Rural Matters

A rule proposed by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services will reduce schools’ ability to access federal help to serve low-income students who receive special education services at school. More information is below. You can read the proposed changes and comment on them at the Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services. (Rule CMS-2287-P) Deadline is tomorrow!

Under the proposed rule, schools would not be able to receive payments for “administrative” services or for most transportation provided to students in special education whose families are eligible for Medicaid.

In addition to cutting reimbursements for transportation to and from school, to school activities, and to outside therapeutic providers, the cuts would also affect administrative services such as outreach to families, referrals, or training for staff who work with these students. In addition, districts would not be able to use these funds for expanded physical, occupational and speech therapy programs for students, services which many students would not otherwise receive.

The changes are intended to meet the President’s budget goals and would cut $3.6 billion over five years. The reduction would force districts to reduce services to low-income students and/or pay for the services from the district’s general funds, which many districts find are increasingly strapped by other demands and requirements.

It is important to note that the rule change would not affect payments for direct medical services provided in schools to children who qualify through Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA)

Apart from the proposed cuts to Medicaid reimbursements for schools, however, the President’s budget also proposes additional cuts in federal funding for schools through IDEA. IDEA is the primary federal funding mechanism for supporting students who receive special education services at school. IDEA was authorized to provide 40% of funding for students with special needs in public schools. The Act has never been funded at that level, and the proposed Medicaid cuts would put IDEA funding at only 16%.

The Medicaid cuts are being carried out through an administrative process called a rule change. The public is allowed to comment on such rule changes, but the deadline is nearly here – it is November 6. To read the proposed rule, visit www.cms.hhs.gov/eRulemaking. You can also submit your comments electronically at the site -- scroll down to CMA-2287-P for this particular rule. Comments do not have to be formally composed.

You can read more about the proposed changes at:

http://www.sacbee.com/111/story/392837.html

http://www.nctimes.com/articles/2007/10/21/news/top_stories/19_30_6110_20_07.txt

Posted by Robin Lambert at 12:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Commentary on School Choice in South Carolina

This article also appeared in The Times and Democrat,
in Orangeburg, South Carolina on August 30, 2007.

Resting in their heavenly repose, South Carolina's civil rights pioneers of the 1930s and 1940s must be scratching their heads. A prominent African-American state senator, also a Democrat and minister, says many of his generational peers are longing for the days of racially segregated schools. Another minister says most African-American children "fared better when we were segregated."

These leaders are understandably frustrated. Too many children are not reaping the academic gains that African-Americans hoped would follow public school desegregation. On last year's state achievement test, more than 40,000 African-American students in grades three through eight scored "Below Basic" in English/Language Arts. An average of 60 percent of all African-American students in third through eighth grade performed at the Below Basic level in science.

There is some good news. Thousands of African-American students are performing well, scoring at the highest levels, "Proficient" or "Advanced," on the state test. However, thousands more have the unrealized potential to do so.

Proposals to solve students' academic problems abound, but many are simplistic. South Carolina has long favored such approaches in public policy. Human bondage would fuel economic development. Secession would free South Carolina of the federal yoke. Racial oppression and segregation would preserve "our way of life." Low taxes would attract industry. Providing a "minimally adequate education" will secure the state's future.

Now comes school choice...

Continue reading "GUEST AUTHOR: Hayes Mizell" »

Posted by GUEST AUTHOR at 09:52 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Status of Education in Rural America, a new report from the National Center on Education Statistics (NCES) has some pretty interesting information about rural schools.

For example, rural students face more challenges related to college access and participation than students in any other locale. High-poverty rural schools spend LESS per pupil than high-poverty urban schools and less than most other rural schools.

And, "remote" rural schools -- those that are more than 35 miles from a city and more than 10 miles from a town -- have higher rates of poverty than many urban schools. In fact, African American and American Indian/Native Alaskan students who attend remote rural schools are more likely to attend a high poverty school than are their peers in cities.

Despite these challenges, remote rural schools have higher averaged freshman graduation rates than all other locales except suburbs, which they equal.

But you wouldn’t learn this information from most news reports. Those tend to focus on how rural is "in the middle," doing better on most indicators than cities and not as well as suburbs.

That's because news coverage has focused mainly on the rural "averages" highlighted in the report's own summary.

The reality, however, is that “rural” is highly variable. Rural places differ from one another more dramatically and on more dimensions than most suburbs or cities.

Some rural schools in affluent communities have plenty of resources, long histories of public support, and lots of opportunity. In short, they skew up the rural averages.

On the other hand, there are hundreds of struggling rural districts that face poverty rates as high or higher than most of the nation’s poorest urban districts (see "The 'Rural 800' Districts"), and many have long-standing histories of political and social struggle. Yet these poor rural districts have even fewer financial and municipal resources than districts in most large cities, and they get less attention.

When indicators for the best-resourced rural schools are averaged with those for the most challenged schools, the result reveals little about either school setting. And the averages divert attention from real needs. And from real possibilities in rural schools, including struggling ones.

So what does the report have to say about rural schools that is revealing and important?

Continue reading "Rural Schools—Not So Much—In the Middle" »

Posted by Robin Lambert at 02:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

We wanted to know more about the rural school districts that serve high poverty communities so first we statistically rounded up the 7604 districts nationwide that have over half their students in a school that is physically located in a rural community. Then we identified the 800 – about 10 percent -- that have the highest rate of eligibility for the federal Title I program. That is the program providing funds for disadvantaged students. We’ll call these 800 high-poverty rural districts the "rural 800."

Continue reading to find out more about these districts and to see a chart of the 16 states where most Rural 800 districts are located.

Continue reading "The "Rural 800" Districts" »

Posted by Marty Strange at 09:24 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

By Rachel Tompkins

The U.S. Supreme Court decided last week that schools could not choose to end racial segregation by assigning children to schools based on racial characteristics. The court suggested that was just as bad as the century’s long practice of using race to exclude children from school.

It’s an Alice in Wonderland type of reasoning that, as one commentator said, doesn’t pass the kindergarten test of “which of these things is alike and which is different.” Other commentators, some of whom at one time supported or even benefited from school desegregation, weighed in support of the decision.

Juan Williams, journalist and biographer of Justice Thurgood Marshall, wrote an op ed in the New York Times arguing that the decision was correct. He thinks it is time to end the era of forced integration and just focus on making all schools good whatever their racial composition.

I can understand that reasoning even if I don’t agree with it. It reminds me of a meeting I attended in a church basement in Cleveland, Ohio, in the 1970’s at which an elderly African-American gentleman talked about his long struggle for school desegregation in that city. He said: “ I have spent my life trying to get our kids into their schools thinking they would be better. I have come to find out that most of their schools aren’t so good either. Now we’ve got to work to make all the schools better.”

But will it ever happen if the children are sorted into racially separate schools?

On this point, Williams cites an interview with Marshall who says that he didn’t fight for school desegregation because he thought there was magic in having black children and white children sit next to each other. He said he did it because white folks would have to provide resources for all children if they were together in the same school.

Thurgood Marshall was right then and he is right today. It’s about the money and what the money can buy.

Continue reading "Thurgood Marshall Was Right" »

Posted by Rachel Tompkins at 01:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Check out yesterday's post on the Daily Yonder for an interesting comparison of the effects of flooding and the combination of low funding and high stakes testing demands on schools in many rural communities.

The author, Richard Oswald, lives in Atchison County, Missouri, where the Missouri River flooded earlier this summer. He's also a former school superintendent. So, he's got some first-hand references that draw a vivid picture of what's happening to many rural schools, especially those located in communities with "quick stop" economies.

While at DailyYonder, take a look at "Saving Greensburg..." Governor Kathleen Sibelius has said that re-opening the high school is key to saving this small Kansas town that was destroyed by a tornado in May.

Posted by Robin Lambert at 08:10 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Marty Strange, Policy Director, Rural School and Community Trust

“No, not us,” said the Nebraska Supreme Court when asked by rural students, parents, and school districts if Nebraska’s miserly school funding system does enough to educate her youth.

The Nebraska Constitution requires “free instruction in the common schools” of the state. The plaintiffs wanted to know if those words have any meaning in a court of law, or are they just so much constitutional blather?

The Court said the meaning of those words is a “political question” for the legislature and the governor, not the courts, to decide. The court found for blather.

Political question? Don’t kid yourself. Courts decide the questions they want to decide. The ones they don’t want to decide they label “political.”

While it is true that courts should not legislate, it is also true that words have meaning, and it is the Court’s duty to interpret their meaning, especially when those words are part of the Constitution.

But according to the Nebraska Supreme Court, the words “free instruction in the common schools of this state” can mean a coloring book, a crayon, and a tree stump for a desk if the politicians say so.

Then the judges suggested the plaintiffs were merely angry and sullen sinners who could go to hell for daring to ask these Wizards of Oz to come out from behind their curtain and perform their public duty to interpret the Nebraska Constitution.

Mind you, the Supreme Courts in over a dozen states have had no trouble ruling that their state’s school funding system is inadequate without ducking behind the “political question” curtain for cover.

Continue reading "Searching for Justice in the Stygian Swamp" »

Posted by Marty Strange at 03:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Most states are trying to restrict educational costs by placing limits on school expenditures or on taxes levied to support schools. These taxing and spending limits can make it very difficult for schools to improve or expand programs, boost teacher salaries, or even maintain existing offerings.

Laws in many states, however, provide local communities a way around the limitations of taxing or spending caps through the “override” process. In such cases, local voters can choose to spend more than the law permits, or tax themselves at a rate higher than the state tax lid, if 50% or more of voters approve the override.

But some states require a so-called supermajority, in which the override depends on 60% of voters, sometimes even higher margins, to approve the override. This requirement compounds the problems that poor communities face in raising revenues for their schools.

The Problem of Supermajorities

Supermajority overrides in effect make some people’s vote worth more than others. They create “premium” voters and “discount” voters. Say for example, that 60% approval is required to override a lid. That means six votes are needed to achieve the same effect that five would have in a simple majority election. The votes of those who support the override are effectively discounted by one-sixth, or about 17%. On the other hand, the votes of those who oppose the override are inflated by one-fourth—four votes have the same power as five would have in a simple majority election, a 25% premium.

Continue reading "Supermajorities Make the Votes of Some Worth More than the Votes of Others" »

Posted by Marty Strange at 11:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Two small rural high schools in Union County, South Carolina are likely in their last year of existence, as soon as a recent school board decision to consolidate becomes final. Even though over 700 Jonesville High and Lockhart School supporters jammed into public meetings to plead for their schools – especially notable because Lockhart has 120 students and Jonesville has 240 – the board voted 7-2 to consolidate the schools into Union High School, which has 1000 students. The two smaller schools lived under threat of consolidation for years, and successfully fought off efforts to close them until just these last few weeks. How did this happen?

Continue reading "Consolidation in One South Carolina District: More Dollars = Less Sense?" »

Posted by Amanda Adler at 11:40 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Voters in Alabama passed "Amendment 2" on Tuesday (59% /41%), requiring each school system (district) in the state to contribute 10 mills of property tax toward the school system's budget.

Prior to the passage of Amendment 2, local school systems were required to contribute the equivalent of 10 mills toward the state school funding formula for their system. Thirty of the state's 101 school systems collected less than 10 mills of property tax and made up the difference, usually through local sales taxes. A mill of property tax is $1 dollar tax for each $1,000 of assessed valuation.

Property taxes in Alabama remain the lowest in the nation, but the constitutional amendment will shift some of the local tax requirment for schools from sales taxes, which are more subject to economic variation and fall more heavily on low and middle income people who spend a higher share of their income on necessities, to property taxes, which are more stable and predictible and tend to fall more heavily on people who own more valuable homes and land.

Although the shift from 10-mill equivalent to 10 actual mills is viewed in some ways as a tax fairness measure, it is widely expected to generate more income for local schools. Most school systems will continue to collect all or part of their local sales tax for schools, which will now supply additional income above the 10 mill requirement.

Posted by Robin Lambert at 12:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

As voters across the country go to the polls next week, many will be asked to cast a ballot on one or more tax initiatives--or on measures to limit government's taxing authority or its spending. Many of those initiatives could have far-reaching implications for schools. One initiative that has received little national attention is in Alabama.

In that state a measure known as Amendment 2 would require all school systems in the state to contribute 10 mills of local property tax toward the support of local schools. That's just $1 in taxes on each $1000 in valuation, or $100 a year for a $100,000 house. Hard to believe, but true.

Part of the reason the measure has gotten so little attention is that it's a somewhat embarrassing situation, even for the most strident anti-tax advocates. Less than $100 a year on a $100,000 house is very little to ask citizens to provide toward the support of local schools.

Another reason that the measure has gotten relatively little attention outside the state is that it will apply primarily to rural counties. The most powerful advocates for low property taxes in Alabama have traditionally been large corporations and individuals that hold huge tracts of "unimproved" (mainly forest) acreage-- acreage that is mainly in rural places.

Continue reading "Minimum--very minimum--School Support on Ballot in Alabama" »

Posted by Robin Lambert at 12:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Seems there are ever more kinds of small schools every day. In recent days we have noted schools that are “necessarily small,” “small by default,” “small by choice,” “small by design,” part of “small learning communities,” and “naturally small.”

It is worth noting that the proliferation of terms to describe schools that are not big parallels a growth in awareness that, in education, small works. Make no mistake, all these terms carry the political baggage of school finance battles in which various interests are trying to win a bigger piece of the pie, or keep others from getting a bigger piece of the pie, or making sure their kind of smallness and not someone else’s kind of smallness gets a bigger piece of the pie.

It’s time we had a glossary to sort out the political nuances of these terms. Here’s my offering. What’s yours?

Continue reading "The Many Meanings of “Small”" »

Posted by Marty Strange at 10:38 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Paul Greenberg’s been getting some mail. And he doesn’t like it.

The editorial page editor of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette said in a Sunday editorial (September 24, 2006) that he had been sent about a “zillion” copies of an article appearing on this Blog (“Facts are stubborn things, Mr. Greenberg,” posted September 8, 2006).

The article chided Greenberg for not leveling with Arkansans about the facts surrounding the closing of Paron High School. Paron High was forced to close after it was annexed by neighboring Bryant School District. The excuse Bryant gave for the closure was that Paron allegedly was unable to teach all of the 38 courses Arkansas high schools are required to teach each year.

Our article recited a pile of facts about the good performance of Paron students and about the circumstances surrounding the school’s efforts to teach journalism, one of the 38 required courses. Those facts were repeated by many writers who sent letters to the editor as well as emails to the Democrat-Gazette editorial page.

And Mr. Greenberg feels beleaguered and besieged by all this email. I doubt he got a zillion, but any number might have been a bit much for him.

He’s not used to seeing in print opinions he doesn’t agree with, unless he approves publishing them. As editorial

Continue reading "Paron and the Propagandist " »

Posted by Marty Strange at 10:44 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

“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.

Continue reading "School Finance Resource Page" »

Posted by Amanda Adler at 03:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

South Dakota Coalition of Schools, an umbrella organization of 59 mostly rural schools, along with 53 individual student and taxpayer plaintiffs, has filed a lawsuit against the State Department of Education, Board of Education, Governor Mike Rounds, Secretary of Education Rick Melmer, and State Treasurer Vernon Larson. The suit alleges that inadequate funding by the state is causing a constitutional violation of the state’s education clause, and that there is no relationship between the funds that are provided and the actual costs of providing an adequate relationship for these students. The complaint cites high numbers of students failing standardized tests and high dropout rates as evidence that the current finance system is “broken.” A recently-completed adequacy study commissioned by over 130 districts in the state showed a $133 million funding shortfall, and the study was also extensively cited in the complaint, and filed with the court as an exhibit. Interestingly, the same firm who completed the districts’ adequacy study is currently completing an efficiency study for the state legislature, and this limited undertaking was called “investigating how to most efficiently rearrange the deck chairs on a sinking ship” by the plaintiffs.

Posted by Amanda Adler at 08:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBacks (0)