Fifty years after the Supreme Court issued its ruling in "San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez," the trajectory of school finance desegregation has shifted from expansive federal hopes to narrower state efforts. Attempts to address many of the disparities continue to be constrained by the complex and intersecting nature…

Contrary to Supreme Court Justice Lewis F. Powell's majority opinion in "San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez" (1973), Texas's school finance system was the result of years of legislation and state-building that gave some areas the resources and capacity to provide more educational opportunities than others. As this…

In the last decade, many political conflicts over K-12 education in the United States have increasingly divided along party lines. While it may seem like this development represents a sudden and surprising departure from a long-standing tradition of bipartisanship, I argue that the politics of education has been gradually growing more exposed to…

This article explores the passage and failure of the 1973 Illinois Resource Equalizer formula which was designed to reduce disparities in school finance by breaking the connection between local wealth and school revenue. It argues that two sets of goals drove passage of the new law--equity and local property tax relief--and they came into conflict…

This article discusses concerns about how Neil M. Gorsuch, a U.S. Supreme Court nominee, might influence decisions regarding cases involving the appropriate scope of services guaranteed by federal special-education law, government aid to religious institutions providing educational services, and how intellectual property law applies to sports…

This case represents a multitude of leadership dilemmas created by financial exigencies and the difficult decisions that must be made during times of economic austerity. Under the best of circumstances, deciding between programmatic elimination and/or employee termination is agonizing, onerous, and filled with political and social ramifications.…

Southern California is facing a demographic transformation that will become characteristic of the nation as a whole in coming decades. In this research, we present a historical review of the region's attempt to address school inequity, recent enrollment and segregation trends, and an investigation of whether segregation still matters. Our results…

Prior to the United States Supreme Court's decision in "Brown v. Board of Education" (1954), educational finance litigation focused almost entirely on the equitable distribution of state educational financing, ending preferential disbursement of state funds. This ended in 1973, with the United States Supreme Court's decision in "San…

Congress's role in defining and promoting equality of educational opportunity has evolved over the past 55 years since "Brown v. Board of Education." Most recently, all three branches of the federal government have focused more on equality of educational opportunity for "individual" students rather than for protected classes.…

This book chronicles the history of school finance reform in Texas between 1968 and 1995. Specifically, the book focuses on the substantial changes in the method of funding Texas public schools, aimed at creating a more equitable system of educational opportunity. The author, Dr. Jose A. Cardenas, founded the Intercultural Development Research…