The primary local funding source for school support has always been the property or "ad valorum" tax. State funds, determined for each district by the "foundation program" formula, supplement this tax. Local school boards, state legislatures, state constitutions, and the voters have the power to provide quality education. In…

In a research note to a nine-volume, six-state study of the impact of school finance reform on minorities and the poor, the author examines methodological issues involved in using statistics to measure the distribution of local fiscal capacity among school districts with different income and ethnic compositions. Using Texas as an example, the…

This research effort examines inequalities in educational input resources among school systems in Texas and California in light of the Rodriguez and Serrano court cases. Low-income families in both states were found to be in districts of low per-pupil-Expenditures and inferior educational services primarily because they are located in districts…