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The In Equities Of U S School Funding The Regulatory Review

Leo Migdal
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the in equities of u s school funding the regulatory review

Scholars debate various methods of funding public education in the United States. Public education advocates have fought for centuries to achieve educational equity in the United States. For the last 40 years, much of that fight has concerned funding parity, but some experts argue that equal funding alone is not enough to achieve equitable outcomes for all students. Publicly funded schools first emerged in the United States in the 1780s. Public schools expanded first in cities and northeastern states before gradually making their way to other parts of the country. By 1830, around half of children were enrolled in public schools.

By 1870, more than three quarters of children attended public schools. But public school has not always been accessible for all Americans. Before the Civil War, U.S. schools regularly excluded or offered inferior education to people of color. After the War, Southern states skirted constitutional protections for Black students by enacting Jim Crow laws that diminished or eliminated educational opportunities for Black students while claiming to treat them equally. This practice did not end until well after the Supreme Court struck down race-based school segregation in Brown v.

Board of Education in 1954. Funding disparities remained among the primary drivers of this historic inequality. For most of American history, public schools were funded almost exclusively through local property taxes. Proponents of local funding argued that, as a local service, schools would add value only to the local community and thus should be funded by local means. Federal funding was almost nonexistent until 1917, when the Smith-Hughes Act established the first federal funds for vocational school. Even after the expansion of state support for public schools, states supplied only around one-sixth of school funding.

Fifty years after the San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez decision, the fundamental reality of school finance inequity remains a central feature of American public schools. Local school funding is still based primarily on local property taxes and reflects large disparities in property values between wealthy and low-income communities.1 1.See Daphne Kenyon, Bethany Paquin & Semida Munteanu, Public Schools and... States, Land Lines, Apr. 2022, at 32, 34–35, https://www.lincolninst.edu/sites/default/files/pubfiles/public-schools-property-tax-lla220406.pdf [https://perma.cc/TMY4-QGZA].Show More State aid to education is a significant source of additional funding, but it is particularly vulnerable to economic downturns and is not enough in many states to... at 37.Show More Finally, federal aid is explicitly designed to support low-income students, but its relative size is small: since at least the 1980s, it has remained less than ten percent of the funds...

for Educ. Stats., NCES 2002-129, Federal Support for Education: Fiscal Years 1980 to 2001, at iii (Nov. 2001), https://nces.ed.gov/pubs2002/2002129.pdf [https://perma.cc/3CBR-D8FE]; Public School Revenue Sources, Nat’l Ctr. for Educ. Stats.: Condition of Education 1 (May 2022), https://nces.ed.gov/programs/coe/pdf/2022/cma‌_508.pdf [https://perma.cc/RN5F-4VFX]; How is K–12 Education Funded?, Peter G. Peterson Found.

(Aug. 16, 2022), https://www.pgpf.org/budget-basics/how-is-k-12-education-funded [https://perma.cc/4URP-UABJ].Show More The Rodriguez decision largely foreclosed the possibility of remedying school funding inequities through federal courts. The majority’s core holding was that education is not a fundamental right and therefore judicial scrutiny of these inequities is limited to rational basis.4 4.San Antonio Indep. Sch. Dist.

v. Rodriguez, 411 U.S. 1, 35, 40 (1973).Show More After the decision, many states faced litigation in state courts around inequities and inadequacies in school funding based on clauses in their state constitutions.5 5.Jeffrey S. Sutton, San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez and Its Aftermath, 94 Va. L.

Rev 1963, 1974 (2008) (noting that, “as of June 2008, forty-five States have faced state-constitutional challenges to their systems of funding public schools”). While the first generation of state school finance cases focused primarily on inequality in school funding, the next generation of cases focused increasingly on the adequacy of educational funding levels. Id. at 1973.Show More These state court decisions contributed to narrowing the spending disparities within states in many cases, but these gains were difficult to sustain over time and did not address inequities across state... Houck & Elizabeth DeBray, The Shift From Adequacy to Equity in Federal Education Policymaking: A Proposal for How ESEA Could Reshape the State Role in Education Finance, RSF, Dec. 2015, at 148, 150–53, https://www.rsfjournal.org/content/rsfjs​s/1/3/148.full.pdf [https://perma.cc/BM5M-7M6P]; see also Dennis J.

Condron, The Waning Impact of School Finance Litigation on Inequality in Per Student Revenue During the Adequacy Era, 43 J. Educ. Fin. 1, 18 (2017).Show More Many decades after the Rodriguez decision, fundamental inequities in school financing remain the norm. Although the federal government’s major investments in elementary and secondary education pre-dated the Rodriguez decision7 7.See Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965, Pub. L.

No. 89-10, 79 Stat. 27 (codified as amended in scattered sections of 20 U.S.C.).Show More, in the last two decades those funds have sought to leverage wide-ranging changes in American schooling. While these sometimes controversial interventions seem to have increased state investments in public education, the impact on school funding disparities has been more modest. This Essay will examine the efforts by the federal government to foster greater equity in school financing and assess several alternative approaches that might be more effective. After a brief overview of federal education funding, the Essay will analyze the legacy of the Rodriguez decision on school funding and examine the evolution of federal strategies to expand educational equity.

I. Overview of Federal Education Funding As originally enacted, the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (“ESEA”) of 1965 sought to fill the gaps in funding for low-income students through the creation of the Title I program.8 8.Elementary and Secondary Education... L. No. 89-10, § 201, 79 Stat.

27, 27 (repealed 1978).Show More Soon after its launch, growing concern that states were reducing their own commitments to education funding led to explicit provisions that require that Title I funding “supplement, not supplant”... L. No. 114-95, § 1012, 192 Stat. 1802, 1875 (2015) (codified as amended at 20 U.S.C. § 6321(b)(1)).Show More Therefore, a central feature of federal funding has long been to respond to and help remedy inequitable state and local investments in schools serving low-income students.

In the last several decades, states have begun to remedy the historical underfunding of schools serving poor students and students of color. But is funding equity enough to create a fair education system? In a nation celebrated for its pursuit of equality, the U.S. education system tells a different tale—one where the zip code often determines destiny. An Economic Policy Institute report reveals how social class remains a dominant predictor of educational success, with early disparities in children’s lives seldom bridged in later years [1] . The root of this inequity lies in a system where education funding is heavily dependent on local property taxes, leading to significant disparities.

Districts in affluent areas can afford to spend more on each pupil compared to those in poverty-stricken regions, thereby perpetuating a chasm in educational quality and outcomes [2, 3]. This situation calls for a crucial revision of the U.S. education funding formula to provide equitable opportunities to all students, irrespective of their socio-economic background. Government intervention is critical in education, a fundamental pillar for achieving equality of opportunity and economic mobility. Despite arguments against increased funding, research finds targeted resources significantly enhance educational outcomes [4, 5]. Inspired by California’s Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) and similar models, the proposed funding formula introduces base, supplemental, and concentration grants, specifically designed to support English learners, low-income students, and foster youth [6, 7].

This approach champions equity and holistic student success [5, 8]. In essence, it embodies a commitment to educational justice, ensuring every child has access to the necessary resources for learning. Recent studies, such as those from Public Advocates, emphasize the necessity of reimagining our education system as a means to address long standing societal injustices. California’s underwhelming commitment to school funding, despite its massive economy, underscores the urgent need for comprehensive reform across the U.S. [6]. Furthermore, the U.S.

Department of Education’s 2023 Equity Action Plan provides a framework for addressing these disparities through federal initiatives. This plan focuses on improving access and outcomes for historically underserved students by implementing maintenance of equity requirements and increasing support for learners with disabilities [9]. Last updated 19 hours ago ago. Our resources are updated regularly but please keep in mind that links, programs, policies, and contact information do change. Every year, American taxpayers spend over $800 billion on public K-12 education. Where that money comes from, how it’s distributed, and whether it actually helps kids learn better has sparked some of the fiercest political battles in the country.

The fights about fundamental questions: Should rich neighborhoods get better schools than poor ones? Can parents use tax money to send their kids to private schools? Does spending more actually make schools better? These debates shape the education of 50 million American children. They determine whether a kid in rural Mississippi gets the same opportunities as one in suburban Connecticut. And they reflect deep disagreements about the role of government, the meaning of equality, and what America owes its children.

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