When More Is Not Enough: (Re)Considering Disparities in Federal Funding for Special Education

• In Event: Addressing Equity Through Federal Education Policy During the Obama, Trump, and Biden Administrations

Abstract

Framework

“Full funding” for the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) is a cornerstone of the Biden-Harris Administration’s education policy platform. IDEA is one of the federal government’s primary funding statutes for public education and in exchange for federal grants-in-aid, states agree to implement the law’s detailed requirements for ensuring students with disabilities a free and appropriate public education (FAPE). IDEA currently authorizes federal appropriations up to 40% of average per pupil spending nationwide – and yet, federal appropriations have never achieved this goal. The Administration’s proposed FY2022 budget has been touted as taking first steps toward full funding and requests a 20% increase in federal appropriations for IDEA, with the promise of future requests for additional funding.

Receiving comparatively less, if any, consideration in policy discussions has been how existing and potentially new federal IDEA dollars should be distributed to states. IDEA grants to states for programs that provide special education and related services for school-aged children with disabilities are calculated using a complex set of formulae. That said, there are long standing concerns that the formulae result in an inequitable distribution of federal aid among states and also create new and worsen existing inequities in education funding across and within states (Education Law Center, 2018; McCann, 2014). In the face of such concerns, and particularly as federal policymakers weigh proposals to increase IDEA appropriations, it is both necessary and timely to carefully consider the formulae used to distribute IDEA funding to states.

Purpose

In this study, we explore whether the existing formulae contained in IDEA yield a progressive distribution of existing federal dollars so that states with higher levels of need receive more funding per pupil than states with lower levels of overall need. We then simulate how proposed increases in appropriations for IDEA would be distributed under the existing formula.

Methods

We use the U.S. Department of Education’s (ED) Maintenance of Effort Reduction and Coordinated Early Intervening Services data (MOE) to model the existing distribution of federal funding. These data are reported annually and include the total allocation for IDEA Part B (611) dollars, by state. We use the formulae’s existing calculations to model the distribution of proposed increases in federal appropriations among states. Disparities in the distribution of existing federal funding are evaluated using descriptive statistics typically used in evaluating the distribution of educational resources among jurisdictions.

Findings

We find that:
● The distribution of existing federal IDEA dollars systematically disadvantages states with higher levels of need, as measured by the share of students identified with a disability and students living in poverty.
● Existing calculations, which are explicitly tied to state demographics prior to 1999, are biased against states that have seen increasing and diversifying student populations.
● Increasing federal appropriations without modifying the formulae used to distribute funding will exacerbate rather than remedy disparities in federal IDEA funding.

Significance

Considering these findings, we propose a new policy framework for revising IDEA’s funding formulae to improve equity in the distribution of federal funding.

Authors

• Tammy Kolbe, University of Vermont

• Elizabeth Dhuey, University of Toronto

• Sara Doutre, WestEd