School Finance Resource Page
“Only a fool would find that money does not matter in education.”
- Howard E. Manning, Jr., North Carolina Superior Court Judge,
from the 2000 Hoke County v. State school finance decision.
Despite these strong words, those of us who work to ensure a quality education close to home for all students often find ourselves without answers for those who assert that schools don’t need more money. How much is enough? What unique resources do rural schools need? How can we obtain the funding to meet the needs of our local school? These are all questions that must be answered. Here are some resources that may help you find the information you need, provide ideas for advocacy campaigns, or perhaps inspire more questions that you should ask of public officials and policymakers who deal with your school’s finances every day.
Check back on this page often – we will continue to add to it and update it so that it contains the most up-to-date references and research that may assist rural school advocates. And, please – share with us helpful websites, articles, and other resources that you do not see listed here!
Organizations Working on School Funding and Finance Issues
The Rural Education Finance Center (REFC) of The Rural School and Community Trust
The Rural Education Finance Center works with rural people and organizations who advocate for equitable funding for all public schools serving rural communities. REFC researches school finance issues and shares findings, promotes best fiscal management practices for rural schools. REFC provides support on current legal issues involving school finance systems, and tracks legal and policy developments affecting rural school finance nationwide.
The National Access Network
Access is a research, networking, and training organization working with advocates. Their website provides nationwide school funding litigation and policy updates, as well as information on other education issues, including No Child Left Behind.
Rural Trust Research on School Finance Issues
Best Fiscal Management Practices for Rural Schools
Jerry Johnson and Greg Malhoit have written a step-by-step guide to the school budgeting process, and in clear language, have compiled the ways in which community members can be involved from start to finish. The guide also explains how using sound budgeting principles can strengthen rural advocates’ positions when advocating for the funding their schools need.
How to Analyze Your State's Education Finance System
This booklet, written by William Mathis, is a comprehensive way for citizens to begin learning about education finance, and contains definitions, explanations, and flowcharts to help guide you step by step through this often complicated and challenging field.
Providing Rural Students with a High Quality Education - The Rural Perspective on the Concept of Educational Adequacy
How do five leading state-level rural advocacy organizations define “adequacy” from a rural perspective? How do these groups, experienced in working for change in the school finance arena, make the connections between financial resources, community involvement, and high quality education so that policymakers listen and better understand what rural schools need? Greg Malhoit has compiled responses and information from a convening of these groups into a guide to participating in the costing-out process to determine adequacy.
Research Websites
U.S. Census
The U.S. Census website contains an Education Finance Data page where you can find figures from every state on very broad topics such as per-pupil spending totals and amounts received from federal, state, and local sources. The most recent data, reported in 2006, is from the fiscal year 2003-2004.
Education Finance Statistics Center
The Education Finance Statistics Center, a part of the National Center for Education Statistics of the U.S. Department of Education contains graphs of much of the Census data, as well as papers describing the stsate systems for financing local school districts. The state overviews are brief, but serve as good introducations to the various ways states allocate money to schools.
Online Guides to School Finance Topics
Public Education Network (PEN) - Guide to Public Engagement and School Finance Litigation
PEN developed this paper to describe how advocacy groups can organize around school funding lawsuits, whether they have been recently filed, are ongoing, or have already been decided. The guide also includes basic information on how the litigation process usually proceeds.
Mid-Continent Research for Education and Learning (MCREL) - School Finance: From Equity to Adequacy
MCREL’s paper provides a brief history of school funding suits and explains the equity and adequacy theories on which those lawsuits have been based.