This report represents the beginning of an effort by chief state school officers to compile information systematically on the states' educational programs and to report that information regularly to the public and their policymakers. This year, the report emphasizes demographic and fiscal background information bearing on the states' education systems. The first section provides a state-by-state breakdown of state school system demographics, including estimated school-age population, change, percent of total population, and change in percent of total population, projected from the 1970 and 1980 Census. The second section lists general population characteristics for each state, including per-capita income, educational attainment of adults, and percent voting. The third section focuses on financial resources of each state, including gross state product per school-age child and relative tax capacity index. The fourth section provides statistics on student needs, based on the school-age population in poverty and the percent of K-12 enrollments in private schools. The final section provides data collected from questionnaires on the features of the states' educational programs. Included are comparative statistics on instructional time, school participation, teacher preparation and certification, and effective schooling programs. Color-coded maps are provided to illustrate each of these tables. A final section addresses gaps in the data presented and describes future efforts to obtain data on educational outcomes. (TE)