Exploring weighted student formulas as a policy for improving equity for distributing resources to schools: A case study of two California school districts

Chambers, Jay G.; Levin, Jesse; Shambaugh, Larisa

doi:10.1016/j.econedurev.2009.09.005

Cited by 14 publications

(15 citation statements)

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“…While WSF initiatives presume that some students cost more to educate than others, these programs vary widely in terms of the categories of students deemed more expensive to educate (Furtick & Snell, 2013; Travers, Green, & Miles, 2013). For example, some districts, such as Cincinnati, Denver, Houston, New York City, and San Francisco, provide weights for students who live in poverty; other locales, such as Baltimore, only weight poverty for high school students; still others, such as Hartford, do not provide poverty weights at all (Chambers, Levin, & Shambaugh, 2010; Chambers, Shambaugh, Levin, & Muraki, 2008; Education Resource Strategies, 2010; Miles & Roza, 2006; Miles, Ware, & Roza, 2003). Some districts, such as Baltimore and Hartford, include weights for students who demonstrate high achievement 3 as well as low achievement, whereas other districts, such as Cincinnati, Denver, and New York City, only include weights for struggling students (Education Resource Strategies, 2010).…”

Section: Conceptual Frameworkmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Challenges of Advancing Fiscal Equity in a Resource-Strained Context

et al. 2015

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Weighted student funding (WSF) is a multifaceted school finance, management, and governance reform that is gaining attention. While WSF has a number of goals, its primary objective is to redress intra-district funding inequities. This article draws on a mixed-methods study of WSF in Prince George's County Public Schools to examine the initiative's impact on the distribution of financial resources to the 180 schools that were affected by it. Our findings indicate that WSF was not a robust mechanism for advancing equity and illustrate how technical, economic, and political factors can undermine the ability of WSF to realize its equity goals.

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Section: Conceptual Frameworkmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Challenges of Advancing Fiscal Equity in a Resource-Strained Context

et al. 2015

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“…Baker, Sciarra and Farrie (2009 use a regression based approach to determine the extent that state and local revenues per pupil vary, across districts, across states, with respect to child poverty concentrations, controlling for competitive wage variation, economies of scale and population density. Others have applied similar approaches to evaluate the sensitivity of school site budgets to student characteristics (Ajwad, 2006;Baker 2009Baker , 2012Chambers, Levin, & Shambaugh 2010;Levin et al, 2013). The goal of these regression-based methods is to determine the relationship between variation in poverty concentrations across schools or districts and availability of financial resources, controlling for exogenous cost pressures.…”

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confidence: 99%

Evaluating the recession’s impact on state school finance systems

Baker

2014

EPAA

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Abstract:The Great Recession's effect on state school finance systems was unlike previous downturns in the early 1990s and early 2000s in that it a) involved a greater loss of taxable income in many states, thus greater loss to state general fund revenues, b) also involved a substantial collapse of housing markets and related reduction or at least leveling of growth of taxable property wealth, c) but also involved a substantive infusion of federal "fiscal stabilization" aid to be used to fill holes in state general aid formulas. The goal of this study is to evaluate the effects of the recession on equity of state school funding systems with respect to child poverty concentrations. Using school district level panel data from 1993 to 2011, we evaluate the interplay between local, state and federal source revenues through the course of the recent recession by comparison with the less severe economic downturn of the early 2000s. Then using state level estimates of elasticities between revenue and spending measures and district poverty rates, we estimate whether changes in the distribution of state, local or federal revenue contribute most to changes in overall equity of current spending and whether those contributions changed during the recent recession. Keywords: school funding; fiscal stabilization; recession; poverty; equity Evaluando el impacto de la recesión en los sistemas estatales de financiamiento educativo Resumen: El efecto de la Gran Recesión en los sistemas estatales de financiamiento educativo fue epaa aape Education Policy Analysis Archives Vol. 22 No. 91 2 diferente a las crisis anteriores en la década de 1990 y principios de 2000, ya que a) implicó una mayor pérdida de renta imponible en muchos estados, por lo tanto una mayor pérdida de ingresos del fondo general, b) también implicó una caída sustancial de los mercados de vivienda y la reducción relacionada o, al menos, la nivelación del crecimiento de la riqueza propiedad imponible, c), también involucró una infusión sustantiva de ayuda federal para la "estabilización fiscal" que se utilizó para cubrir déficits en las fórmulas generales de sobre de los presupuestos estatales. El objetivo de este estudio es evaluar los efectos de la recesión en la equidad de los sistemas de financiación de escuelas estatales en relación a las áreas de concentración de pobreza infantil. Utilizando datos de panel a nivel de distrito escolar 1993-2011, se evalúa la interacción entre los ingresos de fuentes locales, estatales y federales a través del curso de la reciente recesión en comparación con la crisis económica de la década de 2000 que fue menos severa. Luego, utilizando estimaciones a nivel estatal de las elasticidades entre las medidas de ingresos y de gastos y los índices de pobreza del distrito, se estimó si más cambios en la distribución de ingresos estatales, locales o federales contribuyen a los cambios en el patrimonio neto total del gasto corriente y si esas contribuciones cambiaron durante la reciente recesión. Palabras clave: financiamiento escolar;...

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“…Respondents in both districts reported making staffing changes as a result of the reforms (Chambers et al, 2008). However, the number of full-time staff per student remained unchanged in both districts after the implementation of the weighted student formulas (Chambers et al, 2008), and the distribution of novice teachers across schools in the district remained unchanged (Chambers, Levin, & Shambaugh, 2010). Further, respondents reported that few programmatic changes were made as a result of the new weighted student formulas (Chambers et al, 2008).…”

Section: Fiscal Flexibilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Prior studies on fiscal flexibility reforms point to the difficulty in analyzing resource allocation, given the nature of fiscal flexibility (Chambers et al, 2010;Shambaugh et al, 2008;Weston, 2011). In sum, there is limited evidence on the effects of fiscal flexibility (Fuller et al, 2011;Petko, 2005).…”

Section: Fiscal Flexibilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

A preliminary analysis of California’s New Local Control Funding Formula

Wolf

Sands

2016

EPAA

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California recently overhauled its K–12 public education finance system. Enacted in 2013, the Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) replaced California’s 40-year-old funding formula. The LCFF increases district officials’ fiscal flexibility; provides more resources to districts serving larger proportions of low-income, English learner (EL), and foster youth students; and requires district officials to engage community members in district decisions. This article expands on a study conducted by a team of 12 independent researchers that investigated the early implementation of the LCFF. The study sought to answer three research questions: (a) how are district officials using their newfound budget flexibility? (b) how are district officials engaging parents and other stakeholders? (c) what are the opportunities provided to districts under the LCFF and the challenges it creates for them? Data include 71 semi-structured interviews with district stakeholders across 10 diverse districts in California and 22 interviews with county office of education (COE) officials across the state. Findings include that respondents were cautiously optimistic about the LCFF. District officials appreciated increased budget flexibility and the focus on community engagement. Inevitably, however, district and COE officials experienced challenges in implementing the law during its first year.

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Exploring weighted student formulas as a policy for improving equity for distributing resources to schools: A case study of two California school districts

Cited by 14 publications

References 2 publications

The Challenges of Advancing Fiscal Equity in a Resource-Strained Context

The Challenges of Advancing Fiscal Equity in a Resource-Strained Context

Evaluating the recession’s impact on state school finance systems

A preliminary analysis of California’s New Local Control Funding Formula

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