School Finance 101: Filling our Nation’s Funding Gaps | National Education Policy Center

School Finance 101: Filling our Nation’s Funding Gaps | National Education Policy Center

School Finance 101: Filling our Nation’s Funding Gaps

Big Education Ape: Getting School Finance Indicators Right – School Finance 101 - https://bigeducationape.blogspot.com/2021/01/getting-school-finance-indicators-right.html

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Big Education Ape: The Adequacy and Fairness of State School Finance Systems (second edition) | School Finance Indicators Database - https://bigeducationape.blogspot.com/2020/02/the-adequacy-and-fairness-of-state.html

School Finance Indicators Database - Home

Mark Weber, Matt Di Carlo and I have a new report, with data and visualizations available over at schoolfinancedata.org. For that project, we take advantage of two major data sources to estimate a “cost model” for public school districts in the United States – specifically with the goal of estimating the per pupil costs (spending, controlling for differences in efficiency) to achieve a common outcome goal. We set that common outcome goal at the very modest level of existing national average outcomes on state assessments of reading and math achievement, grades 3 to 8. Yes, these are limited outcomes. Yes, this is a low bar. But, our main point here is to evaluate the disparities that exist across states and districts in the funding available, relative to the predicted costs, of achieving this modest target. Education cost analyses of this type have helped us better understand two things:

1. It costs more to achieve higher outcomes than lower ones; and
2. It costs more to achieve any given level of outcomes in some settings, with some children, than others!

State school finance systems state accountability systems for schools have historically been disjoint. On the one hand, we use state assessment data and other outcome measures to declare schools or districts good or bad – exceptional or failing. But rarely do we design and implement school funding systems that are actually built upon estimates of a) the costs of achieving the desired outcome levels, on average, or b) how those costs vary from one setting and child to the next. That is, we don’t design state school finance systems to deliver the funding that would provide each school or district with equal opportunity to hit the targets we set in state accountability policies. Thus, we necessarily create an unfair playing field. This is true in every state, though some more than others. We’ve rarely even considered how these disparities play out across states. That is, whether children in Mississippi should have equal opportunity to achieve outcomes similar to children in Massachusetts, and what that might cost.

Here’s what those funding gaps look like with respect to costs to achieve national average CONTINUE READING: School Finance 101: Filling our Nation’s Funding Gaps | National Education Policy Center

School Finance Indicators Database - Home

School Finance Indicators Database - Home

School Finance Indicators Database

Big Education Ape: Getting School Finance Indicators Right – School Finance 101 - https://bigeducationape.blogspot.com/2021/01/getting-school-finance-indicators-right.html

Big Education Ape: The Adequacy and Fairness of State School Finance Systems (second edition) | School Finance Indicators Database - https://bigeducationape.blogspot.com/2020/02/the-adequacy-and-fairness-of-state.html

School Finance Indicators Database - Home

WELCOME

The School Finance Indicators Database is a collection of data and research on K-12 public school funding in the U.S. These resources are designed for use not only by researchers, but also by parents, policymakers, journalists, and the general public. Every year, the SFID team publishes two primary databases, both of which are freely available to download:

The State Indicators Database is a user-friendly dataset of roughly 125 state-by-state school funding measures, many of which are available going back to 1993. These measures focus on the adequacy and fairness not only of revenue and spending, but also of how money is spent (e.g., teacher pay competitiveness, staffing ratios). The dataset is accompanied every year by a report presenting key findings, as well as one-page profiles summarizing the school funding systems of all 50 states and D.C. 

The District Cost Database allows users to assess the adequacy of spending levels in over 12,000 public school districts by comparing districts’ actual per-pupil spending with estimates of adequate spending levels in those districts. The database also includes a small set of district-level measures, such as test scores and Census child poverty rates, with which users can compare spending adequacy. The DCD is published annually (currently available for 2018 only).

In addition to the full datasets, annual reports, and state profiles, we also publish a set of online data visualizations (updated annually) and occasional research briefs, which present key measures from both databases. It is our hope that our data, and analyses based on these data, will help to improve school finance debates and policymaking in the U.S.

GETTING STARTED

• Read our latest annual report presenting key findings from the State Indicators Database
• Download one page profiles summarizing each state’s finance system
• View spending adequacy profiles for individual school districts
• Analyze the state database with customizable visualizations
• Download the state and district datasets in Excel or Stata format

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The School Finance Indicators Database is compiled and published by researchers at the Albert Shanker Institute and the Rutgers University Graduate School of Education.

School Finance Indicators Database - Home

School Finance Indicators Database - Home

Jersey Jazzman: COVID and "Learning Loss": Test Scores Should Not Be Our Immediate Concern

Jersey Jazzman: COVID and "Learning Loss": Test Scores Should Not Be Our Immediate Concern

COVID and "Learning Loss": Test Scores Should Not Be Our Immediate Concern

I'll get back to Lakewood in a bit, but I want to take a minute and talk about a new report out yesterday from JerseyCAN and others about learning loss and COVID-19.

Regular readers know I've had my issues with JerseyCAN over the years: too many times, their analyses have missed the mark, often because of a lack of understanding about things like what test scores actually represent and how they should be used to direct K-12 education policy. 

I might make similar complaints about this latest report. Using a convenience sample's outcomes on one test to extrapolate outcomes on another for an entire population is inherently problematic. Further, changes in proficiency rates on the same test are often artifacts of the process of setting those rates, and not indications of any changes in actual student learning. There's also a whole problem of equating "proficiency" across grade levels that tends to get pushed aside in these discussions. Plus the easy way we accept "grade level" as some sort of absolute when it's really a social construct...

But in the end, none of that really matters, because what the report is showing is almost certainly correct: student learning has suffered during the pandemic, and the losses are almost certainly greater for students of color and those in economic disadvantage. 

How could this be otherwise? There is a clear digital divide along racial and ethnic lines in CONTINUE READING: Jersey Jazzman: COVID and "Learning Loss": Test Scores Should Not Be Our Immediate Concern

The Adequacy of School District Spending in the U.S. – School Finance 101

The Adequacy of School District Spending in the U.S. – School Finance 101

The Adequacy of School District Spending in the U.S.

New Project at School Finance Indicators Database

With Matt Di Carlo & Mark Weber

Full research brief

Press release

Dataset

Data visualization

It’s fairly common knowledge that U.S. school districts vary widely in terms of funding. But that’s not necessarily a bad thing. In fact, in an ideal school funding system, we would expect to see differences between districts in their spending levels, even big differences, for the simple reason that the cost of educating students varies a great deal across districts. 

For instance, some districts serve larger shares of high-need students than others, and the former require more resources to achieve a given level of student performance. Similarly, like any employer, districts have to pay competitive wages, and labor costs also vary substantially by location. Teachers in areas with high costs of living, for example, have to be paid more than their colleagues in small rural towns where living is less expensive. 

In short, unequal spending is acceptable and even desirable if it is aligned with unequal costs. The key question is whether districts have the resources to meet their students’ needs. In other words, is school district spending adequate?

This research brief presents key findings from a new public database of funding adequacy for over 12,000 U.S. public school districts. The database (the District Cost Database) allows one to compare each district’s actual per-pupil spending with estimates of adequate per-pupil spending levels—that is, spending levels that would be required to achieve the goal of U.S. average test scores (a common “benchmark” with which the models assess adequacy). The data are for the 2017-18 school year.

The brief reports some good news. Thousands of districts enjoy funding levels above and beyond estimated adequate levels. You can find these districts in every single U.S. state. In some cases, funding is two or three times higher than the targets. Even in states such as Arizona and New Mexico, where large majorities of students attend schools in underfunded districts, there are numerous districts in which spending exceeds estimated requirements.

Yet these districts co-exist with thousands of other school systems, some located within driving distance or even in the next town over, where investment is so poorly aligned with need that funding levels are a fraction of estimated costs. Districts with negative funding gaps are CONTINUE READING: The Adequacy of School District Spending in the U.S. – School Finance 101

Jersey Jazzman: Lakewood, NJ: Where Public Schools Are Left To Wither, Part III

Jersey Jazzman: Lakewood, NJ: Where Public Schools Are Left To Wither, Part III

Lakewood, NJ: Where Public Schools Are Left To Wither, Part III

Here are the other parts of this series:

- Part I

- Part II

What happens when a majority of citizens rejects its own public schools? We need look no further than Lakewood, NJ -- a town that I contend is an object lesson in the consequences of school privatization. Again, I believe at least three things will happen when public schools are left to wither, as they have been in Lakewood:

1. When a large part of a community abandons its public schools, chaos ensues and accountability dissolves.
2. Segregation is the inevitable consequence of school privatization.
3. Educators will be disrespected in a community that does not support its public schools. 

Regarding point #2: in the last post I showed definitively that Lakewood's public and private school populations are highly segregated. In this post, let's spend some time discussing point #1.

I'll note first that, as I've written before, there are plenty of examples of corruption and malfeasance in districts where the majority of children attend the public schools. And the problems with private schools enrolling special needs students in New Jersey have been well documented. 

But one of Lakewood's private schools had, according to the verdict of a jury, taken things to a new level (all emphases mine):

2/27/19: NEW BRUNSWICK - The founder of a Lakewood special education school is guilty of money laundering and misconduct by a corporate official, but not guilty of corruption involving public funds, a jury said Wednesday CONTINUE READING: Jersey Jazzman: Lakewood, NJ: Where Public Schools Are Left To Wither, Part III

Jersey Jazzman: Lakewood, NJ: Where Public Schools Are Left To Wither, Part II

Jersey Jazzman: Lakewood, NJ: Where Public Schools Are Left To Wither, Part II

Lakewood, NJ: Where Public Schools Are Left To Wither, Part II

Here's Part I of this series.

In this series, I'm taking a look at Lakewood, NJ, with an eye toward what might happen if more communities abandon their public schools and, instead, embrace the idea of school "choice." Lakewood, in a state by some accounts with the highest ranked public schools in the nation, is a town where the vast majority of families choose to send their children to private schools.

The Star-Ledger explained what's driving this phenomenon back in 2017:

Lakewood has more than 6,300 students registered in its public schools and another 30,000 mostly Orthodox Jewish students enrolled in the town's 130 private schools. Under state law, towns must fund buses for students attending private schools more than two miles from their houses.

In the upcoming school year, Lakewood expects to spend $27 million on busing alone, more than it spends on classroom instruction, according to the school budget.

Town leaders say Lakewood is severely underfunded by the state, which does not consider the busing of large numbers of private school students when calculating how much state aid the district receives. A permanent source of school funding for busing and special ed would ease many of the town's problems, said Rabbi Aaron Kotler, one of the leaders of the Orthodox Jewish community.

"It would also make Lakewood a place where you wouldn't have people feeling that your children's future is at risk due to a budget problem," Kotler said.

As we'll see throughout this series, the argument that Lakewood is "severely underfunded by the state" is open to debate. For now, let's do what regular readers know always comes CONTINUE READING: Jersey Jazzman: Lakewood, NJ: Where Public Schools Are Left To Wither, Part II

Jersey Jazzman: Lakewood, NJ: Where Public Schools Are Left To Wither, Part I

Jersey Jazzman: Lakewood, NJ: Where Public Schools Are Left To Wither, Part I

Lakewood, NJ: Where Public Schools Are Left To Wither, Part I

If you follow K12 policy, you've probably noticed that the school privatization crowd has recently become reenergized. The folks from right-wing think tanks and the professional school "choice" promoters have been pushing the idea of school vouchers hard, certain that the pandemic has created widespread dissatisfaction with our current system of public school districts.

Many times I've seen these people make the argument that private schools are fully open, and the only reason public schools are not is the intransigence of teachers unions and fecklessness of school boards. Of course, it's hardly that simple: consider that many "no excuses" charter schools -- free of both unions and BOEs -- remain closed. We also really don't know how many private schools are open, or to what extent, or with what consequences.

Nonetheless, the privatizers see an opening. And considering the number of wingnuts out there who think COVID isn't a serious threat that requires extraordinary actions to secure schools, they may be right. School privatization was, to my mind, always a secondary part of the overall conservative agenda, but that may have changed, if only in the short term.

Given the renewed focus on vouchers, I think we're justified in taking some time to really CONTINUE READING: Jersey Jazzman: Lakewood, NJ: Where Public Schools Are Left To Wither, Part I

Carol Burris: Fordham Study Misleads the Public About Fiscal Harm of Charter Schools | Diane Ravitch's blog

Carol Burris: Fordham Study Misleads the Public About Fiscal Harm of Charter Schools | Diane Ravitch's blog

Carol Burris: Fordham Study Misleads the Public About Fiscal Harm of Charter Schools

The Thomas B. Fordham Institute recently published a study claiming that charter schools do no fiscal harm to public schools, and may even lead to greater funding. Dr. Carol Burris, executive director of the Network for Public Schools, has visited public school districts that are in a deep financial hole because of the financial drain caused by the proliferation of charter schools. She read the Fordham study with care and concluded that it was misleading and inaccurate.

Her article was published on Valerie Strauss’s “The Answer Sheet,” along with a response by the author of the study, Mark Weber. Weber agreed with her main point: – That said, I agree that my report does not provide evidence that charter school growth does not harm school district’s fiscal health. That fact is that this report can’t answer that question. My hope, however, is that it does provide a framework for having a more informed discussion about the costs of charter schools on the entire K-12 system.

Her full post is here.

It begins like this:

A recent study published by the Thomas B. Fordham CONTINUE READING: Carol Burris: Fordham Study Misleads the Public About Fiscal Harm of Charter Schools | Diane Ravitch's blog

Fordham Institute Attempts to Mislead the Public Regarding the Impact of Charter Schools on Public School Districts - Network For Public Education

Fordham Institute Attempts to Mislead the Public Regarding the Impact of Charter Schools on Public School Districts - Network For Public Education

Fordham Institute Attempts to Mislead the Public Regarding the Impact of Charter Schools on Public School Districts

A recent study published by the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, entitled Robbers or Victims: Charter Schools and District Finances,was rolled out with fanfare and sent to policymakers across the country.  When the Fordham Institute sent out its mass email, trumpeting its report, its subject line read: “New report finds charter schools pose no fiscal threat to local districts.” That subject line is a blatant falsehood unsupported by their own deeply flawed study.

In the report and its public relations campaign, Fordham cynically attempts to razzle-dazzle the reader with misleading conclusions based on questionable data in hopes of convincing the public that charter schools do no financial harm to public schools. The Walton Foundation and The Fordham Foundation, the Fordham Institute’s related organization, funded the study. It is worth noting that The Fordham Foundation sponsors eleven charter schools in Ohio, for which it receives administrative fees.

The origins of the study, unacknowledged in the report, is author Mark Weber’s 2019 doctoral dissertation. Advocacy organizations are often accused of cherry-picking examples. With Robbers and Victims, Fordham cherry-picked a study on which to base its puffery. In a Fordham podcast and his blog, Weber, an elementary school music teacher who completed his doctoral studies at Rutgers University, reports that Fordham CONTINUE READING: Fordham Institute Attempts to Mislead the Public Regarding the Impact of Charter Schools on Public School Districts - Network For Public Education

CURMUDGUCATION: Mark Weber's Three Critical Testing Questions

CURMUDGUCATION: Mark Weber's Three Critical Testing Questions

Mark Weber's Three Critical Testing Questions

This is not the first time I've piggy-backed on a post from Mark "Jersey Jazzman" Weber, but sometimes what he posts just sets a bright blazing lightbulb off in my head. Weber is a certified PhD-carrying academic of data crunching, and he is an absolute master of rendering complicated ideas comprehensible to civilians, and that's what he's done with his post  about why "We Don't Need Standardized Testing In A Pandemic."  

I encourage you very much to go read the whole post. But sometimes saying, "This! This! This!" isn't enough for me. So. What I'm going to center on is his three-question response to anyone who says that students must take a standardized test.

1) What are you going to do with the results?

This question is hugely powerful and by far the least answered. Here's Weber:

A core concept of assessment is that tests must be shown to be valid for the purposes in which they will be used. In other words: you should make a separate argument for every proposed use of a test. A test that may be valid to use for, say, determining whether there are enough overall resources in the education system isn't necessarily valid for the purpose of determining whether a student should pass to the next grade.

Psyshometricians often speak of making a validity argument in favor of the use of a test for a particular purpose. That argument should touch upon the relevancy of the outcomes to a specific use, the consequences of making decisions based on these outcomes, the opportunity to learn the content in the test, and other factors.

This is just so key. As Weber notes, one of the huge problems with the current Big Standardized Test system is that one test is supposed to serve a variety of purposes. Evaluate schools, evaluate teachers, assess curriculum, inform parents, plus serve as a CONTINUE READING: CURMUDGUCATION: Mark Weber's Three Critical Testing Questions

Jersey Jazzman: We Don't Need Standardized Testing In a Pandemic

Jersey Jazzman: We Don't Need Standardized Testing In a Pandemic

We Don't Need Standardized Testing In a Pandemic

UPDATE: Just as I was finishing this post, I caught a glimpse of this news:

The U.S. Department of Education extended flexibility to states today in how and when they administer mandated end-of-the-year assessments, including allowing shorter tests that can be given remotely and, in the summer, or even in the fall. The federal agency advised states to blunt the impact of the tests, suggesting the scores not be used in final grades and grade promotion decisions.

However, despite the disruption to schools from the pandemic, the federal agency did not liberate states from administering standardized tests; it will continue to require statewide assessments. Some states, including Georgia, requested waivers that would allow them to forgo standardized testing altogether this year.

As I argue below, this is a bad idea. I really hope the Biden administration can be persuaded to reconsider.

* * *

A notable bit of education policy news in New Jersey last week:

New Jersey will apply to the federal government to waive standardized testing for the current school year as districts across the state continue to cope with the constraints of the coronavirus pandemic, Gov. Phil Murphy announced Friday.

Murphy said the state has not yet received word from President Joe Biden’s administration as to whether it will accept its application to waive the federal CONTINUE READING: Jersey Jazzman: We Don't Need Standardized Testing In a Pandemic

Jersey Jazzman: The Fiscal Impact Of Charter Schools on School Districts: Thoughts on My New Report

Jersey Jazzman: The Fiscal Impact Of Charter Schools on School Districts: Thoughts on My New Report

The Fiscal Impact Of Charter Schools on School Districts: Thoughts on My New Report

If you follow me on Twitter, you probably noticed a few comments about a new report I have out with the Fordham Institute: Robbers or Victims? Charter Schools and District Finances. I'm putting my thoughts here so you know they are mine and mine alone. Hopefully, I can shed light on what the report finds and what I believe that means.

Let me start by saying I don't think a have a false sense of my place in the ongoing debate about education policy: I'm a teacher and blogger who went and got a PhD in the field, who continues to teach K12 (but also teaches grad students in education policy part-time), and has a bit of following on social media (although not nearly as large as others). My blog is full of posts that call out what I believe is bad research in support of education "reform" -- especially charter schools. I also put out reports now and then for a variety of groups that have cast doubt on charter school "success" stories.

Given this, it was a surprise to me when I got an email last year from Fordham, asking about a working paper based on my dissertation. Fordham is well known as a supporter of charter schools, and regularly produces research supporting their expansion. Why would they want to work with me? Did they know who I am and what I've done?

It turns out they did. They were considering doing a study very similar to what I had done CONTINUE READING: Jersey Jazzman: The Fiscal Impact Of Charter Schools on School Districts: Thoughts on My New Report

Jersey Jazzman: January, 2021 Update on NJ COVID School Opening Plans: Still Racially Biased, Still Inadequately Funded For Many

Jersey Jazzman: January, 2021 Update on NJ COVID School Opening Plans: Still Racially Biased, Still Inadequately Funded For Many

January, 2021 Update on NJ COVID School Opening Plans: Still Racially Biased, Still Inadequately Funded For Many

The estimable Colleen O'Dea from NJ Spotlight News continues to do New Jersey a service by updating the data on school instructional models during the pandemic. I've been collecting her updates, including the latest one from late in January, and matching it to enrollment and funding data from the NJDOE.

I did my first report on this for the New Jersey Policy Perspective back in October, and have updated my findings here several times since (here and here). Let me be clear: these are not reports about how many students and families are electing to participate in remote, hybrid, or in-person learning. Rather, I'm showing what the options are for students in their school districts. 

A school district, for example, may offer hybrid learning (a combination of limited classroom time and virtual learning at home) to its students; however, those students may choose to stay home full-time. But a student in a "remote" district won't have that option: they never get to decide whether they want to come to school at least part-time.

There are four categories of instructional models in the data

• In-person, where all instruction takes place in school (again, NJ law says students could still elect to learn from home).
• Remote, where there is no in-person learning available.
• Hybrid, where there is a mix of in-person and remote learning for the district's students.
• Combination (combo), where different schools within the district have different models.

The reports I've been doing, based on O'Dea's data, have been getting a fair bit of attention CONTINUE READING: Jersey Jazzman: January, 2021 Update on NJ COVID School Opening Plans: Still Racially Biased, Still Inadequately Funded For Many

Getting School Finance Indicators Right – School Finance 101

Getting School Finance Indicators Right – School Finance 101

Getting School Finance Indicators Right

Our data and reports can be found at: http://schoolfinancedata.org/

A few years back, Mark Weber and I decided (for a variety of reasons) that we needed to regain control over our school finance indicators work. We needed to find competent collaborators who would support our desire to continuously improve the quality and integrity of the indicators and our communication of them. We also needed to find an appropriate outlet. The William T. Grant Foundation had provided us with significant support to develop an open source data system and a set of indicators to improve the conversation around school funding equity and adequacy.

We found exactly what we were looking for through Matt Di Carlo at Shanker Institute, with whom I have collaborated on a few prior projects, most notably: https://www.shankerinstitute.org/resource/does-money-matter-second-edition

I started this work back in the mid to late 2000s around the time I transitioned from Kansas to New Jersey. I’ve written previously about my concern over other “indicators” reports that are out there and the need to improve and add clarity and consistency to the conversation.

Here in April of 2019, I explain the mindset behind the development of our new (in the past few years) school finance indicators data system (SFID):

Matt Di Carlo helped bring this all together into a clea

Matt Di Carlo helped bring this all together into a clear, concise set of indicators to be presented as the body of our new reports.

Below is the summary of our newest update:

The publication of this annual report and accompanying database is motivated by two CONTINUE READING: Getting School Finance Indicators Right – School Finance 101