Budget/Financing

Fixing school funding is more than just “more”

6 Comments

Patrick McIlheran:

It’s funny that everybody hates the way Wisconsin reckons school aid. The formula’s doing what it was supposed to do.
The aim was that if a poor school district and a rich one imposed the same property tax rate, state aid would make their schools equally funded. The system does that, admirably. As Allan Odden, who studied the formula on the state’s behalf last fall, found, it’s local tax rates, not wealth, that determines revenue. Some places just want to tax themselves less.
He suggests changing it.
Districts say they’re squeezed by two numbers: Their revenue shouldn’t rise more than an inflation-linked number, about $260 a student this year, while their labor costs can rise by more, 3.8%.
Of course, school spending has risen faster than inflation or Wisconsinites’ income over the past decade or so, especially thanks to referendums letting districts blow the caps. Still, the difference is why districts constantly say they’re cutting even while Wisconsin taxpayers spend 5% more a year on average on schools.
Wisconsin’s not underspending. We’re already 12th-highest in per-pupil spending, 11% above the national average.
For which we’re getting . . . OK results. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce last winter graded states on schools. Wisconsin got a C on its return on investment: Our high per-pupil spending produces middling achievement. Virginia got results on the National Assessment of Educational Progress similar to ours but for $1,800 less per pupil. Massachusetts spent more and got great scores. Minnesota did both, massively outscoring us for 10% less per child. “Some states are not getting what they’re paying for,” chamber spokeswoman Karen Elzey put it.

Minnesota’s NAEP scores are higher than Wisconsin’s, yet they spend over $1000 per student less than we do.

6 thoughts on “Fixing school funding is more than just “more””

  1. A reader pointed out that McIlheran’s words reference Minnesota spending over $1000 per student less than Wisconsin (average is $9,200; MMSD is $13,684), yet outperforming our NAEP scores. I’ve added links to the NAEP results.
    MMSD spending source: Enrollment (24,342)
    http://www.mmsd.org/topics/stats/2006/
    and final 2006/2007 Citizen’s budget $333,101,865
    http://www.schoolinfosystem.org/archives/Citizens_Budget_030507.pdf
    Minnesota has a very active charter school environment
    http://www.mncharterschools.org/

  2. The NAEP site is interesting. I just looked at the state profiles…Wisconsin and Minnesota are really similar demographically. Minnesota has slightly fewer students, fewer school districts, more schools, fewer charters, and fewer teachers than Wisconsin. And they also have a higher student/teacher ratio, which would account for some, perhaps a bit chunk, of the lower per student spending. Maybe Minnesota has figured out the whole teachers union, salary and benefits equation better than we have.

  3. Ah, the grass is greener argument! OK, I”ll bite. Although I think Madison’s grass is very green, I think Minnesota may have a few advantages.
    Minnesota has a significant advantage over Wisconsin, distance from Illinois. As Illinois and the Feds withdrew poverty assistance in the late 1980s and 1990s, Wisconsin was an attractive and, for some, necessary option (for a time). The percentage of school-age kids from low-income families is higher in Wisconsin – and it makes a big difference on school funding and readiness.
    Minnesota did not have a four term governor that continued to rail against higher property taxes without providing adequate support or coordination of the state’s educational system. Do you think the power of the governor and the republican-led legislature might have favored certain districts over others? Couldn’t this be considered inefficiency, delivering resources not according to need?
    Minnesota did not have such a collapse of urban school systems (as what happened with Milwaukee). Minnesota also did not see as great of sprawl development.
    People complain that Madison has a high percentage of “low-income kids”. Well, one of the reasons is that many young, middle-class families moved or settled in new homes with lower taxes outside Madison, and that opportunities for low-income housing was suppressed outside of Madison. Higher resulting educational needs = greater funding needs.
    Larger changes in enrollment over the state = greater funding needs. Guess which state has had larger changes in enrollment (number of districts that have seen either high rates of growth or decline)?
    Minnesota does not have school funding system that penalizes a city so severely for having high property values.
    Minnesota does a better job with daycare and prenatal care.
    Minnesota has a lower rate of incarceration. Wisconsin has demonstrated racial bias on this issue.
    Minnesota has a bit better planning in how schools are used. For many public school districts, the schools are combined with community centers, where the gyms and other facilities are used for a greater portion of the year.
    Minnesota has fewer school districts. We could combine all the schools in Dane County, for instance, and we’d come up with a different viewpoint on per student school funding. Want to advance that idea? (Many states have school districts aligned to counties).
    Minnesota has a better system for delivering social services – not putting as much of the demand on schools, but having a better infrastructure for children and families social support.
    It’s true that per pupil spending is directly related to class size. If you want to save money in Madison, you can tighten administration a bit, but cuts really mean increased class size and fewer professionals in the schools. And, cuts, to be done well, require more administrators, not less.
    If you want Minnesota, we’ll need to put more into comprehensive, community planning around our schools.
    We can learn from other states, but we can also learn from knowing – with some detail – what our fundamental issues are. One of those may be a bias (toward distraction) against what is working well – we have a solid school system with an excellent, national reputation. Just ask some Minnesotans. I think they will tell you that they are struggling with budgets, too.
    One of our fundamental issues (in my opinion) is a resistance to meet rising costs with modest increases in spending. There is a statewide bias against this fairly rational idea. The answer this time, I believe, _is_ going to be more money. However, we also need smart targeting, formative assessment (clearly saying what we are trying to achieve), transparent summative assessment (professional, unbiased, and open performance review for programs and educational strategies), and a greater willingness to work together to make it easier for schools to meet our critical educational needs.
    Making it harder won’t give us strong schools – and strong schools – more than anything – is where our energies should be focused. Anything else is marginalization and a backslide.

  5. Fourth grade mathematics results on NAEP for Minnesota, Texas, Wisconsin, in 1992 and 2005.
    Minnesota Texas Wisconsin
    White
    1992 231 230 233
    2005 251 254 247
    Black
    1992 190 199 195
    2005 219 228 210
    Hispanic
    1992 * 208 208
    2005 223 235 224
    Asian Am
    1992 208 234 *
    2005 242 264 236
    * means the number of students fell below the level where scores were reported separately.

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