The Feds Revisit How We Fund Our Public Schools
NPR\’s education team follows up on what the federal government is doing to address inequalities in funding for schools across the country. (photo credit: Abhi Sharma / Flickr)
StateImpact contributed a story to the project about how changes to Indiana’s funding formula affected schools with high number of English language learners and students living in poverty. We reported how funding played out in Goshen Community Schools, a district with 50 percent English language learners.
Today, Cory Turner of NPR’s Ed team has a follow up on the topic of school funding and what the federal government is doing to equalize it:
Today, the U.S. Department of Education unveiled new rules, explaining to states and districts how they can prove they’re spreading resources fairly between poor and less-poor schools.
Today’s release is a re-write of rules that were first unveiled last spring and that caused quite a stir, creating a political unicorn: a fight in which Republicans and teachers unions found themselves on the same side.
That fight hinged on a simple fact of life in America’s schools: Districts often spend more money in more affluent schools. That’s because teachers in poorer schools that receive federal Title I aid tend to be less experienced and, as a result, less expensive.
