How might school funds be spent more effectively in today's uncertain environment? This up-to-date volume explores a range of ideas to help schools and districts better manage their resources, including: how to rethink staffing and management to get more value for employee compensation; how policymakers might revisit pension arrangements in ways…

All too often, the public perception of school administration is that it is a large bureaucracy diverting critical resources from instruction. According to "Answering the Critics of School Administration: What Are the Facts? Second Edition," by Nancy Protheroe, the data show otherwise. Six common misperceptions of school administration are…

This book addresses the critical issues and challenges facing state and district policymakers as they work to develop school-based funding policies and related resource data systems. The text is divided into three sections. The first section provides a conceptual overview of the different issues involved in designing, implementing, and evaluating…

This book is designed to serve as a comprehensive resource on all aspects of school finance for Pennsylvania educators. Chapter 1 provides a historical overview of Pennsylvania school finance. The next three chapters examine the local, state, and federal sources of revenue. The fifth chapter explains the components of Pennsylvania's mandatory…

Comparing or estimating the costs of educational projects by merely using cost-per-student figures is imprecise and ignores area differences in prices. The resource approach to cost analysis begins by determining specific physical resources (such as facilities, staff, equipment, materials, and services) needed for a project. Then the cost of these…

Behind the concept of power equalization is the assumption that at any specified tax rate every school district in a State, regardless of wealth, has the same dollar resource level per pupil. A State established schedule of local district funding level choices related to tax rates is essential; however, tax levels are always a product of the…

In fiscal 1996, Maryland expended over $5.7 billion on public education. This paper reviews the sources of revenue for education, focusing on the relative importance of federal, state, and local funding, and provides an overview of state education aid. The state's commitment to the public schools accounted for over 40 percent of spending at the…

The 13 Chapters in this book address the important issue of how schools and school districts allocate their resources. The book summarizes the emerging research in educational resource allocations (tax dollars) at the district, school, and classroom levels. Following the preface by Lawrence O. Picus, the chapters include: (1) "Why Do We Need to…

School business administration is recognized as an important component of educational administration. The current trend toward the administrative team concept of administration has added prestige and importance to the function of the school business administrator. The study reported here revealed that a large percentage of present school districts…

Problems associated with state support for community colleges are discussed with particular emphasis on situations where local college districts are responsible for providing a portion of total institutional revenue. Three of these problems, relating to the equity and efficiency of how state aid is distributed, are: (1) the integration of direct…

Cases related to school finance, in which decisions were handed down in 1982, are reviewed in this chapter. It is observed that the constitutionality of existing state school finance programs was upheld in New York, Colorado, and Georgia, and that litigation was prevalent in the areas of taxation for schools and uses of school revenue. Issues…

This book is designed as a primer on the politics of the struggle for equal educational opportunity in U.S. public schools through a look at the experience of New York State. It shows how efforts to shrink the gap between rich and poor school districts by adjusting state aid formulas are frustrated largely due to the dictates of political…

On most international comparisons of educational achievement, United States' schools fare poorly. A closer look at how several foreign countries educate their children, as well as the political process for setting educational policies, suggests a multitude of initiatives that could be profitably adapted to the American educational system. A survey…

The contemporary school business administrator must be knowledgeable in a wide variety of areas. This book was designed to serve as a basic reference for practicing school business administrators as well as a text for graduate courses in school business administration. It offers a comprehensive overview of school business management. Chapters 1-3…