Equity or Adequacy of School Funding

Abstract

Definitions of equal educational opportunity have evolved over the past 200 years, from access to schooling, to equal spending per pupil, to variable spending per pupil depending upon their individual educational needs. Existing arrangements for financing public K-12 education generally employ state subventions to narrow the disparities in funding that result from heavy reliance on local property taxes as the primary source of public school revenue. Although the quest for equity in school funding has dominated legal and political actions in recent years, in this article I argue that adequacy of school funding deserves far greater attention than it has thus far received and that single-minded pursuit of equity may lead to equality of funding at a level inadequate to provide the programs and services children need if they are to compete successfully in adult life.