilities for managing these revenues, this article attempts to analyze the impact these new responsibilities may have on the management capabilities of local governments. (Author/NQ)