Education Week - June 6, 2018 - 21

SPENDING INDEX
Here's another way of looking at
per-student spending: This index
shows just how close a state's
school districts come in meeting
the national per-pupil average-
or, depending on your perspective,
the degree to which lowerspending districts fall short of
that national benchmark. In states
that scored 100 percent, all
districts met or cleared that bar.
TAXABLE RESOURCES SPENT
ON EDUCATION
This indicator shows just how big
a bite of a state's taxable
resources K-12 education takes.
It's based on state and local
revenues and the gross state
product as reported in federal
data.
SOURCE: Education Week
Research Center, 2018

Idaho

State Snapshots From
This Year's Analysis
California
California was one of only seven states that improved
their overall school finance grades by a point or more
between 2017 and 2018, demonstrating just how
challenging it can be to move the needle on these
metrics. California's 3.5 point gain was largely driven
by increases in per-pupil spending and the percent
of students in districts spending at or above the U.S.
average. The state's finance ranking jumped from
39th in last year's report to 32nd, the largest uptick
in the nation.

Statewide Enrollment: 6.2

Alaska
Alaska-like many states-shows some sharply
contrasting results when it comes to school
funding. It's the only state to provide higher funding
for poor districts than for their wealthier peers. But
it struggles on other measures assessing fairness
in the allocation of resources across districts,
finishing last in the nation for finance equity. In
striking contrast, it gets the nation's highest score
on measures of overall spending and trails only
Vermont in per-pupil spending, as adjusted for
regional cost differences.

Statewide Enrollment: 133,400

million

Judy Wai is a
counselor at
Audubon Elementary
School in Foster
City, Calif. The San
Mateo-Foster City
district used its
local flexibility
under the state's
funding formula to
funnel resources
into additional
counselors and
other priorities
identified by the
community.

Idaho, which receives the nation's lowest school
finance score, with a 59.7 or a D-minus, struggles
with both spending and the distribution of funding
across districts within the state. Only Arizona and
Utah spend less per student when adjusted for
variations in regional costs. Just 2.8 percent of
Idaho's students are in districts spending at or
above the national average.

Statewide Enrollment: 302,300

Ramin Rahimian for Education Week

PERCENT OF STUDENTS IN
DISTRICTS SPENDING AT OR
ABOVE THE U.S. AVERAGE:
This indicator shows that all
students in only seven states and
the District of Columbia attend
school in districts that spend at
least the national average on
K-12.

Wyoming
Vermont

States in the top tier for school spending are
sometimes at the other end of the spectrum for
finance equity. Vermont leads the nation for perpupil spending at $20,795 when dollar amounts
are adjusted for variations in regional costs. It also
devotes a larger share (5.4 percent) of its total
taxable resources to education than any other state.
In stark contrast, Vermont ranks 48th on equity,
with the state at or near the bottom on three of
the four indicators of how even funding levels are
among its districts.

Wyoming posts the nation's highest overall grade in
school finance, with the only A-minus (91.4). It has
remained at the top of the rankings for most of the
past decade by pairing good results on spending
metrics with strong performance on equity measures.
At $17,700, its per-pupil spending is fourth-highest
in the nation (adjusted for regional cost differences),
and 100 percent of its students are in districts
spending at or above the U.S. average. These results
are aided by the state's dedication of 4.7 percent of
its taxable resources to education, the fourth-largest
share in the nation.

Statewide Enrollment: 93,000

Statewide Enrollment: 76,000
SOURCE: Education Week Research Center

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Education Week - June 6, 2018

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