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This brief is one in a series aimed at providing K-12 education decision makers and advocates with an evidence base to ground discussions about how to best serve students during and following the novel coronavirus pandemic. It addresses one central question: What are the key considerations for districts that may need to reduce spending and potentially lay off employees? In order to answer this question, the brief breaks down the issue into four points: (1) State revenues will drop for districts in many states. The extent of revenue loss will vary considerably across districts and could be partially mitigated by the federal response; (2) If the federal government does not offset state revenue losses, districts will need to cut spending on salaries and benefits; (3) School spending cuts negatively affect students' educational outcomes and apparently neutral budget choices often have disproportionate effects on traditionally underserved students; and (4) The COVID-19 pandemic creates substantial new demands on schools that will likely require a reallocation of resources. Based on these points, the brief provides four strategies to consider and two strategies to avoid. [This brief was co-prepared by Georgetown University, McCourt School of Public Policy.]

Deciding how to spend the nation's education dollars is a tremendous responsibility. It's easy to forget that this responsibility falls primarily to district leaders (sometimes with input from principals). Sometimes those decisions go well and schools beat the odds on student outcomes. Other times, they do not, and student outcomes lag. Sometimes these decisions help ensure financial stability from one year to the next. Other times, district leaders commit to spending more than the district can afford, resulting in disruptive and destabilizing cuts to schools. There's no doubt, finance is a critical part of the job for K-12 leaders, from school principals to district officials to state superintendents. But there is growing evidence that these leaders are not getting the financial skills they need from the nation's colleges of education, where most get their training. This study explores what kind of finance training is offered among leading colleges of education and how well it meets the demands on today's K-12 leaders.

Amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, a number of school districts have broken from tradition to offer pay outside of the rigid step-and-lane salary schedules. In particular, many districts are now offering flat-dollar raises or non-recurring bonuses, incentives to address long-standing recruitment and retention issues, or compensation to shape teacher behavior in other ways such as getting vaccinated. It's possible that these reforms are only temporary. The fall of 2021 was a remarkably tight labor market, especially for "low-skill" workers like instructional aides and bus drivers. Or, districts may be so flush with one-time federal relief funds that they're simply trying to spend their money quickly. Still, it's a promising sign that districts are being nimble with their funds at a time that calls for fast thinking, and some of these innovations in teacher pay may live on beyond the pandemic if district leaders find them effective. In this piece, the authors outline the types of innovations popping up, explain why they matter, and highlight some of the districts trying them.

Because states typically fund districts based on student counts, districts reporting shrinking enrollment worry about shrinking dollars as well. The seemingly obvious quick fix is for states to hold districts financially harmless for some or all of their enrollment loss. But states have many factors to weigh when deciding whether or how to go down the "hold harmless" path, and state-by-state context matters. This brief explores some of those considerations. It also includes a list of states that have added or are considering new hold harmless provisions in response to pandemic-driven enrollment losses, as well as states that already had existing policies.

Weighted student funding (WSF) decentralizes control over resources and empowers principals as financial leaders of their schools. In this study, we set out to understand how principals are making use of those leadership opportunities. Based upon a 2017-18 survey of 639 principals in 14 school districts implementing WSF, we find that principals are actively engaged in the budget process and utilize their flexibilities, but often do not come into their role with the financial leadership training to carry out those tasks. Among the findings: (1) Principals understand how WSF works and why their district is using it; (2) Principals in WSF districts take the lead on budget decisions for their schools; (3) Principals in WSF districts involve school-level stakeholders often left out of the budget development process; (4) Principals in WSF districts customize spending for their school community; and (5) Many principals lack formal training to fully leverage the benefits of WSF. While our results capture some of the variability in principals' experiences across WSF districts, more research is needed to understand how these results are shaped by the diversity of rationales motivating districts to adopt WSF, as well as continued evolution of WSF within and across districts.

This brief summarizes findings from a three-year, U.S. Department of Education-funded research study analyzing the use of weighted student funding (WSF) at the district and state level. The study focuses on these key questions: (1) Why do districts adopt WSF? (2) Is there a typical WSF model that districts are using? (3) Do WSF districts spend more on at-risk students? (4) Are principals taking a financial leadership role in WSF districts? and (5) What about outcomes? Are achievement gaps narrowing in WSF districts? For current WSF district leaders and those considering it, this research can help them learn from what peer systems are doing as they seek how to best deploy their dollars to improve student outcomes.

Congress enacted the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) 50 years ago as part of President Lyndon B. Johnson's "War on Poverty." The most expansive federal education bill ever passed, it was developed as redress, establishing that poor children needed more educational services than wealthier children. Title I of the ESEA provides federal funds to state and local education agencies with the intention of augmenting funding for high-poverty students. Yet even today, after five decades, substantial revisions, and an allocation of over $14 billion, Title I is not living up to its promise. The authors assert that the solution is not simply a matter of fixing one piece or another of a given formula. They propose a return to basics: A poor student deserves what the federal support promised to poor children 50 years ago, regardless of where that student lives and what their school or school district looks like. This paper suggests, and details some clear principles for reforming Title I formulas, and measuring the progress made. They are: (1) Simplicity; (2) Tie the money to qualifying students in schools with concentrated poverty; (3) Consistency; (4) Leveling the playing field; and (5) Flexibility. Title 1 funding formulas have become so complex and murky that few people really understand how they work and even fewer think they are achieving their true purpose. Stakeholder politics will persist, but the authors encourage both sides to come together to evaluate proposals against these fundamental principles, so that Title I can finally start to fulfill its 50-year-old promise to poor students.

One of a state's primary responsibilities is to divvy up the public funds for K-12 schooling. In each state, a set of finance policies determines how the state and local funds are apportioned so that districts and other providers can then apply them to schools and classrooms. Different states use a host of variables and formulas to determine how much each district and school receives. Some leaders have come to realize that allocation formulas have big implications for whether a state's education system promotes or inhibits increased productivity in schools. With many states seeing some black in their balance sheets after years of highly constrained state funding, and districts asking for a share of the new money, forward-thinking state leaders are calling for something in return--namely, that districts and schools make sure the money does more to improve student outcomes. This focus on getting a greater return on funds has implications not just for districts but also for states. To get better outcomes for the money--an imperative given today's budget strictures and urgency for better student results--districts will have to use funds differently going forward. Student-based allocation, also known as weighted student funding, where funds are attached to each student and move with students wherever they go to school, provides the most equitable, efficient, and flexible path toward increased productivity. This brief explains why it is a good idea to allocate resources on the basis of students, and measures several states' progress toward doing so. [An earlier version of this brief was published in 2014.]

While many policymakers see college credit attainment programs as potential cost savings, little research has examined the actual savings (if any) tied to taking college classes in high school. This Rapid Response brief helps fill the gap, investigating and comparing the costs of providing college credit in high school in three states with the costs of attaining credit "after" high school. We examine costs paid by public dollars, in addition to costs borne by students and families (private dollars). This analysis seeks to uncover the incremental spending per pupil for a three-credit college course taken while in high school. This means we aim to identify any extra spending (both public funding and student-paid tuition or fees) beyond what is typically funded per pupil for public high school. We find that none of the three states yielded a public savings for credits accumulated via dual enrollment. And we find that the cost implications vary substantially by state and program, hinging on funding details in a state's dual enrollment design and its education funding formula. [This report was originally published November 2017.]

In 2013, California moved to drive more resources for students with higher needs, create more spending flexibility and let districts decide how to spend substantial new dollars by adopting a new watershed state finance policy, the Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF). As California's Weighted Student Funding (WSF) law enters Year 5 of implementation, we investigate whether we are seeing an improved relationship between spending and outcomes in the early years of LCFF. Given that one of WSF's main policy aims is to promote a more productive use of dollars, it makes sense to investigate that relationship. Our early finding suggests a more positive relationship between funding and student outcomes after LCFF than before LCFF. In other words, money appeared to matter more in the wake of LCFF. This December 2017 analysis of data from some 600 districts launches what we hope will be a new wave of much-needed research on education productivity. With LCFF, California has undertaken one of the nation's largest weighted student funding (WSF) overhauls to date. As such, its experience is of national interest. This paper is part 3 of a series analyzing early impacts of LCFF. [For part 1, see ED612169. For part 2, see ED612170.]

In 2013, California implemented a watershed weighted student funding formula (WSF) that deployed substantial new funds to districts based on their counts of student types, while also stripping long-standing spending constraints on districts. The state finance formula (the Local Control Funding Formula or LCFF) specifically boosted allocations to districts for their foster youth, students with limited English, and those living in poverty. But California's funding law does not require districts to deploy resources generated on behalf of their high-needs students to the schools those students attend. Our analysis of eight districts takes a first look at whether districts did, in fact, allocate a larger share of their new funds to their highest-needs schools. First, we find that districts generally aren't tracking allocations by school. That means district and state leaders and the public mostly don't know whether the new funds are boosting spending on the highest-needs schools. Where school-level data was accessible, we find that some districts did allocate a larger share of their new money and staffing to the highest-needs schools. Others did the opposite. Our findings underscore the need for districts to publicly report spending by school. This paper is part 2 of a series analyzing early impacts of LCFF. [For part 1, see ED612169. For part 3, see ED612172.]

In 2013 California adopted a new watershed state finance policy, the Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) to drive more resources to students with higher needs, create more spending flexibility, and let districts decide how to spend substantial new dollars. Our analysis examines financial data from nearly all California school systems to clarify how their spending choices changed in the first three years of the new state funding law. We find that predictions of wholesale ill-conceived spending choices in the absence of state prescription have not been borne out. And while we find that districts generally didn't make radical changes in spending, they did spend in ways that could help the highest-need students and did show evidence of "customizing" spending to meet local needs. With LCFF, California has undertaken one of the nation's largest weighted student funding (WSF) overhauls to date. As such, its experience is of national interest. This paper is part 1 of a series analyzing early impacts of LCFF. [For part 2, see ED612170. For part 3, see ED612172.]

The expectation in this country is that all students should be able to succeed in school. Yet new data and accountability agendas have heightened attention to performance disparities between students with different identifiable needs--needs that stem from poverty, disability, or limited English proficiency. Educators and policymakers know that such students often arrive at school with myriad challenges that call for increased resources to help them reach their full potential. To address gaps in student performance, many policymakers look to adjust the state's funding formula. Some layer on funds for specific programs or services, while others push for a wholesale overhaul of the way resources are allocated (e.g., advocating for a student based allocation system). But many policymakers find themselves trying to do this work in the dark. This brief offers guidance to help state policymakers ask the right questions and tap their own data when designing funding policies to serve high-needs students.

Teacher compensation is driven largely by teacher longevity. While it's true that wages in many fields generally increase with experience, what differs in teaching is the degree to which pay is linked to seniority. And compared to other professions, teaching has more heavily back-loaded pay -- meaning a disproportionate share of earnings comes late in a career. This analysis explores the extent to which teacher salary policies favor the most senior teachers, examines the consequences of this tradition, and discusses how districts might distribute the same total salary dollars via fixed-dollar increments to all teachers (instead of using fixed percentages). This would raise salaries in teachers' earlier years, without changing their lifetime earnings. Doing so could help school systems strengthen their teaching forces in several ways, without costing the district more, creating a fairer arrangement that may help school systems in the long run. This report examines one slice of the salary pie that school districts potentially have the power to adjust regardless of how many new dollars are available to raise wages.

Labor, in the form of wages and benefits, makes up most of the costs of schooling. Much has been written about wages--especially the idea that we need to make salaries more competitive to attract a stronger labor pool. Analysts pay less attention to benefits, except to bemoan the rising cost of them. But as a portion of labor compensation, we find, benefits are growing faster than salaries. Higher benefits costs mean fewer dollars for other purposes--not just salaries, but also technology, facilities, curricular materials, and more. This analysis examines the per-teacher cost of benefits, both on an annual basis and a weekly basis, relative to costs in other professional industries. Because the work year is shorter in teaching than in other industries, the cost of benefits per week of labor is substantially higher. Some analysts suggest curbing costs by reducing benefits packages. Instead, this report proposes changes to the work year. By increasing the number of weeks in the contracts for instructional staff, school systems could get the most for their benefits dollars, teachers could make more money overall, and students could be given new opportunities for when and how to learn.

On top of many policymakers' wish lists is increased teacher pay. Particular attention also has focused on mechanisms such as merit pay to target rewards to the most effective teachers and keep them in the classroom. Yet resources are constrained. Raising pay for some or all teachers inevitably takes funds away from some other element of schooling. With little likelihood of surplus education funding in the foreseeable future, many pay overhauls have stalled or been scrapped entirely. But there is a way forward that would yield higher pay without fiscal sacrifice, new analysis shows: increasing the class sizes of only the most effective teachers. Targeted increases in class size would require fewer teachers overall and the savings from the reduced number of teachers could be repurposed as bonuses for the teachers taking on larger classes. This fiscal analysis explores teacher cost and enrollment data in one district to quantify the amount of funds available for teacher bonuses associated with strategic class size increases of three students for the most effective teachers.

In the absence of reliable estimates of national K-12 staffing, Jim Simpkins and Marguerite Roza compile data from several national sources to determine historical K-12 staffing ratios. Their analysis finds that staffing ratios across K-12 education have risen precipitously over several decades and, despite the impact of the Great Recession, remain at 2004 levels. A state-by-state comparison reveals large disparities across states.

Teacher salary decisions are often made with little connection to the pension obligations they entail. In this paper, authors Marguerite Roza and Jessica Jonovski model the impacts of late-term raises on teacher pension obligations showing that on average each dollar raise triggers $10 to $16 in new taxpayer obligations. The authors provide suggestions to mitigate such impacts while improving incentives for early and mid career teachers.

The strength and effectiveness of the American public school system has risen to the top of our national agenda in a way not seen since the Cold War. In short, the civic health of communities, the states, and the nation is inextricably entwined with the capacity and the potency of public schools. In this brief, the authors argue that mayors, as the person responsible for a municipality's overall well-being, are uniquely positioned to identify and promote productive school models and advocate for all students, regardless of what type of school they attend. Whether or not a mayor has any direct or formal role in its management, the strength of their city's local school offerings reflects on the municipality. It is also true that resources for public education are inherently limited. While some cities are feeling more financial pressure than others, none have unlimited funds. That means municipal and education leaders always face choices about where to put those scarce resources. While schools operate with funds from federal, state, and local sources (and sometimes a share of municipal monies), there are policies that emerge about what schools should operate and for whom.