Because states typically fund districts based on student counts, districts reporting shrinking enrollment worry about shrinking dollars as well. The seemingly obvious quick fix is for states to hold districts financially harmless for some or all of their enrollment loss. But states have many factors to weigh when deciding whether or how to go down…

Federal law defines English learner (EL) eligibility differently for Indigenous, compared to non-Indigenous, students, allowing for broader entry into the EL category, along with its accompanying resources and services. We interviewed EL leaders from 25 state departments of education to learn about their level of understanding of the…

Sixty-seven school finance reforms (SFRs) in 26 states have taken place since 1990; however, there is little empirical evidence on the heterogeneity of SFR effects. We provide a comprehensive description of how individual reforms affected resource allocation to low- and high-income districts within states, including both financial and…

One of the states served by the Southeast Comprehensive Center (SECC) requested the center's assistance in compiling information regarding educational support for Native American students. To obtain this information, SECC staff contacted 16 states that have state agency contacts for Indian Education and/or that indicate a population of more than…

Raising academic standards and eliminating achievement gaps between advantaged and disadvantaged students are America's prime national educational goals. Current federal and state policies, however, largely ignore the fact that the childhood poverty rate in the United States is 21%, the highest in the industrialized world, and that poverty…