Fair and Equal: School Funding and State-Level Racial Inequality of Educational Achievement

• In Event: 3429 - Section on Sociology of Education Refereed Roundtables (1 hour)
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: 5. Diversity, Inequality and Education: Race/Ethnicity at School

Abstract

Racial segregation between districts has increased and funding inequality is arguably larger between rather than within districts and states. These trends suggest the importance of examining the relationship between education funding and racial inequality of educational achievement at the state-level, which incorporates inequality both within and between districts. Using 1990-2015 state-level NAEP data by race, linked to Census finance data and funding fairness data from the Education Law Center, I address two questions: Are White-Black achievement gaps related to education funding and the fairness of its distribution? Do these relationships vary by funding source? Results from models including state and year fixed effects suggest gaps depend more on local revenue than other revenue sources. However, achievement gaps depend more consistently on the fairness of revenue distribution than the revenue amount.

Author

• Emily Rauscher, Brown University