For the past several years, Marguerite Roza has led a series of Center on Reinventing Public Education studies on how school districts spend their money. Her reports have shown that school districts often do not know how their funds are allocated, and that common district practices often lead to lower spending in low-income neighborhood schools.…

This guide was developed to encourage community organizations to employ public engagement strategies in the context of school finance litigation taking place in their states. While litigation may at times seem daunting and complex to non-lawyers, there is much that community-based organizations concerned with education reform can do to become…

At the advent of the 21st century, schools are devoting more and more financial and staff resources to incorporating technology into the classroom to support teaching, learning and the management of school business. But as schools purchase computers and link them together in local and wide-area networks, totaling the dollars spent on hardware is…

Every Year, thousands of American children enter school already behind. Although most Americans are aware of that fact, what they often don't know, is that instead of organizing our educational systems to make things better for these children, we organize systems of public education in ways that make things worse. This report is unique among…

This document is one of a series of reports based on the Special Education Expenditure Project, a study of the nation's spending on special education and related services based on analysis of data for the 1999-2000 school year. This report focuses on three questions: "How much is the nation spending on services for students with disabilities?";…

This document, prepared by the Texas State Auditor's Office, offers detailed guidelines for conducting a financial audit of community colleges in Texas. Its purpose is to assist governing boards and college management in ensuring that their colleges are receiving high-quality opinion audits on annual financial statements. The guide includes the…

Between fall 1987 and 1992, Maui Community College's (MCC's) (Hawaii) enrollment increased by 40%, to 2,799 students. This growth was a result of increased student and community interest in higher education on all three islands in Maui County, as well as MCC's aggressive recruitment and educational program delivery. However, budget restrictions…

The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) requires that each state education agency (SEA) establish and maintain an advisory panel for the purpose of providing policy guidance with respect to special education and related services for children with disabilities. This document is a brief summary of survey information received from 48…

Calls for changes in California's complex state-run school funding system, provided the backdrop for "Overhauling School Funding in California: The Push for Greater Adequacy, Equity, and Accountability," the EdSource 27th Annual Forum in March 2004. Participants discussed approaches for determining what would constitute adequate funding,…

Despite wide publicity and common usage, the concept of skills shortage has different meaning to different people depending on their perspective. Understanding the different concepts of skills shortages, their measurement and the causes of skill shortages is important if sound policies are to be developed in the areas of employment, education,…

An evaluation approach using the mathematical method of the Hasse diagram technique is applied on 20 environmental and chemical Internet resources. The data for this evaluation procedure are taken out of a metadatabase called DAIN (Metadatabase of Internet Resources for Environmental Chemicals) which is set up by the GSF Research Centre for…

Writing assessment began in Alaska in the 1970s, and the Alaska Writing Assessment (AWA) that was piloted in 1997 built on previous efforts. The 1997 AWA involved more than 20,000 students in grades 5, 7, and 10 from 43 school districts, and the mandatory assessment planned for 1998 will include approximately 28,000 students. This review of the…

Although all public schools could be eligible for federal funds under Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) and Individuals with Disabilities Act (IDEA) programs, concerns have been raised about whether charter schools are receiving an equitable share of these federal funds. This report describes: (1) how federal Title I and IDEA funds are…

This report responds to Delaware state legislation requiring the development of proposed revised regulations for the classification of students as learning disabled (LD). The report first describes the current system, noting that in 1997 15 percent of the student population were served under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act and over…

This testimony presents an overview of the budgetary needs of the California Community College system for the fiscal year 2001-2002. Thomas J. Nussbaum, Chancellor of the California Community Colleges, makes a case for a requested budget increase of between $750 million and $800 million per year. The request is based in large part on the funding…