Funding Alert

The first witness in the August 22 hearing told the committee that school funding cases have been brought in 45 out of the 50 states with 20 cases still active. Plaintiffs, seeking reform in school funding, have prevailed in the highest courts in 26 states, including New Jersey.

The committee members seemed to appreciate learning some of the context and background to the committee’s charge of creating a new funding formula. "I am relieved to hear that other states are struggling with the same issues as New Jersey," remarked committee co-chair Senator John Adler.

The first witness was Molly A. Hunter, Director of the National Access Network at Teachers College, Columbia University. The next witness was Michael Griffith, Education Finance Consultant to the National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL). Ms. Hunter told the committee

that school funding litigation, like the Abbott v. Burke case, had its genesis in the famous U.S. Supreme Court decision of Brown v. Board of Education. "Advocates were looking for better educational opportunities for poor and minority students," she said.

When the Supreme Court ruled in 1973 that education was not a fundamental right under the U.S. Constitution, plaintiffs began looking to state courts. Almost all state constitutions, unlike the federal constitution, contain an education clause, requiring the state to provide a public education to the children in their communities. The underlying rationale for this requirement is the strong sentiment that education of the citizenry is imperative for the preservation of democracy.

The early cases sought equity in funding. The plaintiffs were looking for "equal" funding for poor and minority students. Over a period years, the plaintiffs’ strategy shifted from an "equity" or fairness approach to an "adequacy" or sufficiency approach as more and more states adopted rigorous curriculum standards. Indeed, in the 1997 Abbott ruling, the New Jersey Supreme Court became the first in the nation to adopt the State’s core curriculum content standards as the "substantive" definition of a "thorough and efficient" education under the State constitution.

Ms. Hunter took note that standards based reform paved the way for the shift in litigation strategy by essentially changing the underlying question in school funding from "How much money do we have to spend on education?" to "How much money is necessary to meet these standards?"

Another question that confronted the courts was how to measure adequacy of funding. The plaintiffs and defendants often asked the courts to look at inputs such as class size, quality of teachers, availability of professional development and outputs, such as test scores, and graduation rates.

In New Jersey, the Supreme Court found that there were significant differences in both inputs and outputs between educationally successful suburban school districts and high poverty urban districts. As a result, the Court directed the State to use the average per pupil spending level in the successful suburban districts as the benchmark for funding "regular" or foundational education in high poverty urban districts. Thus, New Jersey became the first state to ensure "parity" in foundation funding for standards-based education between students in affluent suburban schools and those in poor, urban schools. ¹

Another critical issue is the causal link, i.e. the nature of the relationship between inputs and outcomes and the effect of external factors outside the role of the school system. Poverty is an example of such an external factor. Once external factors are identified, the next question is whether the school system has responsibility for dealing with such external factors.

The N.J. Supreme Court was clear in its Abbott rulings that poverty has a seriously detrimental effect on the ability of children to learn and, therefore, "adequate" education funding needed to include what the court called "supplemental funding" over and above parity, to address the real needs of children living in these poorest communities. In the landmark 1998 Abbott V ruling, the Court directed the State to implement and fund a package of supplemental programs to "wipe out the disadvantages" of poor students, including well planned, high quality preschool education. Ms. Hunter noted that, in just a few short years, New Jersey’s Abbott preschool program has become the best in the nation.

Several committee members asked Ms. Hunter whether there are any states that have done a particularly good job at school funding reform, providing both adequate and equitable funding to all students, as well as fairness to taxpayers. Ms. Hunter pointed to Maryland as good example and also to Kentucky and Vermont. She noted that all three states featured foundation amounts based on cost studies, an increase in the level of state support, and an equalizing of resources between wealthy and less-wealthy districts. Successful systems also include a state established local share.

Mr. Griffith also noted

that it was unlikely that significant savings would be realized by the consolidation of school districts unless school buildings were actually closed.

For more information on the experience of other states, visit www.schoolfunding.info.

¹ The Supreme Court said, in pertinent part, in Abbott IV, "We emphasize that plaintiffs' right is one of thorough and efficient educational opportunity; parity is simply one judicial remedy that can help to create that opportunity. . . . Increased funding at parity is our chosen interim remedy because it is beyond dispute that per-pupil expenditures remain a relevant and important element in the attempt to assure constitutionally sufficient educational opportunity. . . .The State, however, has neither validated the T & E amount nor established that spending in excess of the T & E amount is mere inefficiency... The Court, therefore, resorts to an objective and reasonable indicator of the resources necessary for the provision of a thorough and efficient education, namely, those successful districts that, consistent with the Constitution, most likely will achieve at the levels established by the standards under the statute.