School Funding from NPR ED

Here at NPR Ed, we write a lot about the head-spinning ways that schools are funded in the U.S. In our School Money project — a collaboration between NPR Ed and member station reporters across the country — we looked into how the U.S. pays for its public schools and the research about the kinds of investments that really make a difference for students. We got a chance to revisit those ideas this week, when the nonprofit EdBuild released a report on the massive disparities in funding between school districts across the country. It starts with a number: $23 billion. According to EdBuild, that's how much more funding predominantly white school districts receive compared with districts that serve mostly students of color. As Rebecca Sibilia, founder and CEO of EdBuild, explains, a school district's resources often come down to how wealthy an area is and how much residents pay in taxes. "We have built a school funding system that is reliant on geography, and therefore the school funding system has inherited all of the historical ills of where we have forced and incentivize people to live," she says. The average district serving mostly white students gets $2,226 more per student than a school district serving mostly students of color, the report says. If you read through it, you might notice that in some of the states with the worst funding disparities — like Arizona, Oklahoma and Colorado — teachers have gone on strike in the past year. And funding looks more equal in the South, where school district lines are often drawn along county lines, making districts larger across the board. "This confirms a theory that we've had, which is that the larger the tax base — the larger the actual geography of the school districts — the more you can actually balance out the difference between a wealthy white suburb and a less wealthy rural or urban area," Sibilia says. EdBuild singles out 21 states — including California, New Jersey and New York — in which mostly white districts get more funding than districts composed primarily of students of color.   Click the button below to read more about the report   READ Before you go, here are some of our favorite stories from the week: Teachers and students across the country took part in Read Across America last week. The week has historically celebrated the work of Dr. Seuss — but some of Seuss' classics, according to our Code Switch team, have been criticized for the way they portray people of color. And Black History Month may be over, but that doesn't mean that learning about black history needs to stop. NPR's Jason Fuller reported on Morning Edition that teaching black history — and the narratives of black people — can be incorporated into everyday lessons. You can listen to his story here.   See you next week.