The benefits of participating in one of these programs have been well documented, but so too have the gaps in been well documented, but so too have the gaps in participation among Black and Hispanic students, English participation among Black and Hispanic students, English learners, students with disabilities, and other groups not well learners,…

Funding for special education has traditionally focused on providing some form of equity for students identified as having a disability (Dragoo, 2018; Hargrove et al., 1983; Zettel & Ballard, 1979). However, the pressure to raise standards for all students led to questions of funding adequacy and efficiency (Baker, 2018; Hanushek, 2007).The…

Identification rates of children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) have been increasing since the year 2000, while federal special education funding has remained stagnant. Researchers gathered data from states related to individual state funding systems, per pupil spending and identification rates of students with ASD to determine if state…

Since 1978, the Education for All Handicapped Children's Act (now IDEA) committed Congress to provide 40 percent of the average per pupil spending to educate children with disabilities. While states have used a variety of special education funding formulas to attempt to meet the needs of children with disabilities, the funding has never approached…

As states reckon with racial enrollment and attainment gaps in higher education, some have made efforts to address them through their higher education funding. Two common approaches are outcomes-based funding (OBF) and Promise programs, as each can be designed with an explicit race equity lens. This report summarizes a two-year study examining the…

The Every Student Succeeds Act of 2015 requires states to use a variety of indicators, including standardized tests and attendance records, to designate schools for support and improvement based on schoolwide performance and the performance of groups of students within schools. Schoolwide and group-level performance indicators are also…

To ensure all children can be successful in school and beyond, states have increasingly supported and expanded pre-kindergarten (pre-k) programs aimed and improving student outcomes and reducing disparities. While research has shown generally positive short-term outcomes for specific programs, state design and support for pre-k programs varies…

College affordability has been an urgent concern in the context of Texas higher education. In September 2003, the Texas Legislature passed HB 3015 (2003) to allow governing boards of public universities to set different designated tuition rates, with no upper limit. As a result, tuition at four-year colleges and universities in Texas has…

This article examines how three relatively recent decisions enacted and upheld by Pennsylvania lawmakers have increased racial disparities in education funding and are helping to explode what Ladson-Billings has termed the educational debt. We find that districts with the highest concentrations of Black and Latinx students are profoundly…

This paper applies outcome-based school aid to Ohio's FY 2014 school district data to find systematic patterns between school aid parameters and outcome equity as well as fiscal equity. Empirical findings suggest that outcome-based power-equalizing aid improves both fiscal and outcome equity more than Ohio's aid formula does, with…

A state's special education funding structure affects both the level of special education services provided and how equitably these services are distributed across districts. Irrespective of the funding system, districts in almost all states use unrestricted funds to pay for special education services not covered by revenue designated for special…

Free college has been gaining traction as a public policy option in recent years and has been adopted in some form by at least 15 states. Enthusiasm for the idea has gained momentum with the growing realization that a healthy economy requires a well-educated workforce and that workers benefit immensely from education beyond high school. Indeed,…

Instead of asking whether money matters, this paper questions whose money matters in public education. Previous literature on education funding uses an aggregate expenditure per pupil to measure the relationship between education funding and academic performance. Federalism creates mainly three levels of funding sources: federal, state, and local…

Computer science (CS) education in California has grown substantially in the last decade. Early grassroots efforts have evolved into a broad coalition of educators, industry leaders, and other members of the CS community known as Computer Science for California (CSforCA). At the same time, developments in multiple aspects of state policy reflect…

Researchers interviewed higher education professionals, asking: How do professionals working in higher education equity and access sectors, both public and private, assign responsibility for improving access, and what solutions do they propose? Informed by Kingdon's multiple streams framework and Guajardo et al.'s theory of change in action,…