Tuesday, July 7, 2009
Monday, June 29, 2009
New Book Influences Supreme Court Decision
Although it has just hit the bookstores, Schoolhouses, Courthouses and Statehouses: Solving the Funding-Achievement Puzzle in America’s Public Schools, is already having a major impact. On June 25, 2009, the US Supreme Court issued its decision in Horne v. Flores in which the Court reversed a federal court order requiring the Arizona legislature to substantially increase funding for education. Citing Schoolhouses, Courthouses and Statehouses for the proposition that such “court-imposed funding mandates” have not been very successful in improving student achievement, the Court overturned the lower courts’ funding order. The majority opinion also cited several other research articles written by Schoolhouses, Courthouses and Statehouses’ co-author, Eric Hanushek, in support of its decision.
Hanushek said that the decision is likely to have a significant impact on school funding litigation, given the Supreme Court’s acceptance of many of the arguments that he and Lindseth make in their book. He said “the courts have recognized there is a lot more to reforming our public schools than simply increasing the amount of funds they have to spend. More fundamental reforms, of the type we propose in our book, are necessary.”
A major part of the Court’s opinion was directing attention to outcomes and achievement as opposed to incremental funding. This judgment is entirely consistent with an emphasis on accountability and results while at the same time granting local districts considerable autonomy in how they achieve high levels of performance.
Al Lindseth indicated that he was aware that the book had been brought to the attention of the Supreme Court in one of the numerous amicus (friend of the court) briefs that had been submitted, but that it is very rare for the Court to rely on such amicus briefs or the arguments in them. Needless to say, he was pleased that the Court had made an exception in this case.
Hanushek said that the decision is likely to have a significant impact on school funding litigation, given the Supreme Court’s acceptance of many of the arguments that he and Lindseth make in their book. He said “the courts have recognized there is a lot more to reforming our public schools than simply increasing the amount of funds they have to spend. More fundamental reforms, of the type we propose in our book, are necessary.”
A major part of the Court’s opinion was directing attention to outcomes and achievement as opposed to incremental funding. This judgment is entirely consistent with an emphasis on accountability and results while at the same time granting local districts considerable autonomy in how they achieve high levels of performance.
Al Lindseth indicated that he was aware that the book had been brought to the attention of the Supreme Court in one of the numerous amicus (friend of the court) briefs that had been submitted, but that it is very rare for the Court to rely on such amicus briefs or the arguments in them. Needless to say, he was pleased that the Court had made an exception in this case.
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Al Lindseth Discusses Education Reform
Al Lindseth was a guest on the Jim Bohannon Show last night, where he discussed how the nation's education system can be reformed.
To listen to the interview click here.
To listen to the interview click here.
Monday, June 15, 2009
The Genesis of Schoolhouses, Courthouses, and Statehouses
While just released this month, our book Schoolhouses, Courthouses, and Statehouses had its beginnings more than a decade ago in Kansas City. My co-author, Al Lindseth, and I appeared together in a federal court case about funding. As a result of an earlier federal judgment, the State of Missouri had been funding KC at a level sufficient to make it the highest spending district of any large city. Our collaboration there and in a series of subsequent court cases was focused on bringing scientific evidence to bear on educational funding cases. Of course at that time, we had little idea of writing a book. We were instead focused on the immediate issues.
Al subsequently became the lead attorney for the State of New York’s defense of the funding “adequacy” case in New York City, and I again testified as an expert witness on funding and achievement issues. The monumental nature of the case got both of us (independently) thinking about the role of the courts in educational policy making. Testimony in this case, the Campaign for Fiscal Equity v. State of New York, lasted eight months. The trial court ruled that the children of New York City were not being provided a constitutionally appropriate education. After subsequent testimony on a remedy, the court ordered an increase of $5.82 billion per year in operating expenses plus an additional sum for capital expenditures. This sum was later reduced by the state’s highest court, but the principle of court-mandated expenditures remained.
We were each appalled by this ruling. Independent of any feelings about the level of performance of students in New York, we felt that this was a very bad way to make education policy. The court really did not have the relevant expertise. Nor was it in a good position to make appropriations decisions. The courts original ruling would have meant an average increase of over $1,000 to the tax bill of all New York State households.
More importantly, past evidence suggested that this increase in spending would be unlikely to lead to improved student performance unless accompanied by more fundamental reforms. But the New York court was not prepared to consider or order any basic reforms. Instead it stopped with consideration just of spending.
When we discussed writing a joint book on school finance, our focus was largely on the courts. We thought it would be useful to make the case that the courts were not good educational policy makers. The initial design was that we would combine our perspectives on legal and policy issues in a general treatment of educational finance decisions.
Schoolhouses does indeed include our thinking on the role of the courts. But it ended up going considerably beyond that. We added a discussion of why improving schools is so important for our nation. More than that, however, we moved to the task of describing what might be better. After all, neither the courts nor the state legislatures have solved the achievement problem even though they have pushed spending much higher.
The system of performance-based funding is the end result of our diagnosis of the problems with current school funding. The current system is not structured to provide incentives for increased student achievement. In fact, it is just the opposite, where a variety of state policies reward failure and punish success. We took the design problem seriously. We describe a set of alternative policy arrangements that show promise for solving the funding-achievement puzzle (i.e., for setting a system where increased funds are matched with increased student outcomes).
Al subsequently became the lead attorney for the State of New York’s defense of the funding “adequacy” case in New York City, and I again testified as an expert witness on funding and achievement issues. The monumental nature of the case got both of us (independently) thinking about the role of the courts in educational policy making. Testimony in this case, the Campaign for Fiscal Equity v. State of New York, lasted eight months. The trial court ruled that the children of New York City were not being provided a constitutionally appropriate education. After subsequent testimony on a remedy, the court ordered an increase of $5.82 billion per year in operating expenses plus an additional sum for capital expenditures. This sum was later reduced by the state’s highest court, but the principle of court-mandated expenditures remained.
We were each appalled by this ruling. Independent of any feelings about the level of performance of students in New York, we felt that this was a very bad way to make education policy. The court really did not have the relevant expertise. Nor was it in a good position to make appropriations decisions. The courts original ruling would have meant an average increase of over $1,000 to the tax bill of all New York State households.
More importantly, past evidence suggested that this increase in spending would be unlikely to lead to improved student performance unless accompanied by more fundamental reforms. But the New York court was not prepared to consider or order any basic reforms. Instead it stopped with consideration just of spending.
When we discussed writing a joint book on school finance, our focus was largely on the courts. We thought it would be useful to make the case that the courts were not good educational policy makers. The initial design was that we would combine our perspectives on legal and policy issues in a general treatment of educational finance decisions.
Schoolhouses does indeed include our thinking on the role of the courts. But it ended up going considerably beyond that. We added a discussion of why improving schools is so important for our nation. More than that, however, we moved to the task of describing what might be better. After all, neither the courts nor the state legislatures have solved the achievement problem even though they have pushed spending much higher.
The system of performance-based funding is the end result of our diagnosis of the problems with current school funding. The current system is not structured to provide incentives for increased student achievement. In fact, it is just the opposite, where a variety of state policies reward failure and punish success. We took the design problem seriously. We describe a set of alternative policy arrangements that show promise for solving the funding-achievement puzzle (i.e., for setting a system where increased funds are matched with increased student outcomes).
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