In 2018, a wave of educator strikes called Red for Ed swept through several states. Educators in Arizona won additional funding from the state legislature, supposedly for teacher salaries, which school boards could spend as they chose. This article quantitatively examines the participation and results of the 2018 Arizona educator strike, using…

In recent decades, parallel literature has documented the magnitudes and effects of teacher turnover and the impact of state school finance reforms (SFRs). In this paper, we examine SFRs as possible mechanisms to improve teacher salary, turnover, and job satisfaction by using nationally representative data from 2000 to 2016 and leveraging…

This paper examines how school districts change teacher salaries in response to large changes in revenue. Using district-level salary schedule data for nearly all California school districts, we analyze two time periods: one with a decrease in funding (2007-08 to 2011-12 marked by the Great Recession) and one with a significant increase in funding…

In the United States, state-funded preschool is a critical component of both K-12 public education and the early childhood education and care system. In 2021, 44 states and the District of Columbia operated 63 school/center-based preschool programs serving over 1.3 million children. The vast majority of state-funded preschool programs require two…

At a time when national discourse in the USA centers the need for professionalization, regulation, and surveillance, this article emphasizes the ways in which neoliberal logics harm those working in early childhood education in the USA. While stakeholders at every level debate proposed solutions to the early childhood education crisis, largely…

In the course of the COVID-19 pandemic, education policy debates have thrust a heightened focus on the provision of adequate school resources and on educator well-being and turnover, concerns particularly critical for school districts that serve large shares of economically disadvantaged students. In this article, we investigate voter and parent…

System governing boards fulfill roles as both regulators and protectors for their multiple constituent campuses. While centralized control provides many benefits to institutional members, such advantages are also be accompanied by limitations upon campuses to pursue expanded missions, fully compete, and spend according to individual rather than…

The introduction of elementary schools in Sweden (and elsewhere) in the mid-nineteenth century required the quick hiring of many new teachers, which in turn posed challenges about their financing. This paper analyses school inspectors' reports and teachers' journals to illuminate local strategies to provide affordable teaching in the Uppsala…

In recent decades, education leaders and researchers have increasingly sought to disaggregate key higher education outcome data--graduation rates, attainment, employment, and income--by race and ethnicity in order to uncover and narrow equity gaps. The same is true, recently, for affordability, especially as it relates to the differential impact…

Purpose: Teacher pay in Arkansas public schools varies widely from district to district across the state. This pay discrepancy is driven by both the funds available to a district and by how these funds are allocated. A standard per student budget is given to districts across the state, but this budget can be supplemented by additional property…

While many state-level finance equity studies examine the effectiveness of state funding mechanisms overall, fewer examine specific components that make up these mechanisms. This research uses state-level longitudinal administrative data to examine levels of horizontal and vertical equity in the distribution of teacher salary dollars via the…

The fiscal crisis facing the economy has led to withdrawal of the state from major sectors of the economy including education. With the advent of the liberalized economic policy the private sector has been playing a pivotal role in the economic development. Higher education ceases to be the 'merit good' and the universities are encouraged to…

The quality of the teaching force in our public schools has received great attention as one of the approaches to improve student performance, as there exists ample evidence that teacher quality matters for student achievement (see McCaffrey et al., 2004 for a review on this literature). Rivkin, Hanushek, and Kain (2005) find large differences…

Currently, Vietnam is adopting a cost-sharing policy for public higher education. A dual mechanism of tuition fees has been introduced: (i) the tuition fee covers part of the instruction cost; and (ii) the tuition fee covers the full instruction cost. Despite this, Vietnamese public universities still face a shortage of income for maintaining good…

The Gelmini reform implemented in Italy in 2010 was designed to ensure greater efficiency and effectiveness within the higher education (HE) sector. The reform was implemented in a climate of general austerity, which caused severe cuts in public funds for the university system. This paper documents the unintended consequences of the reform in…