Budgeting is inherently political. Too often, short-term goals overrun long-term institutional interest. By presenting the many layers of budgeting models with a clear, comparative framework, author Larry Goldstein, demonstrates the organic link between planning and budgeting, making it crystal clear that budgets and plans represent two sides of…

This paper estimates the causal effect of equalizing revenues across public school districts on students' intergenerational mobility, using variation from 13 school finance reforms passed in 20 US states between 1986 and 2004. Since households sort in response to each reform, post-reform revenues are endogenous to an extent that varies across…

Higher education benefits individuals and the state: college graduates are more likely to be employed and earn higher wages than nongraduates, boosting state tax revenues and reducing pressure on the social safety net. However, California's higher education system is not keeping up with the changing economy. Projections suggest that the state will…

Education is the bedrock of an informed democracy and the bridge to lifelong learning. To ensure that every Texan reaches their full potential, it's important that all families have access to high-quality education--regardless of their ZIP code. However, efforts to expand educational options for Texas families in the form of charter schools have…

Now that competing versions of HB 3 have been passed in each chamber, it is up to the House and Senate to work together to smooth out the differences. While there is a lot of agreement within the two versions of this bill, there are glaring discrepancies. This brief describes the discrepancies of the House and Senate bills in the following…

This Data Point is based on data from four iterations of the National Postsecondary Student Aid Study (NPSAS), a large, nationally representative sample survey of students that focuses on how they finance their postsecondary education. This Data Point includes data on the percentage of total price of attendance covered by Pell Grants and the…

Tiebout theorizes that local public services are provided more efficiently if costs are paid out of local revenues rather than by inter-governmental grants. But if local politics is not as pluralistic as Dahl has argued, citizens of higher socio-economic status will exercise greater influence, resulting in higher inequalities in service provision.…

On July 20, 2015, the National Audit Office (NAO) published its report "Overseeing the financial sustainability in the further education sector." The NAO examined oversight of the financial sustainability of the FE sector in England, with specific focus on general further education colleges (GFECs) (excluding sixth form colleges (SFCs)).…

The annual community college tuition and fees report provides information about tuition and fees charged at each of Iowa's 15 community colleges. This report also provides trends in tuition and fees among Iowa's community colleges, sources of general operating revenue, and comparisons among states and institutions. For fiscal year (FY) 2020,…

The methodology presented in this paper offers an approach for assessing the robustness of a country's vocational education strategy from the governance and financing standpoints. The analysis may serve as an input for decisions on financial assistance. Developed on the basis of the European Commission's Budget Support Guidelines 2017 -- Annex 3,…

State funding for higher education has increased in recent years. Per student funding for the California Community Colleges (CCC) is at an historic high and the Cal Grant program is larger than ever. But the state's investment in its public universities remains far lower than in the past. Indeed, California invests less per student (adjusted for…

UNICEF's first global report on pre-primary education presents a comprehensive analysis of the status of early childhood education worldwide. It also outlines a set of practical recommendations for governments and partners to make quality pre-primary education universal and routine. Noting that at least 175 million children -- 50 per cent of the…

Use of education finance data is ubiquitous. Yet, because the academic calendar circumscribes two calendar years, researchers have linked the Consumer Price Index to three different dates: the Fall, Spring and academic fiscal years. We demonstrate that linking the CPI to these different academic year results in identifying different trends in U.S.…

In 2013, Wisconsin's legislature added a statewide voucher program to the existing voucher programs in Milwaukee and Racine. The state expanded the statewide program in 2015 and changed the funding mechanism of the program so that its cost was borne by local school districts. The program is already distributing tens of millions of dollars to pay…

Purpose: Through case studies of five states with varying facilities policies, this study examines the factors contributing to expanded state investment in equitable public school facilities and how those factors can be leveraged to encourage states that make minimal investments to expand their support for facilities funding. Methods: Data…