School Finance Redesign Project
In the past decade, controversies about public spending on education have grown as states adopted performance standards and as No Child Left Behind has put teeth in those expectations. Educators say that meeting higher standards requires more money. Some policymakers claim that past spending increases were large enough to pay for higher performance if funds were used productively.
Though no one seriously argues that more spending could never lead to school improvement, there is reason to fear that without changes in the way funds are spent, Americans could end up with a more expensive, but not necessarily more effective or equitable, system of public education.
In this environment, elected officials have searched for answers to two questions: How much money will it take for all students to meet standards and how should the money be spent?
The Bill & Melinda Gates foundation asked the Center on Reinventing Public Education (CRPE) to create the School Finance Redesign Project (SFRP) to help elected officials better understand how the finance system now works and to identify the options that they have in allocating resources to support K-12 education. The project, initiated in 2002, has now grown to include more than 30 separate studies.
More Publications
Featured Publications
What Is the Sum of the Parts? How Federal, State and District Funding Streams Confound Efforts to Address Different Student Types
Marguerite Roza, Kacey Guin, Tricia Davis
Allocation Anatomy: How District Policies That Deploy Resources Can Support (or Undermine) District Reform Strategies
Marguerite Roza
Allocation Anatomy: District Resource Distribution Practices & Reform Strategies (Research Brief)
Marguerite Roza
