Because states typically fund districts based on student counts, districts reporting shrinking enrollment worry about shrinking dollars as well. The seemingly obvious quick fix is for states to hold districts financially harmless for some or all of their enrollment loss. But states have many factors to weigh when deciding whether or how to go down…

This brief is part of Education Law Center's "Tracking State Aid Cuts in the Pandemic" series. Against a backdrop of significant underfunding even before the pandemic, the Texas Education Agency announced in June that federal Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act funding would be used in place of the final payments…

The Great Recession is an economic crisis which has had repercussions through different facets of U.S. society. Texas, despite overall economic health, enacted severe cuts to education as a result of the Great Recession. A potential consequence of these austerity measures is the identification of Black, Latinx, and Native American students for…

To promote success among all students, schools hire an array of support staff, professional personnel, and administrators. The majority of a school's budget is dedicated to personnel costs, so when the Legislature cuts education funding, they are also cutting staff. However, changes in staffing have not been consistent over time or within staffing…

On February 24, 2017, all of the authors of the state-of-the-state manuscripts published in the "Journal of Education Finance" met in Cincinnati, Ohio, to participate in a roundtable discussion focused on recent legislative actions in 38 states. A majority of those papers were revised to reflect a final report on legislative actions…

In this study, 79 local school district leaders from the state of Texas were contacted and asked for their input relating to strategic practices used during an economic downturn. Findings describe how the recent funding cuts affected the varied districts; how the districts fared in comparison with similar districts in the area; steps the district…

In response to a challenging state economy, the Texas Legislature implemented the Regular Program Adjustment Factor (RPAF) in 2011, effectively reducing state funding to all Texas school districts. This mixed methods study reveals the effect of the RPAF on a sample of the smallest Texas school districts and their response to decreased state…

In every state in the South, the percentage of residents with bachelor's degrees or higher who were born outside the state exceed the percentage born in-state, reflecting their dependence on imported talent over building their own talent-development systems. In Virginia, the Southern state with the highest percentage of residents with a B.A. or…

This executive summary highlights research findings on outcomes in education, employment, and income in the southern United States region. Findings include: (1) As a whole, Southern schools, colleges, and universities perform better than ever, though they are in constant need of improvement to meet the demands of both democracy and a changing…

We all want Texas kids to have a bright future, but Texas is consistently ranked in the bottom ten states for child well-being. Texas decision makers must create policies that improve conditions for all Texas kids and put them on the road to success. According to the Annie E. Casey Foundation, Texas ranks 43rd in overall child well-being (based on…

Chapter 1: In response to tightened budgets and concerns about higher education costs, governments have introduced rules to limit the use of publicly funded aid, particularly at for-profit colleges. In this paper, we use an event study framework to estimate how tuition, enrollments, and loan use changed at for-profit colleges that became…

Texas households experience food insecurity at a rate of nearly 19 percent (one of the highest in the nation). Kids without access to meals are less likely to perform well in school and more likely to be at risk of poor health. While most children have access to meals during the year through the national school lunch program, participation in…

The numbers were already bad, and they keep getting worse, for the Dallas County Community College District (DCCCD). Given the weak economy, administrators planned for a 5 percent reduction in state funding in the 2010-11 academic year. The actual reduction ballooned to more than 7.5 percent, an additional $13 million that DCCCD would be forced to…

After months of arduous negotiation and partisan squabbling, states across the country have produced budgets for the new fiscal year that in many cases will bring deep cuts to state spending, including money for schools. The budget blueprints adopted by numerous states were postscripts to divisive legislative sessions that saw newly elected…

Two competing pressures--downsized budgets and rising policy interest--have left the future of performance-based teacher compensation uncertain. A dicey fiscal climate and research that has shown limited impact have led some states and districts to scale back, abandon, or change their fledgling merit-pay programs, causing observers to wonder what…