Volume 13, Number 1, Spring 2004
Resource Distribution and Rural
“Even though it costs smaller districts
incrementally more per
pupil to educate their students, there is no
mechanism of
adjustment…to correct for this factor.”
The current per pupil model of funding for
places rural
schools at a disadvantage. Schools that have a
high
enrollment of students receive a higher share of their
funding from
the state, yet are able operate on less financing
because their
overhead costs have been met. In contrast,
rural
schools that often have smaller numbers of enrolled
students may
not receive enough funding to meet overhead
costs. Rural
schools have to depend heavily on local levies for
educational
funding, and are still faced with the challenges of
poor
environmental conditions and providing stable building
maintenance. Many
times, rural schools are forced to cut
curriculum
offered to students as a result of these challenges.
Local referendum further complicates rural school district
funding.
Districts are allowed to enhance their revenues with
local
referendum, and the average
raises about
$406 per student. Smaller schools, however,
require at
least $665 per student or 63.7% more in local
referendum due to
lower student enrollment that results in a
smaller share
of state funding.1
The effects of inadequate state funding and insufficient
augmentation
through local referendum have caused many
rural
schools to have more problems with infrastructure,
resources, and
staffing than districts with more state funding
as well
as districts that receive higher referendum amounts
(above the state median). The following
statistics illustrate the
problem.
• 0.8% of schools in large districts need replacement while
6.3% of buildings in small districts need replacing.
• 12% of the smallest districts offer French classes,
compared to 91%
of the largest districts.
• Over 25% of small
school
districts have
difficulty
attracting
teachers,
compared
to 0% of
the largest
school districts.1
Research indicates that
students in
smaller school
settings often
score
higher on
student
performance than
do
larger
schools. In fact,
many large
schools
organize their
student
bodies into
smaller units
to
compensate for this
performance
finding. Yet
student
performance is
also
greatly affected by
poor
environmental
conditions. How
can we
insure that
our small,
rural
schools receive
adequate
financial funding from the state to overcome
environmental
issues and raise student performance?
Political Science and Public Policy specialist,
Gregory R.
Thorson, Ph.D., has been researching this topic. He proposes
a new
model of state funding for education that would help
address this
issue. Dr. Thorson suggests the following
adjustment to the
state’s funding formula in order to help
offset the
per-pupil cost disparity between large and small
schools: The
state is currently provides districts with $4,601
per
student. Policymakers should consider increasing this
amount by 8%
for each district’s first 500 students ($4,969)
and 4% for
the next 500 students ($4,785 for students 501-
1,000). All additional students beyond the first 1,000 in each
district would
be funded at the $4,601 level.
This model not only captures the true costs of education
based on the
findings of discrepancies in infrastructure,
resources and
staffing between small and large school
districts, but
more importantly, it allows students in smaller
districts the
opportunity to raise performance levels, enabling
all school
districts to benefit. In 2003, Thorson’s proposal
would have
cost approximately $77 million (less than 2
percent of
total education funding). Thorson’s proposal has
been
introduced as a bill in the legislature, and testimony has
been
presented.
For more information, visit the Center for Rural Policy and
Development website:
www.mnsu.edu/ruralmn/pages/Publications/publications
Prepared jointly by Dr. Gregory R. Thorson,
and Zoe Wong,
CYFC staff
References are included with the web-based
version of this newsletter
at www.cyfc.umn.edu/publications/connection