“Moving From Good to Great in Wisconsin: Funding Schools Adequately And Doubling Student Performance”

March 2007

Adequacy was defined as follows: “The goal is to have all, or all but the students with the most sever and profound disabilities, perform at or above proficiency on [state exams], (with the proficiency standard calibrated over time to those of the NAEP).” Also included in the definition are the expectations listed in Wisconsin’s Academic Standards and the federal No Child Left Behind Act.

Editorial comment: The No Child Left Behind Act’s goal of 100 percent proficiency - listed as one of the components of “adequacy” - is an unprecedented and, experts argue, unattainable goal. Robert Linn, co-director of the National Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards, and Student Testing, calls the 100% proficiency standard “unrealistically high.”

In addition, the study states that “the proficiency standard [is] calibrated over time to those of the NAEP.” Few countries in the world have even half of students proficient in reading and math when proficiency is defined according to the unrealistically high NAEP cut scores. It appears that the level of adequacy the study actually costs out is not what the study claims.

Despite the title, the study does not truly explore what “doubling student performance” means, beyond references to doubling NAEP scores – an especially narrow measure of “student performance”

Average per pupil cost: $9,820

• Base funding (state and local expenditures): $8,520
• State funding for categorical programs for special needs programs: $1,300

The authors also provide an alternate “simpler approach,” described as potential recommendations to policy-makers and taking into account inflationary changes between 2005-2006 (the years the data was from) and 2006-2007:

• Base cost: $8,400 per pupil
• Tutors for low-income students: $700 per student eligible for free or reduced-price lunch
• Extended day programs: $600 per student eligible for free or reduced-price lunch
• ELL services: $700 per English Language learner
• Severe special education students – the two percent of special education students with the greatest needs: $40,000 total per student (approx. $113 per pupil when divided across all students in the state)
• Per pupil estimates for all other special education students are not listed
  

$786 million, or 9.2 percent.

In addition, the study also analyzed the Wisconsin school finance system and indicated that about $702 million would be additional state money and $84 million would be potential new local money.

This figure includes a hold-harmless correction that would prevent school districts from receiving less state aid under the formula recommended in the study (see Additional Findings)

The authors list a series of evidence-based recommendations. The major ones include:

• Continued support for full-day kindergarten for parents who want it
• Class sizes of 15 for grades K-3 and 25 for grades 4-12
• 1 specialist-subject teacher per 5 core teachers in elementary and middle school; 1 specialist teacher per 3 core-subject teachers in high school
• Instructional coaches for students
• Tutors for students eligible for free or reduce-price lunch
• Additional ELL instructors
• Extended day programs, based on serving 50% of a school’s low-income student population
• Summer school, based on serving 50% of a school’s low-income student population
• Increased numbers of teachers and guidance counselors for student support and family outreach for low-income students
• “Intensive” professional development
• Increased funding for technology
• Additional teachers and administrators for small districts, beyond the ratios recommended for schools in general

Editorial comment: According to Jack Norman, a school finance expert in Wisconsin, the authors “underestimated the resources needed for middle- and high-school non-core subjects” by reshuffling many existing staff positions and reducing the number of teachers allocated to upper grades, particularly in non-core courses. In addition, Norman says the study’s numbers underestimate the resources “for small rural districts with their particular inefficiencies [and] for health insurance and other benefits.” The price tags of insurance and other benefits have skyrocketed in recent years.

Authors found 17 districts spending more than the recommendations listed in this study, with a total combined spending of $9.2 million over the recommended adequacy amount

The study recommends a “Response to Intervention” model for special education (see p. 79 for a full description)

The study recommends full state funding for the $40,000 per student cost of the two percent of special education students who are the most severely disabled

While the state’s 4-year-old kindergarten program is included in the cost, preschool is not included

The study did not include debt service, which totals about $700 per pupil in Wisconsin

The study included a complex analysis of Wisconsin’s funding formula and how to revise the formula to make the formula more equitable across districts. The authors recommended many changes to the formula regarding levy rates at different tiers and maximum levies for districts. In addition, the authors make recommendations as to which programs should be funded by which levels of government. This analysis is complicated and reflects the sources of funding and not the amount of funding. For this reason, we have not included the details in this fact sheet.

This study did not consider capital funding for facilities, etc., transportation, food service, adult education, or community service costs, which are ordinarily excluded from adequacy studies.

Evidence-based Approach:

• The study used an evidence-based methodology. Authors state that they estimated the resources recommended by research literature that would produce “effect sizes” such that all students would be able to meet the adequacy goals listed in the study. The authors then determined the per pupil cost of those resources for prototype schools.
• Salaries in the study are based on actual salaries from 2004-05, adjusted for inflation. The study also makes recommendations for how districts can best pay for legacy or retiree health care costs.
  
  

None.

The Wisconsin School Finance Adequacy Initiative, a policy task force that comprises policymakers, educators, and other state citizens and stakeholders