In the 21 states examined, public K-12 enrollment declined in every state except for three states and the District of Columbia. The AP and Stanford found that public K-12 enrollment dropped by approximately 711,000 students in those locations. California and New York experienced massive enrollment declines, with nearly 271,000 and 133,000 students leaving public schools. 

By contrast, K-12 enrollments increased in other schooling sectors. Homeschool enrollment grew by about 184,000 during the pandemic, as likely would’ve been expected, with the homeschooling sectors in Florida and New York growing the most. 

Private school enrollments also grew, but more modestly, increasing by nearly 103,000. Florida, again, and Tennessee experienced the most significant growth in their private schools. 

Yet, the private and homeschool sector growth only accounted for about 40% of public school enrollment losses. Dee estimated that population changes, such as students moving to other states and declining birth rates, accounted for more than a quarter of public school enrollment losses. 

At the same time, the report estimated that 240,133 students remain unaccounted for. These unexplained losses featured most prominently in California and New York, where nearly 152,000 and 60,000 students remain missing, respectively. 

Some absences are likely due to unregistered homeschooling and families not enrolling their children in kindergarten, which is optional in nine of the 21 reviewed states. In these cases, Dee estimated that skipping kindergarten accounted for almost 40% of unexplained absences.

Nonetheless, some students have not attended school for multiple years now. Researchers have previously estimated that the lifetime earnings of students who experienced just one year of learning loss could be reduced by more than 9%, so there will be long-term concerns about many of these students and their futures. 

These public school enrollment declines have also hastened financial crises for many school districts that were unprepared for them, especially urban ones. For instance, Minneapolis Public Schools announced an impending fiscal crisis due to declining enrollment last fall.

With fewer students in public schools and an increasing number of families more comfortable with switching schools, public school districts will need to up their game as they navigate a more competitive education marketplace. Research shows that school districts can positively respond to competitive pressures by implementing measures like open enrollment. 

Policymakers should weaken school district monopolies, so students have options outside of their residentially-assigned schools. Oftentimes students drop out of school because of bullying by other students, not feeling like they fit in with classmates, not getting the academic attention they need, or conflicts with teaching staff. Policies, such as education savings accounts and open enrollment, provide students with flexible schooling options to transfer to schools that fit their needs. Education savings accounts, in particular, allow for significant educational customization, paying for tuition, books, physical therapy, transportation, and much more.

From the states

State policymakers continue to advance school choice proposals nationwide.

The Utah State Senate failed to pass a proposal (S.B. 166) to make microschools legal in the state.

In Idaho, the Senate Education Committee passed a proposal (S.B. 1038) that would establish approximately 6,600 education savings accounts. These accounts could be used to pay for various approved education expenses, such as private school tuition or textbooks. There are no income restrictions on the accounts. 

The Arkansas Senate passed Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders’ LEARNS Act (S.B. 294), which would initially establish education savings accounts for students who are homeless, in foster care, have disabilities, or are assigned to failing public schools. However, student eligibility would expand by 2026 to all K-12 students. At the same time, the proposal would also remove any caps on charter schools and student transfers through open enrollment. Currently, the bill has 25 cosponsors in the Senate and 55 cosponsors in the House, providing a supermajority and majority, respectively.

What to watch

South Carolina policymakers are thinking about expanding open enrollment. Proposals in the South Carolina House and Senate would expand public school choice, allowing students to transfer to public schools other than their assigned ones. Currently, some public school districts in the Palmetto State permit students to participate in within-district open enrollment, but the new proposal would require all school districts to participate in cross- and within-district open enrollment. During his testimony, Reason Foundation Senior Policy Analyst Christian Barnard recommended adding transparency provisions to strengthen the proposal.

Texas governor’s State of the State address calls for school choice reforms. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott called K-12 education an “emergency item” this legislative session. Noting that Texas successfully implemented education savings accounts (ESAs) for students with special needs during the pandemic, Gov. Abbott stated that Texas now needs to establish universal state-funded ESAs for all Texas families. 

Recommended reading 

A Poor Poverty Measure
Ishtiaque Fazlul, Cory Koedel, and Eric Parsons at Education Next

“While it has been understood for some time that school lunch enrollment as a poverty indicator is blunt and prone to error, the magnitude of the problem has not yet been fully appreciated. In exploring the rules, features, and processes of the National School Lunch Program, we find that the program’s design, incentives, and lack of income-verification enforcement likely contribute to the oversubscription.”

Stockton, Calif., School Officials Could Face Criminal Charges after Audit Finds ‘Sufficient Evidence’ of Relief Fund Fraud
Linda Jacobson at The74

“The audit by an independent California agency largely focused on a questionable $7.3 million contract paid for with pandemic relief funds. In 2021, former officials appeared to ram through the purchase of 2,200 ultraviolet air filters designed to kill COVID despite multiple warnings that they weren’t following laws and procedures, the report said.”

___________________________________________________________________________

Are you a state or local policymaker interested in education reform? Reason Foundation’s Education Policy team can help you make sense of complex school finance data and discuss innovative reform options that expand students’ educational opportunities. Please reach out to me directly at jude.schwalbach@reason.org for more information.  

The post Funding Education Opportunity: Examining public school enrollment losses and sectors with gains, state education legislation, and more appeared first on Reason Foundation.

For example, with rural lawmakers and school districts often opposed to school choice, a new report suggests that students residing in rural areas may have much to gain from school choice policies. A report by Heritage Foundation’s Jason Bedrick and Matthew Ladner finds most children living in rural areas are often closer to private school options than some might think. In fact, seven in 10 students living in rural areas live within 10 miles of a private elementary school. The report also found that the number of tax-credit scholarships awarded to Arizona students living in five rural counties increased by 163% between the 2010-11 and 2020-21 school years, showing how school choice policies can benefit students living in rural areas. 

Arizona’s robust school choice options, which “reach further into rural areas than in any other states,” have not been a death knell for rural school districts, the report says. In fact, since charter schools were first introduced in 1994, the state has only consolidated rural school districts in two counties, closed one school district (which had no charter or private schools in it), and created one new school district, Bedrick and Ladner noted.

This phenomenon is not unique to Arizona. Last year, Ron Matus and Dava Hankerson of Step Up for Students released a report showing the positive effects of school choice policies for families living in rural Florida. During the past 20 years, the number of private schools in the Sunshine State’s rural counties expanded from 69 to 120. Matus and Hankerson point out that, “In Florida’s rural counties, the number of students using ESAs [education savings accounts] has grown from 65 in year one to 731 last year, to 1,985 and counting this fall.” This demonstrates that the education marketplace can respond to demand when given a chance to compete with the public school districts’ monopolies. 

This year’s National School Choice Week also made it clear that more policymakers across the country are realizing that education freedom and rural school districts can thrive side by side. As Matus and Hakerson noted, “School choice doesn’t make the sky fall on rural district schools. But it does help part the clouds for rural families who need options for their children.”

And this rural education marketplace should also include public school open enrollment, a valuable school choice policy. A new Reason Foundation report also highlights how states can implement open enrollment funding policies that allow state and local education dollars to follow students to their public schools of choice. “States can take three different pathways to improve portability: comprehensive school finance reform, targeted solutions, and creating a distinct funding mechanism that supports open enrollment,” the study shows.

A competitive education marketplace can be the tide that raises all boats. 

From the States

State policymakers continue to introduce energetic school choice proposals across the nation.

Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds signed the Students First Act, which would provide universal education saving accounts to Iowa families. The new law makes all K-12 students in Iowa eligible to receive a $7,598 voucher. Iowa is now one of three states to have universal education savings accounts.

The Utah House and Senate both passed a proposal (House Bill 215) that would provide 5,000 K-12 students with approximately $8,000 in scholarships. Scholarship recipients could use them to pay for tutoring, private school tuition, and homeschooling. Utah Gov. Spencer Cox signed the bill into law this past weekend.

In Missouri, a proposal by Rep. Ben Baker would require all school districts to participate in open enrollment. If passed, HB 559 would make Missouri’s open enrollment law the strongest in the nation.

Texas policymakers introduced two school choice proposals in January. Rep. Mayes Middleton introduced Senate Bill 176–the Texas Parental Empowerment Act would establish parent-controlled accounts which can be funded through tax credits. Parents could use these accounts to pay for approved education expenses, such as private school tuition or fees, books, or tutoring. House Bill 557, filed by Rep. Cody Vasut, would reimburse Texas parents for private school tuition and other education-related expenses, such as transportation costs.

Virginia Lt. Gov. Winsome Sears and State Delegate Glenn Davis introduced a proposal (House Bill 1508) for education success accounts. Eligible students could use these accounts to pay for private school tuition and other approved educational expenses. Upon parents’ request, Virginia would transfer a percentage of the state funds that would otherwise have been allocated to the school district in which the student resides. The Virginia House Education Committee recently voted to advance the proposal, assigning it to the appropriations committee.

What to watch

Kentucky Anti-Charter School Lawsuit Riles School Choice Proponents. Although charter schools have been legal in Kentucky since 2017, none have ever opened. A 2022 law requiring two pilot charter schools in northern Kentucky aimed to change that, but the Council for Better Education, Jefferson County Public Schools, and Dayton Independent Schools recently filed a lawsuit to block the law from going into effect. 

Dayton Public Schools Faces Heavy Fine for Failing to Bus Charter School Students. Dayton Public Schools could be fined up to $750,000 by the Ohio Department of Education for not complying with a state law that requires school districts to provide transportation to students enrolled in charter schools that reside inside the school district. Dayton Public Schools stated that it couldn’t provide necessary transportation because of conflicting bell schedules and bus driver shortages. The school district is suing the state over the citation.

The First Round of West Virginia’s Hope Scholarships Distributed to Families. Approximately 1,800 recipients received their scholarships which can be used for private school tuition. Nearly 90% of recipients received the full annual amount of about $4,298. Earlier this month, the West Virginia treasurer filed an emergency amendment that would allow scholarship recipients to use their funds to pay for microschool tuition. If the secretary of state does not approve the rule by Feb. 15, it will automatically take effect. 

Recommended Reading 

Pandemic Schools and Religious Renewal
Lewis M. Andrews at National Affairs

“Senior centers, YMCAs, town halls, and other community venues that might normally have been available were, as a result of the pandemic, either closed, operating on limited hours, or committed to their own emergency efforts. By process of elimination, many families realized that the one place large enough, safe enough, and empty enough to run a small school during the workweek was the local parish.”

We Need to Prepare Now for The School Closures That Are Coming
Tim Daly at Fordham

“My advice to cities grappling with falling enrollment is to begin planning now. Engage in robust processes to take community input on which schools will close and when. But do not drag your feet hoping for a miracle that saves you from the scourge of closures altogether… Instead, invest your time and resources in helping families transition… Give families a real voice in determining their child’s new placement—and offer assistance in the pursuit of seats in charter schools, as well as traditional district schools.”

Public Schools Have Lost over a Million Students. Here’s Where They’re Going
Matthew Lee and Lynn Swaner at National Review

“Rising enrollments in choice schools, particularly in private schools, not only provide evidence of a continuing school-choice wave sweeping the country but also demonstrate how these learning environments will continue to be an important part of the United States’ educational fabric.”

_________________________________________________________

Are you a state or local policymaker interested in education reform? Reason Foundation’s Education Policy team can help you make sense of complex school finance data and discuss innovative reform options that expand students’ educational opportunities. Please reach out to me directly at jude.schwalbach@reason.org for more information.  

The post Funding Education Opportunity: School choice in rural America, 2023 education legislation, and more appeared first on Reason Foundation.

New data from Burbio, a service aggregating school enrollment and budget data, sheds light on how public school K-12 enrollments have fluctuated this school year (2022-23) in 15 states. Of the states reported, Burbio revealed that South Carolina (1.0% increase in K-12 students), North Dakota (1.3%), Massachusetts (0.2%), Utah (0.1%), Delaware (0.4%), Arkansas (0.6%), Georgia (0.6%), and Virginia (0.9%) experienced enrollment growth, while Indiana (-0.1% decrease in K-12 students), West Virginia (-0.3%), Wyoming (-0.4%), Mississippi (-0.5%), Idaho (-0.8%), Rhode Island (-0.8%) and Hawaii (-1.7%) saw enrollment drops.

• Interestingly, Idaho’s public school enrollment growth of 1.8% from the 2021-22 school year was partly reversed with the state’s 0.8% decline this year.
• Similarly, Wyoming experienced 7% enrollment growth between 2002 and 2020 but also saw student counts drop by 0.4% this year.

While most states have yet to announce their final enrollments for the start of the 2022-23 school year, preliminary reports from some large school districts may provide a sneak peek at trends. 

• Recently, Minneapolis Public Schools reported it experienced a 2% decline in enrollment, and the school district’s finance committee announced an “impending financial crisis” due to the loss of students and expiring federal funds. 
• Chicago Public Schools reported its K-12 enrollment dropped by 3% this fall.
• And New York City Public Schools reported a 1.8% decline in K-12 enrollment. 

On the other hand, Arizona’s Department of Education announced in a preliminary report that the state’s K-12 public school enrollment has increased by 3.5% this school year.

Last school year, the states that experienced the largest declines in K-12 public school enrollment were New York (-2%) and California (-1.8%). K-12 enrollments still grew in about half of 50 states last year, with Montana, Idaho, Arizona, and South Carolina seeing the largest student growth in percentage terms. The net loss of public school students across the country was 91,000 students during the 2021-2022 year.

School districts grappling with changing enrollments must prepare for the fiscal consequences of fewer students, especially as federal emergency relief funds dry up. These factors mean that districts should do everything possible to prepare for slimmer budgets. Shortsighted spending decisions could have significant financial repercussions for school districts. Accordingly, school districts should shore up their budgets by rightsizing and using any remaining Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund (ESSER) dollars on temporary commitments.

From the states

State legislators have already pre-filed various school choice proposals across the nation.

In Missouri, Rep. Josh Hulbert pre-filed five proposals advancing education savings accounts, one of which is a universal school choice bill that would expand the state’s current MOScholars program to be open to all students. 

Two Texas legislators pre-filed proposals that would establish tax-credit education savings accounts. Under the proposals, parents could use these versatile accounts to pay for a variety of educational expenses, such as tutoring or private school tuition.

Ohio legislators are considering a proposal that would expand eligibility for the state’s voucher program to all students regardless of their household income. The proposal also aims to increase the existing income tax credit for homeschooling expenses from $250 to $2,000 a year. 

In Tennessee, legislators are considering a proposal that would expand school district eligibility to participate in the Volunteer State’s education savings account program. Current law limits participation to school districts with 10 schools that performed in the bottom 10%, whereas the proposal would allow school districts with five or more schools that performed in the bottom 10% to be eligible.

What to watch

Kentucky Supreme Court Rules Tax-Credit ESA Unconstitutional
The Kentucky Supreme Court unanimously ruled that Kentucky’s Education Opportunity Account Program violated the state’s constitution. These accounts allowed eligible parents to use money donated to account-granting organizations to pay for education expenses, such as private school tuition, tutoring, transportation, and more. Individuals that donated to an account-granting organization would receive a tax credit. The court wrote, “If the legislature thinks the people of Kentucky want this change, [it] should place the matter on the ballot.”

Teachers’ Union Sues New Hampshire DOE Over Education Freedom Accounts
The New Hampshire arm of the American Federation for Teachers is suing the New Hampshire Department of Education over the agency’s Education Freedom Accounts–education savings accounts available to students in low or middle-income households. Account holders can use them to pay for a variety of educational expenses, such as private school tuition, tutoring, and books. More than 3,000 students currently have an Education Freedom Account. The Institute for Justice, which successfully defended the Granite State’s tax-credit scholarship program in 2014, will represent Education Freedom Account holders.

Vermont Must Now Pay for Private School Tuition Under the Town Tuition Program
A recent settlement in the wake of Carson v Makin ended discrimination against religious private schools in Vermont. The Green Mountain State’s Town Tuition Program required towns to pay for the private education of any student that resided in a town without a public school. However, towns were not required to reimburse eligible families that enrolled their children in religious private schools. Not only did the recent settlement deem this policy unconstitutional, but the Vermont Education Agency also issued a letter to school districts requiring them to treat private religious schools the same as secular ones.

Oklahoma to Open the Nation’s First Religious Charter School
The Oklahoma Attorney General released an opinion that prohibitions against religious charter schools are unconstitutional in the wake of recent Supreme Court decisions. The Archdiocese of Oklahoma City plans to submit an application for a virtual charter school authorization. If approved, this would be the nation’s first religious charter school. However, the religious charter school would likely face legal challenges from the Freedom from Religion Foundation.

Recommended reading 

Rerouting the Myths of Rural Education Choice
Ron Matus and Dava Hankerson at Step Up for Students
“Families in rural Florida, like families everywhere, are choosing learning options other than district schools. In 2021-22, 16.7 percent of students in Florida’s 30 rural counties attended something other than a district school, whether a private school, charter school or home education. That’s up from 10.6 percent a decade prior.”

ICYMI: How is the new transfer law affecting schools? It depends on which districts you ask
Andrea Eger at Tulsa World
“We’ve always lived on a lot of transfers, and I think we’re a well-kept secret,” said Superintendent Sherry Durkee, whose district has seen a 23% increase in transfer students compared with last year’s numbers. “There has been a big change in expectations with people wanting versatility to access education like they want it. We have made a concerted effort to maximize choice within the district because we have to get on board with the way of the future.”

The Ohio EdChoice Program’s impact on school district enrollments, finances, and academics
Stéphane Lavertu and John J. Gregg at Fordham Institute
“The analysis indicates that the performance-based EdChoice program led to lower levels of segregation among minority students, no change (and perhaps an increase) in district expenditures per pupil, no change in districts’ ability to generate local revenue (leading to an increase in local revenue per pupil), and higher academic achievement among the remaining district students.”

The post Funding Education Opportunity: K-12 student enrollment updates, 2023 education legislation, and more appeared first on Reason Foundation.

The midterms helped illustrate school choice can be a winning policy issue for candidates. Voters in Florida’s Miami-Dade County, where about 75% of students are enrolled in school choice programs, issued a strong rebuke to Charlie Crist, a former Republican governor running as a Democrat, and his anti-school choice running mate Karla Hernandez-Mats, president of United Teachers of Dade. While President Joe Biden won Miami-Dade by seven points in 2020, Gov. Ron DeSantis trounced Crist with an 11-point victory in the county.

And this trend is not unique to school choice bastions like Florida. Corey DeAngelis pointed out in The Wall Street Journal that Democrats like Pennsylvania Gov.-elect Josh Shapiro, Gov. J. B. Pritzker of Illinois, and Gov. Kathy Hochul of New York won their races while supporting school choice policies.

Earlier this year, Pennsylvania Democrats in the state legislature, in particular, showed significant support for school choice when most “joined all legislative Republicans in enacting the largest expansion of the Keystone State’s school-choice policy in state history.”

In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, support for school choice policies is strong. For instance, nearly 80% of Pennsylvania respondents, 76% of Illinois respondents, and 80% of New York respondents with school-aged children supported education savings accounts, according to an EdChoice poll.

Support for more flexible education options is unsurprising. Gallup polling from August 2022 showed that 55% of respondents were either somewhat or completely dissatisfied with the state of K-12 education, the highest level of dissatisfaction in the poll since 2018. 

As the American Enterprise Institute’s Fredrick Hess noted, “Parents don’t really want to return to the status quo ante of public education. Indeed, more than half of all parents say—after the pandemic experience—that they’d like to retain some element of homeschooling going forward.” 

In light of some sweeping school choice victories, policymakers and candidates on all sides of the aisle should embrace school choice policies that help students and appeal to parents and voters.

From the States

Reason Foundation’s new report, “Public schools without boundaries: A 50 state ranking of K-12 open enrollment,” shows that most states need to implement better student transfer policies.

Unfortunately, the study finds most states’ open enrollment options fall short of good policy. In fact, only 11 states require all school districts to participate in open enrollment, just three states require state education agencies to publish annual reports on student transfers, seven states require school districts to post their open seats by grade level, and only 24 states prohibit school districts from charging transfer students tuition. While no state meets every policy best practices on Reason Foundation’s open enrollment checklist, some states provide good models for other states to replicate. 

Florida: The state’s open enrollment law could serve as a model for other states. All school districts in the Sunshine State are required to participate in both cross-district and within-district open enrollment and must regularly report the number of available seats by grade level so parents have access to this important information. Moreover, Florida cannot charge transfer students’ families tuition or fees, and the state’s school districts are allowed to provide transportation to transfer students, two barriers families in many other states face.

Wisconsin: The most laudable facet of Wisconsin’s open enrollment option is the state’s funding mechanism for transfer students, which ensures state and local education dollars follow transfer students. This approach maximizes transparency and financially incentivizes all districts to participate in open enrollment. Moreover, the Badger State is one of the few states to have robust, transparent open enrollment reporting. Every year Wisconsin publishes an open enrollment report which provides important data on student transfers, such as the number of transfer students, how many transfer applications were rejected, and the reasons for their rejection. 

The study also highlights policies in each that are limiting students’ options and need to be reformed. For example:

Tennessee: Although Tennessee established a good within-district open enrollment policy in 2021, the state falls short in other important ways. For instance, cross-district open enrollment is voluntary in Tennessee, and all student transfers are at the discretion of the receiving local boards of education. Moreover, school boards can charge tuition or fees to transfer students. This can be a mammoth barrier for students whose families cannot afford the cost and creates perverse incentives for schools to “sell” their seats.

Ohio: Many wealthy and high-performing suburban school districts surrounding Ohio’s eight major cities refuse to participate in the state’s voluntary cross-district open enrollment program. This policy effectively keeps inner-city and nearby rural children from transferring to better schools in the suburbs. All too often, voluntary open enrollment means that the best schools with open seats can continue to exclude children from outside their boundaries, fundamentally undermining the program’s purpose. 

Texas: In Texas, cross-district open enrollment occurs only upon the approval of the receiving school district. Similarly, voluntary within-district transfers are at the discretion of the school district, and parents must petition their school district, making a case for why their children should be transferred to another school. The school district then decides to accept or reject the transfer students’ petitions. To make matters worse, Texas allows school districts to charge transfer students tuition even though they receive additional state aid for transfer students.

What to watch

Report: Enrollment declines were larger in schools that stayed remote for the longest
A new Education Next report by Nat Malkus and Cody Christensen showed that schools that remained fully remote for longer periods suffered more significant drops in K-12 enrollment. In particular, the largest enrollment drops involved younger children in kindergarten and elementary school grades.

California voters support mandated K-12 arts funding as deficit looms
Over 60 percent of California voters approved Proposition 28, a ballot initiative that increases funding for K-12 music and arts education by approximately $1 billion. The Los Angeles Times reported that the new law establishes a “guaranteed annual funding stream for music and arts education by requiring the state to set aside an amount that equals 1% of the total funding already provided to schools each year.”

While music and arts can play important roles, the need will vary, and this new law illustrates how mandated state spending can encumber local education leaders’ decision-making and prevent them from putting resources where they are needed most. California policymakers recently approved increasing K-12 education funding by $9 billion for the 2023 school year–an increase of nearly 13% even though K-12 student enrollments dropped by 4.4% during the pandemic, so most schools should’ve already had the money needed for music and arts. As California’s state leaders predict a $24 billion deficit for the upcoming year, the new spending mandate could very well take funds away from other instructional programs educators would normally prioritize. 

Recommended Reading 

A Crypto Warning From the Ontario Teachers Pension Plan
Mike McShane at Forbes
“Making teacher benefits more portable and flexible would allow teachers to determine their own risk tolerance and invest accordingly. It would free up state funding for classrooms and the salaries of the people that work in them. And, it would help eliminate the incentives for these large pension funds to take on more and more risk, hopefully helping stabilize our financial system writ large.”

As New York City Schools Face a Crisis, Charter Schools Gain Students
Troy Closson at The New York Times
“As traditional public schools in the nation’s largest system endure a perilous period of student loss and funding shortfalls, New York City’s charter schools are on an upward trajectory. The schools gained more than 10,000 children during the pandemic, though the expansion slowed last year, even as enrollment at other schools across the city — both public and private — fell steadily.”

Beyond School Choice: A Conservative K-12 Agenda
Fredrick Hess at American Enterprise Institute
“Conservatives have generally lacked a cohesive K–12 agenda, but they can win parents over by enhancing educational choice, increasing school accountability, and adhering to standards of academic excellence.” 

The post Funding Education Opportunity: Midterm school choice success, new K-12 open enrollment report, and more appeared first on Reason Foundation.

Relatedly, the U.S. Census Bureau recently released preliminary K-12 school spending data that show how COVID-19 challenges and federal pandemic relief funding impacted K-12 school systems in the 2020-2021 school year. 

Taken together, these two data sets provide critical insight into how the pandemic and policymakers’ decisions likely changed public education forever. 

The Census data from the Annual Survey of School System Finances currently includes data from 40 states and Washington, D.C., with 10 states yet to report their spending information, including Indiana, Louisiana, Tennessee, and Texas. It is likely those states’ figures will largely follow the finance trends already reported by a majority of states. 

Overall, the Census findings show state education revenues increased in 27 of 40 states between the 2019-2020 and 2020-2021 school years. Despite temporary disruptions to some tax revenue streams due to the COVID-19 pandemic, most states increased state dollars dedicated to K-12 education. These funding increases follow the trend of the past 20 years, where nearly 90% of states increased state education spending between 2002 and 2020. 

Federal revenue streams for K-12 public schools saw the largest increase, growing more than 45% between the 2019 and 2021 fiscal years. And it is important to note that the preliminary 2020-2021 Census education data reflects only $20.7 billion of the nearly $200 billion in federal funds allocated to states during the pandemic. As of August 18, 2022, school districts had yet to spend $130 billion in Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER) funds, despite the fast approaching 2024 deadline for using them.

The Census report shows that some education costs directly impacted by the pandemic decreased, such as pupil transportation, food services, and administration that weren’t needed when in-person learning was shut down. In the 40 reporting states and Washington, D.C., per-pupil transportation expenditures dropped by nearly 13% on average between the 2019-2020 and 2020-2021 school years. 

Yet during that time, other spending categories understandably increased as school systems navigated the pandemic’s challenges. For instance, pupil support spending increased in all states except Colorado, Massachusetts, New York, and South Carolina. As schools implemented COVID-19 safety precautions, spending on operation and maintenance increased in every state except New York, Massachusetts, and New Jersey. Because states have yet to finalize their official reports to Census, some spending categories could contain irregularities. For example, New York and Massachusetts’ preliminary data appear to be underestimating spending in numerous categories.

We should expect the final 2020-2021 Census report to show significant overall increases in instruction and pupil support because many school districts hired staff and implemented new programs in an attempt to reverse student learning loss during the pandemic. Seeing which states had the highest increases in categories like instruction staff support and administration will provide insight into school districts’ priorities and hiring decisions during extended school closures.

But the just-released NAEP scores make one thing clear: billions of dollars, much of it not spent yet, in federal funding did little to make up for students’ lost time in the classroom during the worst of the pandemic. 

This data also reinforces the argument that states and school districts should invest their remaining ESSER funding in priorities like math and reading tutoring and programs that provide funds directly to families so they can enroll their students in educational services that can help them get back on track. 

From the States

School choice debates making an impact on gubernatorial elections nationwide

In Pennsylvania, school choice is playing a unique role in the gubernatorial race between the Republican Doug Mastriano and Democrat Josh Shapiro, who has bucked the typical Democratic Party platform by supporting “lifeline” scholarships for students in the state’s lowest-performing schools. While this program, which helps pay for private or public school tuition, is more modest than education choice proposals Mastriano would likely push if elected, it is estimated that lifeline scholarships would provide school choice access to nearly 200,000 Pennsylvania students. 

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott recently signaled his support of expanding school choice if reelected. Abbot signed a $6.5 billion K-12 education spending increase in 2019, but his recent support of choice has fueled Beto O’Rouke’s campaign claims that Abbott supports defunding public education in Texas. For years, Republican lawmakers representing Texas’ rural legislative districts have largely rejected school choice proposals. The Texas Tribune recently reported that O’Rouke is trying to capitalize on this fact by “running newspaper ads in at least 17 markets, mostly rural, that urge voters to ‘reject Greg Abbott’s radical plan to defund’ public schools.”

Similarly, in Oklahoma, the state’s Superintendent of Public Instruction Joy Hofmeister calls school choice programs a “rural school killer.” Hofmeister, a former Republican, switched her party affiliation last year to run against Gov. Kevin Stitt, in part due to Stitt’s embrace of school choice and funding students instead of systems. 

Following the passage of Arizona’s Empowerment Scholarship Account, Republican gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake said she supports “100% backpack funding” for students, and would likely attempt to continue the school choice legacy of outgoing Gov. Doug Ducey if elected. Democrat Katie Hobbs, who supported a failed union-backed campaign to overturn the ESA bill, says she wants to increase accountability requirements for charter schools and has criticized state leaders for “kicking the can down the road” on public education spending. Arizona lawmakers sent an additional $1 billion to public schools in their last session. 

What to watch

More Analysis of the NAEP Drop in Math and Reading Scores 

More on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) national testing results: Eighth and fourth graders experienced massive declines in average NAEP math scores, dropping eight and five points, respectively. At the same time, both eighth and fourth-grade students’ average scores in reading declined by three points. “Normally, for a NAEP assessment … we’re talking about significant differences of two or three points. So an eight-point decline that we’re seeing in the math data is stark. It is troubling. It is significant,” Peggy Carr, commissioner of the National Center for Education Statistics, told reporters. In math, the lower NAEP scores reverse the gains of approximately 20 years, while in reading, NAEP scores are now at the same levels as they were 30 years ago, in 1992. 

Kentucky’s School Choice Program Before the State Supreme Court

The Kentucky Supreme Court heard arguments earlier this month about the state’s Education Opportunity Account Program, a tax-credit education savings account that opponents say sends taxpayer dollars to private schools in a way that violates the state constitution. The ESA program was vetoed by Gov. Andy Beshear in 2021 but became law when the legislature overrode the veto. The state Supreme Court is expected to rule on the issue in the coming months. 

Recommended Reading 

Nation’s report card shows steep declines in student learning
Martin R. West at Education Next
“We see that the vocal efforts of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and Texas Gov. Greg Abbott to reopen schools early were not enough to keep students from losing roughly the national average decline of eight points in eighth-grade math… But any efforts to claim credit for them will be complicated by the fact that California students lost only six points in eighth-grade math—far less than would be expected given the slow return to in-person instruction seen under Gov. Gavin Newsom—and also fared well on a relative basis in other grades and subject areas.”

Public education missed the data revolution. It’s time to catch up
Marguerite Roza and Chad Aldeman at The Hill
“Good luck getting real-time data on how many children are enrolled in public schools, are chronically absent, or are making academic progress as a result of federally funded relief efforts. We don’t have it on a national level. States don’t have it. Neither do most districts.”

Encouraging education entrepreneurship
Kerry McDonald at State Policy Network
“Entrepreneurs confront challenges in all sectors, but it became clear from these focus groups and interviews that education entrepreneurs often encounter more obstacles than others. The strict K–12 regulatory environment in most states can create significant barriers to entry and growth.”

The post Funding Education Opportunity: Historic NAEP score declines, Census data on pandemic school spending, and more appeared first on Reason Foundation.

In fact, the median cost of housing in zip codes associated with highly ranked public schools was four times higher than the median cost of homes in zip codes associated with the lowest ranked public schools, according to a 2019 report by the Senate Joint Economic Committee.

When the price of admission to a public school is built into the cost of housing, mortgages function like fees to a private school. Accordingly, residential assignment’s de facto sorting mechanism—property wealth—often isolates students into socioeconomic enclaves. 

New research from Harvard University Economics Professor Raj Chetty explains why this segregation sets low-income students up for failure. His work, Social Capital Volumes I and II, shows that schools are important institutions where students form key social networks and explains how cross-class interaction can form “‘bridging’ social capital,” which is most closely connected to upward mobility. In fact, Chetty finds that students with more cross-class interactions, or economic connectedness, are more likely to rise out of poverty.

Chetty’s research identifies two equally important factors that affect good economic connectedness: exposure to higher-income individuals and friending bias. Exposure to higher-income individuals at school can translate into upward mobility because students have more opportunities to build relationships with people with high social economic status. 

Unfortunately, residential assignment is a major barrier to economic connectedness for many students because it limits their exposure. 

“About half of the social disconnection between low- and high-income Americans is due to differences in exposure. For example, high-income people attend high schools that are disproportionately attended by other high-income people,” Chetty observed.

Weakening the ties between housing and schooling through school choice, including K-12 public school open enrollment, could be a key way to provide students with greater exposure. 

Open enrollment lets students enroll in any public school with open seats regardless of where they live. Strong open enrollment policies operate as a form of public school choice and provide pathways for children to transfer to schools that are a better environmental fit, are safer, or offer AP courses and specialized curricula. For instance, Reason Foundation research showed that families in Texas and Florida use open enrollment to find better educational opportunities for their children.

Most importantly, however, Chetty’s work shows how open enrollment could give more students the opportunity to achieve the American dream. 

Overcoming residential assignment barriers is key to student-centered education. Government-imposed boundaries wrongly lock students into geographic monopolies, limiting their education options. Not only could these students access education options that are the right fit via robust open enrollment policies, but students could also unlock the social networks that are crucial to upward mobility.

From the States: Education initiatives on statewide ballots this November

In Massachusetts, voters may impose an additional 4% tax on incomes over $1 million. The new revenue would fund K-12, college, and university education, as well as public transportation spending. Massachusetts already spends more than $21,000 per pupil on K-12 education and has increased total education revenue by 26% in the last two decades, despite experiencing a 6% enrollment loss.  

California voters will have the chance to approve or deny an initiative that would earmark at least 1% of all state and local tax revenue from public schools exclusively to arts programs. Proposition 28’s opponents are wary of tying local school district leaders’ hands through “ballot-box” budgeting, especially as public school student enrollment declines. The state’s Legislative Analyst’s Office proposal estimates Prop. 28 would cost $800,000-to-$1 billion annually. The proposal comes after California allocated an additional $9 billion to its public school system in 2022.

Illinois voters will choose whether or not to add workers’ collective bargaining rights to the state constitution via Proposition 1, which is supported by teachers’ unions, among others. Critics say, if the proposition is passed, public sector unions would be given a newly-created constitutional right that would allow them to negotiate on a potentially limitless list of subjects and potentially block all future laws and reforms that might impact them.

In Idaho, a ballot initiative to increase education spending by more than $300 million through new corporate and individual taxes, even if approved, will now be voided following this month’s emergency legislative session. Gov. Brad Little signed a bill with a sales tax-funded annual spending increase of $330 million for K-12 schools, which will effectively replace the ballot initiative. Pressure to reform Idaho’s funding system overall was a frequent subject of the emergency session’s debate. 

What to watch

School spending vs. student enrollment
Data from Burbio released this month tracks enrollment declines in districts across the country, from Los Angeles to Fairfax, VA. It shows how severe many school districts’ enrollment declines have been since the pandemic started. Yet, while enrollment numbers are declining, education spending continues to increase in most states. This latest data mirrors education spending and enrollment trends seen well before the pandemic. For example, New York increased inflation-adjusted public school spending by over $26 billion between 2002 and 2020 while losing 10% of its student population over that time. 

Arizona school choice opponents fail to prevent education savings accounts expansion
The Arizona citizen’s referendum led by Save Our Schools (SOS), appears to have failed to block the nation’s biggest expansion of education savings accounts (ESAs). Despite its initial claim of gathering 141,714 signatures last Friday, this week, SOS all but conceded that its collected signatures fell well short of the 118,823 needed to overturn the law. This reversal occurred after the Goldwater Institute released projections that SOS was likely to have submitted approximately 88,866 signatures. Arizona’s secretary of state is expected to release the final signature count in mid-October.   

Corey DeAngelis: Why the COVID-19 pandemic changed the face of education forever
In a new ReasonTV interview, Corey DeAngelis explains why “backpack funding” is here to stay, why Texas is terrible on school choice, and why even non-parents should care about education reform. 

Recommended Reading 

On a Per-Student Basis, School Staffing Levels Are Hitting All-Time Highs
Chad Aldeman at The74Million
“In the 2020-21 school year, staffing levels hit all-time highs, and the typical public school district employed 135 people for every 1,000 students it served.”

‘Flagrantly Illegal’: Law Firm Files Lawsuit To Stop Biden’s Student Loan Forgiveness
Robby Soave at Reason
“President Joe Biden’s plan to forgive hundreds of billions of dollars in student loan debt violates both federal law and the Constitution, according to a just-filed lawsuit from the Pacific Legal Foundation.”

The End of School Reform?
Chester Finn, Jr. and Frederick Hess in National Affairs
“It goes without saying that opportunities for agreement are difficult to spot right now, and such a coalition would have to pull against the centrifugal forces of polarization — a marked contrast to the previous era in which prominent politicians and advocates found centrism a source of political reward.”

The post Funding Education Opportunity: How public school open enrollment impacts upward mobility, education issues on statewide ballots, and more appeared first on Reason Foundation.