Poster #4 - A Deep Dive into Oregon’s School Funding Formula – Unpacking Trends for Special Populations

• In Event: Friday Poster Reception

Abstract

State funding formulas are standard policy levers to allocate finite dollars equitably across schools. For this very reason, all 50 US states use some adjustment mechanisms to divide resources informed by the perceived unique needs of student subgroups, including those eligible for special education (50 states), students from low-income households (47 states), those classified as English Language Learners (48 states), and students enrolled in gifted and talented programs (35 states; Kolbe et al., 2020). However, there is a scarcity of empirical research documenting the effect of state funding formulas on resource allocation for special populations, such as students with disabilities and students classified as English Language Learners. In this paper, I use Oregon as a case study to examine trends in resource allocation and expenditures across two special populations – students in special education and English as a Second Language (ESL) programs.

Oregon uses a student-based funding formula that allocates lump-sum funding to school districts based on their average daily membership (ADM), adjusted for differential needs. Students in special education are double-weighted in the formula up to 11% of the district ADM, and students in ESL programs get an additional 0.5 weight with no caps. There are two other streams through which students in special education receive additional funding – a) districts with more than 11% of their students in special education programs fill a waiver and may receive additional funding, and b) those districts with students whose specialized educational expenditure exceeds $30,000 can apply for a reimbursement through the High-Cost Disabilities Grant (HCDG). For this project, I compiled information from the Oregon Department of Education (ODE) releases on district-level allocations from 2011 to 2024, school-level expenditure data from 2019-22, and district-level reimbursements from the HCDG. I also integrated other publicly available data on district characteristics and student educational environments for special education. With the constructed dataset, I am in the process of examining descriptive trends. My preliminary analysis reveals a series of stylistic facts:

1. Oregon allocates resources for 125 students for every 100 students, primarily due to additional weighting for students in special education, ESL programs, and poverty.


2. About 15% of Oregon students get special education services. Despite the 11% cap on the double-weight allowance, Oregon allocates additional weights for 12% of its student population via special education weights. This happens through the waiver mechanism of the funding policy, suggesting that 11% is a soft cut-off.


3. One percent of Oregon students are eligible for the HCDG; however, the grant reimburses less than half the additional expenses incurred by school districts.


4. Between 2019 to 2022, Oregon schools spent around $7k per student on direct classroom expenses; the additional per-student expense on direct classroom was $4k for students in the ESL program and $10k for students in special education. Other expense buckets where schools spent a reasonable amount on special education services were classroom support, building support, and payment to others.


5. There is meaningful variation in revenue and expenditure trends between districts.

Author

• Havisha Khurana, University of Oregon
  Presenting Author