Title I

A Tool for Tracking Federal Spending on Education and Other Programs for Children

Maggie Severns — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 18:40:00 -0400

It is deceptively difficult to determine how much money the federal government spends on America's children each year. Money spent on children's health, education, and nutrition -- as well as a host of other government programs that promote child welfare -- comes from 180 different federal programs, making it hard to account for just how much is spent each year.

Enter First Focus, a nonpartisan children's advocacy organization that created the Children's Budget, a document that provides a birds' eye view of all federal spending on education. This week, using data from Congressional appropriations bills through fiscal year 2009, First Focus released its latest report. It shows that, while there are 82 different federal programs aimed at children from birth through age 18, the share of federal money spent on children in the non-defense budget has decreased from 10.5 percent to 9.2 percent over the past five years.

The report comes with an array of helpful charts and searchable databases at ChildrensBudget.org. We here at Early Ed Watch were curious about whether spending on education programs in particular has been going up or down over the years. Using the tools on the site, we found:

Education's share of overall federal spending declined between 2005 and 2009, from 2.09 percent to 1.51 percent.
When funding levels are adjusted for inflation, the amount spent on Head Start from 2005 to 2009 decreased by 7.9 percent.
Title I funding stagnated between 2005 and 2007, but received a boost during the last two fiscal years. When adjusted for inflation, funding for Title I in 2009 was 3.2 percent above 2005 funding levels.

There's lots more you can do with the Children's Budget website, including tracking programs and money by program type, federal department, and a variety of other criteria. Keep in mind, of course, that several changes may be ahead in the fiscal 2010 budget, which Congress should pass this fall.

Don't forget that here at New America we have another helpful tool -- the Federal Education Budget Project -- which features data on students' academic achievement and demographics that can be analyzed alongside federal, state and district funding data.

Senate Committee Advances Appropriations Bill Funding Early Childhood Programs

Sara Mead — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 16:31:00 -0400

As Congress determines how to spend federal dollars in the next fiscal year, a significant federal investment in advancing preschoolers’ literacy skills – Early Reading First – appears to be in jeopardy.

On Thursday the Senate Appropriations Committee marked up its version of the fiscal year 2010 Labor-HHS-Education appropriations bill, which includes funding for major federal early childhood programs. Last week, we reported on the House Appropriations Committee’s version of the same legislation.

When it comes to early childhood programs, the two bills have a lot in common. Both would hold funding for the Child Care and Development Block Grant to its fiscal year 2009 level of $2.1 billion, and both would provide a modest $122 million increase in funding for Head Start, raising total Head Start funding to $7.2 million.

While the House and Senate committees funded CCDBG and Head Start at the same levels President Obama requested for 2010, neither committee was willing to fund new early childhood initiatives requested in the President’s budget. Like their House colleagues, the Senate appropriations committee would provide no funding for proposed Title I Early Childhood Grants or the Early Learning Challenge Fund. (As we have reported elsewhere, the Student Aid and Financial Responsibility Act currently in the House would provide $8 billion in mandatory funding—not subject to the appropriations process—for the Early Learning Challenge Grants over the next eight years. A Senate version of the legislation is expected to also include provisions creating and funding the Early Learning Challenge Grants, but has not yet been introduced.)

The Senate committee also provided an increase in funding for the Striving Readers program, although a much smaller one than President Obama requested. The President had requested $370 million in funding for Striving Readers (the program was funded at $35 million in fiscal 2009), including $70 million to expand the adolescent literacy activities the program currently funds, and $300 million for a new PreK-3^rd early literacy initiative intended to replace the Reading First program, which Congress defunded in the fiscal year 2009 budget. The President also requested $163 million in funding for the Early Reading First program, which supports the implementation of scientifically based early literacy strategies in preschool programs.

The Senate bill would provide $263 million in funding for the Striving Readers program, and it would eliminate funding for the Early Reading First program altogether. A press release from the Labor-HHS-Education Subcommittee states that Early Reading First will be subsumed into a revamped Striving Readers program, which “will take a comprehensive approach to literacy, serv[ing] children from birth through grade 12,” but as a practical matter this would almost certainly mean much less funding available to support the implementation of research-based literacy strategies in preschool classrooms. Cutting a program aimed specifically at improving the quality of pre-k programs in this crucial area seems like a step backwards at a time when Congress is taking other steps to advance and support quality improvements in early childhood programs. More generally, the decline in federal investment in PreK-3^rd literacy—from $1.1 billion in fiscal year 2007 to less than $300 million under either of the funding bills emerging from the House or Senate committees—should trouble early childhood advocates.

The fact that both House and Senate committees have passed their versions of the Labor-HHS-Education bill before the August recess raises a possibility that Congress may actually finish work on these bills before the start of the 2010 fiscal year – October 1 -- and without resorting to a big Omnibus bill that combines several spending bills—something that hasn’t happened since 2005. Regardless of when Congress wraps its work on these bills, Early Ed Watch will continue to follow the process until it does so.

In Urban Classrooms, the Least Experienced Teach the Neediest Kids

MaryEllen McGuire — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 20:08:00 -0400

The following op-ed originally appeared in U.S. News & World Report on Friday, June 12^thand can be accessed here. The full report, Equitable Resources in Low Income Schools: Teacher Equity and the Federal Title I Comparability Requirement, can be read here.

Imagine for a moment that you are driving your child to the hospital. She has a high fever and is suffering from severe abdominal pain. It's unclear what's wrong but she is in definite need of medical attention.

Now imagine that the only doctor on call is a recently graduated medical student. It's her first day on the job and there is no experienced physician or surgeon available for consultation. Are you satisfied with this level of care for your child? I wouldn't be. I'd want to benefit from the knowledge of a more experienced physician. Wouldn't you?

Unfortunately, a similar scenario is playing out in America's urban classrooms with shocking regularity. Teachers with the least experience are educating the most disadvantaged students in the highest poverty, most challenging schools. Low-income kids are being "triaged" not by experienced teachers, but by those with fewer than three years of teaching to go on.

Does it matter? Absolutely. According to the research, teacher experience is at least a partial predictor of success in the classroom and, at present, one of the only approximations for teacher quality widely available. Experienced teachers tend to have better classroom management skills and a stronger command of curricular materials. Novice teachers on the other hand struggle during their initial years in any classroom.

Why are our least experienced professionals consistently being handed the most challenging teaching assignments? Because of the way seniority is rewarded in teacher contracts. More often that not, union contracts dictate that veteran teachers get first dibs on available positions within a school system. As a result, when given the chance, teachers often choose to transfer to more desirable, low-poverty schools. As a result of these transfers, students with the greatest educational need are time and time again taught by the least experienced teachers.

How bad is the problem? According to the National Center for Education Statistics, schools with the most low-income and minority students employ almost twice the proportion of teachers with fewer than three years of experience as higher-income and low-minority schools.

Disparities also exist in the distribution of teachers who are highly qualified in their subject areas as defined by No Child Left Behind. According to an Ohio study, one of every eight teachers in schools within the highest poverty and minority levels was not highly qualified, compared with only one of every 50 teachers in the lowest-poverty schools, and one of every 67 teachers in the lowest-minority schools.

Ultimately, disparities in teacher experience and credentials put low-income students at a disadvantage and perpetuate the achievement gap.

You may question whether policymakers are wholly insensitive to these inequities. They are not. When the Elementary and Secondary Education Act was originally passed in 1965, lawmakers inserted specific provisions to ensure that low-income students were provided services "comparable" to those provided to their more wealthy peers. These services included the equitable distribution of teachers.

Unfortunately, language subsequently inserted into law has rendered the provision almost meaningless. Since initial passage, lawmakers have decided to exempt teacher seniority from figuring into school comparability calculations. This has allowed school districts across America to hide the fact-under cover of federal law-that their poorest students in their poorest schools are being taught by their least experienced, least expensive teachers. After all, one of the primary determinants of a teacher's salary is years of experience. If this experience is not figured into comparability calculations, a teacher of 10 years and a teacher of 10 days can appear to have the same qualifications. Multiply this several times over and to compliance officers, the schools filled with experienced teachers look "comparable" to those filled with novices.

But there is hope. Recently published guidance related to the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act clearly says that if states want to receive the second half of their stimulus funds and be eligible for a portion of Education Secretary Arne Duncan's $5 billion Race to the Top Funds, they must make reforms in four areas-including making improvements in "the equitable distribution of qualified teachers for all students, particularly students who are most in need."

One can assume that those five little words, "equitable distribution of qualified teachers," should translate, at the very least, into the equitable distribution of experienced teachers. Only time will tell how "qualified teachers" is further defined.

What else has got to give? Congress must amend current law. It must remove the seniority exception from federal calculations meant to ensure comparable resources across low-poverty and high-poverty schools. As long as teachers are paid more based on seniority versus other measures of demonstrated success, districts will mask the inequitable distribution of experienced, better paid teachers across their schools. If we truly care about raising student achievement, the truth about teacher qualifications at individual schools has to come out.

Once we can wrap our heads around the true extent of the problem we can start taking down the second obstacle: figuring out a way to entice more experienced teachers to teach in high need schools. This will require a long-term commitment to systemic reform including investing in low-poverty schools to make them more attractive teaching placements and funding incentives to initially attract experienced and, we hope, higher quality teachers to low-income schools.

Will this require dollars beyond what we have? Not necessarily.

Federal law already provides schools with money to pay for this. It's just that the funds typically go to reduce class sizes or provide professional development for teachers instead - strategies that have mixed results. Some of these funds should be redirected to pay for incentives drawing teachers into high-poverty schools. This is also a great use of stimulus money.

Secretary Duncan has said that the top priority for stimulus dollars "is to do right by our schools and our kids." A first step in this process is advancing reforms so that the most experienced teachers are matched with the children who need them most. To do otherwise is unfair not only to the next generation of teachers but to those who should be of primary concern: our students.

A Closer Look at the President's Budget: Title I Early Childhood Grants

Sara Mead — Tue, 19 May 2009 20:40:00 -0400

On May 7 the Office of Management and Budget released the President’s budget proposal for fiscal year 2010. As Early Ed Watch reported at the time, that budget includes funding for several new early education programs, including Title I Early Childhood Grants, Early Learning Challenge Fund, Early Literacy Grants, and Home Visitation. Over the next few weeks, we’ll be taking a closer look at these proposed programs. Today, we turn to Title I Early Childhood Grants.

The President’s fiscal year 2010 budget requests $500 million in funding for a new program of matching grants to school districts that use their Title I funds to make investments in pre-kindergarten programs. Title I, the largest federal program supporting preK-12 education, is intended to improve education for disadvantaged youngsters. Current law allows school districts that receive Title I funds to use those to provide pre-k and other early childhood education services to at-risk children below the age of compulsory school attendance. But only about 2 percent of Title I funds are used for this purpose.

The proposed Title I Early Childhood Grants program seeks to create an incentive for school districts, which received a substantial increase in Title I funding as a result of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA, or the stimulus), to use those funds to create, expand, or improve the quality of pre-kindergarten programs.

Funds would be distributed to states based on their share of Title I, Part A funds received in fiscal year 2009. States would then use these funds to provide matching grants to school districts that invest Title I funds in pre-k and other early childhood programs. States would have considerable flexibility in how they choose to operate these matching grant programs. For example, states would be allowed to determine the size of the required local match, to set additional quality requirements for districts to receive matching grant funds, to choose to prioritize certain types of early childhood investments over others, or to prioritize certain school districts over others for matching grants. This flexibility is designed to allow states to tailor the matching grant program to meet identified state needs and to coordinate effectively with existing state pre-k and other early childhood investments. School districts would be required to provide annual reports on the amount of pre-k expenditures and the number of children served.

It’s not surprising to see the administration seeking ways to encourage school districts to use stimulus Title I funds for pre-k. The Senate’s version of the stimulus bill included provisions to set aside 15 percent of both Title I and IDEA funds in the bill specifically for services to preschool-aged children. Those provisions were eliminated in conference committee negotiations, however, due in large part to opposition from interest groups representing school boards and administrators. The proposed Title I Early Childhood Grants program is the administration’s second attempt to push more Title I funds into pre-k programs.

Incentivizing districts to use the infusion of new Title I funds to make pre-k investments makes a lot of sense. Over the past decade, increasing state investments have fueled pre-k expansion. Current budget crises now threaten this progress. The stimulus, however, has provided many districts with a substantial infusion of Title I resources they can use to keep the ball moving forward on pre-k even as states falter. Given the abundant evidence that achievement gaps for disadvantaged students are entrenched well before they start kindergarten, pre-k investments are also consistent with districts’ mandate under NCLB to narrow achievement gaps. And districts that use Title I funds for pre-k are uniquely well-situated to ensure that pre-k programs are aligned with K-3 offerings. The challenge, of course, is to persuade districts to use new Title I funds for pre-k, rather than simply maintaining status quo programs. And that’s exactly what the administration hopes these new incentive funds will be able to accomplish.

There’s a catch here, however, that could undermine the effectiveness of what’s otherwise a smart strategy on the part of the administration. The administration’s proposal here hinges on persuading districts to invest new, stimulus Title I funds in pre-k. But, in its guidance to districts and public outreach around stimulus funds, the Department of Education has also made a point of warning districts about the “cliff” in federal funds—the fact that stimulus investments in Title I, IDEA, and the Education Stabilization Fund will disappear after two years—and in urging them to use these funds to make one-time investments, rather than spending them on new programs and positions that require ongoing funding commitments. The problem: Pre-k is much more an example of the latter type of investment—one that requires ongoing funding—rather than the former. As a result, districts may be reluctant to use stimulus funds to invest in new pre-k programs they aren’t sure they can sustain—even if the federal government provides them an incentive to do so.

The administration has an answer to this, buried in the text of the fiscal year 2010 justification of appropriations estimates to Congress. The Obama administration is seeking to create a new Early Learning Challenge Fund, as part of the broader Zero to Five Initiative President Obama proposed during his campaign. Administration officials intend for that Early Learning Challenge Fund to include—among other things—funding to sustain local early childhood initiatives started with ARRA funds.

Essentially, the Department is asking districts to make future funding commitments now based on the promise of a program that doesn’t yet exist. Before the Early Learning Challenge Fund can provide funding to sustain local early education initiatives, it first has to be authorized by Congress—and, while the outlook for major early education legislation is better than at any time in recent memory, it could still be tricky, particularly with health care reform sucking up so much oxygen right now. Districts have, of course, been known to make funding commitments without a clear sense of how they’ll sustain them in the future. But whether or not Congress chooses to authorize this program could have a major impact on whether or not districts choose to use their new ARRA Title I funds for early childhood programs. It’s increasingly clear that the Early Learning Challenge Fund is the critical lever when it comes to driving early education forward—and later this week we’ll be taking a closer look at the administration’s proposals for that program.

Key Questions on the Obama Administration’s 2010 Education Budget

Ed Policy — Thu, 07 May 2009 21:40:00 -0400

President Barack Obama submitted his first budget request to Congress on Thursday, May 7, 2009. This request follows the initial summary budget request he submitted in February that included only proposed funding levels for federal programs and agencies in aggregate. The detailed budget request includes proposed funding levels for federal programs and agencies in aggregate for the upcoming five to ten fiscal years, and specific fiscal year 2010 funding levels for programs subject to appropriations. The president's 2010 budget request marks the first time the Obama administration has submitted funding recommendations for every federal education program and a comprehensive list of new education policy initiatives.

In an effort to heighten the quality of debate on federal education policy, the New America Foundation's Federal Education Budget Project has reviewed the president's proposals and generated a list of key questions policymakers, the media, stakeholder groups, and the public should ask about the proposals.

Early Education

The 2010 budget request includes a new $300 million Early Learning Challenge Grant program to help states build their early childhood infrastructure and coordinate early childhood care and education services for children from birth through age five. How will this program-one of the four new early education programs included in the president's 2010 budget proposal-fit into the administration's overall vision for improving access to quality early education and its broader K-12 school reform agenda? What will the administration do to ensure that these grants support alignment and coordination not just within the early childhood sector, but also between early childhood programs and K-12 public schools?

K-12 Education

The president's request includes $1.5 billion for the No Child Left Behind Title I school improvement program, a $1 billion increase over the fiscal year 2009 level. Included in the proposal is a new requirement that states use 40 percent of program funds for middle schools and high schools. Will the administration provide guidance and recommendations for how the funds should be used at the middle school and high school level? In general, is this new set-aside an indication that the administration supports a new and separate funding stream for high schools in the upcoming reauthorization of the No Child Left Behind Act?

The president's 2010 budget proposal would increase funding for the Striving Readers program to $370 million from $35 million in 2009. Does the president intend to use Striving Readers as a replacement for the Reading First program, which received $448 million in fiscal year 2008 but did not receive funding in fiscal year 2009 and is not included in the president's 2010 request? Both programs promote scientifically-based reading instruction. If so, how will the administration ensure that Striving Readers overcomes the criticisms that have been targeted at the Reading First program-mainly that it did not significantly improve student reading and comprehension skills? In addition, how will the administration ensure that Striving Readers is not vulnerable to the same management problems encountered with Reading First?

The president's budget request proposes an increase in the Institute for Education Sciences allocation for research, development, and dissemination from $167 million in 2009 to $224 million in 2010 specifically for a new federal initiative called Reading for Understanding and other efforts to improve student achievement. Does the administration have details on this new initiative? To what extent will it overlap with other reading programs, such as Striving Readers? Besides the new Reading for Understanding program, has the administration identified certain innovations it is particularly interested in studying and expanding?

The president requests an increase in funding for the Teacher Incentive Fund from $97 million in 2009 to $517 million for 2010. These funds support the creation of teacher compensation systems that include performance-based incentives for hard-to-staff schools and subject areas. The proposal requires that local education agencies (LEAs), states, and other organizations that receive grants under the program establish compensation systems that include consideration of student academic achievement gains and teacher evaluations. However, many states and LEAs have passed legislation or signed teacher union contracts that prevent teacher compensation systems from taking student performance into account. Will these states and LEAs be ineligible for Teacher Incentive Fund grants? If so, how does the administration plan to encourage these states and LEAs to develop and use innovative teacher compensation systems? To what extent will these activities overlap with other federal programs that focus on teacher compensation and distribution, including funds from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act?

In general, to what extent has the administration considered the interaction between American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funds and fiscal year 2010 funds included in the president's budget request in the identified reform areas concerning data collection, standards and assessments, school improvement, and improving teacher quality?

Higher Education

The president's budget request proposes an increase in funding for the Perkins Loan program from $1.1 billion in available loan assistance in 2009 to $5.8 billion in 2010. Yet the 2010 funding allocated for this change is negative $498 million. Furthermore, the administration shows that the proposal saves $3.2 billion over five years. How does the $4.7 billion increase in available loan funds achieve savings? Is this accomplished by recalling the federal share of the revolving fund that colleges use to make Perkins Loans?

The campus-based aid programs-Federal Work Study, Perkins Loans, and Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grants (SEOG)-are intended to assist low-income students. The federal government provides campus-based aid funds to postsecondary institutions, which then award them to their students. However, the formula the government uses to distribute the aid overwhelmingly benefits elite public and private colleges and universities, even though these institutions serve a relatively small proportion of low-income students. The administration has criticized this formula and proposes changing it for the Perkins Loan program. However, the president's 2010 budget request would leave the formula unchanged for the SEOG and work study programs. Does the administration plan to address this discrepancy in the future?

The 2010 budget request proposes to cancel $511 million in surplus funds for the Academic Competitiveness/SMART Grant (ACG/SMART) programs. The programs provide grant aid to Pell Grant-eligible students who meet additional requirements. We already know that many first-year ACG recipients are unable to meet the 3.0 grade point average required to receive a second-year grant worth $1,300. Has the administration considered, instead of cancelling the unused funds, that the second-year ACG award be increased to provide a greater financial reward for strong academic achievement? Furthermore, the president's budget proposal seems to suggest that the administration will allow the ACG/SMART grant programs to expire after fiscal year 2010 under current law. Does the administration support an extension or reforms for the programs?

The budget request includes $500 million in 2010 and $2.5 billion over five years to fund national and state efforts to improve degree attainment rates in higher education and identify and promote what works in helping needy students get a degree. It also discusses granting states considerable flexibility in the types of programs that can be funded, and allowing states to set aside a portion of their funding to continue college outreach and information activities now undertaken by the guaranty agencies in the FFEL program. Given this last allowance, will these dollars will be distributed to the states by formula or will states be required to compete for funds? If it is a formula program, can one assume that dollars could be sub-granted out to institutions? If the program is competitive, will allowances be made to allow institutions of higher education, perhaps in partnerships with local educational agencies, to apply directly for these funds?

The president's 2010 budget proposal would end the Federal Family Education Loan (FFEL) program and use the savings to finance the Pell Grant program as an entitlement. This proposal has been controversial in Congress, as some lawmakers oppose creating a new entitlement program. Would the administration support using any FFEL program savings to fund the Pell Grant program without making it an entitlement? Would the administration support using FFEL savings to fund other student aid programs that support its higher education agenda?

A downloadable version of these questions can be accessed here.

A Closer Look at Title I Stimulus Spending

Jennifer Cohen — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 21:34:00 -0500

Yesterday we took a look at total stimulus funding per student as estimated by the House Education and Labor Committee's stimulus allocation data. Today, we will take a closer look at the estimated 2009 Title I funding distributions per poor student in each state and the District of Columbia (Puerto Rico is not included in Census estimates). Title I stimulus distribution is expected to be the same in 2009 and 2010. To the untrained eye, Title I stimulus funding appears to be allocated randomly, with little connection to student poverty levels.

According to the House stimulus bill, distribution of stimulus Title I funds will be channeled through two Title I funding formulas: 50 percent through Targeted Grants and 50 percent through Education Finance Incentive Grants (EFIGs). Both of these formulas target funds based on the number of poor students in a state or district as measured by the census. We used 2007 census data for our analysis.

Our analysis suggests that Wyoming is expected to receive the most stimulus funding per poor student at $1,493. This is unexpected given that Wyoming ranks fairly low in terms of percent of students living in poverty - 43^rd out of 51 at 10.8 percent. As might be expected, Utah appears slated to receive the least Title I stimulus funding per poor student at $428. Utah has 10.2 percent of students in poverty and ranks 47^th out of 51 on that indicator. Even though Utah and Wyoming have similar percentages of students living in poverty, their Title I stimulus allocations differ dramatically.

Mississippi has the most students living in poverty (27.2 percent) of the 50 states and the District of Columbia. However, it is only expected to receive $503 dollars in Title I funding per poor student via the stimulus. New Hampshire, the state with the smallest number of students living in poverty, 7.9 percent, is expected to receive $1,002 in Title I funds per poor student.

These findings show that current allocations do not effectively target states with the largest impoverished populations. In fact, of the 10 states expected to receive the most Title I stimulus funding per poor student, only two of them, DC and New York, rank in the top 25 states in terms of student poverty. The District of Columbia ranks third in terms of student population living in poverty at 24.8 percent and New York ranks 14^th with 18.3 percent.

Conversely, of the ten states expected to receive the least Title I stimulus funding per student, six of them are in the top 25 states in terms of student poverty - Arizona, Mississippi, Arkansas, Alabama, Oklahoma, and Tennessee.

The lack of continuity between projected Title I stimulus funding per poor student and percent of students living in poverty can in some part be attributed to the complicated formulas used to calculate the Title I distributions. Grant allocations are skewed by small state minimums, hold harmless amounts, and state expenditure factors.

Furthermore, the Targeted Grant formula uses poverty weights to provide more money to districts with larger impoverished populations. The Targeted formula allocates dollars based on either the actual number of poor students or the proportion of poor students, depending on which results in a higher weighting. As a result, it favors states with many small districts that educate a large proportion of poor students or states with large districts but relatively small proportions of poor students.

For example, a district with 200 students, 25 percent of which live in poverty, would receive less money per poor student than a district with 2,000 students and the same percentage in poverty. The actual number of poor students in the larger district outweighs the number in the first. Similarly, a district with 200 students and 150 of them living in poverty would receive more money per poor student than a district with 2,000 and the same number living in poverty. The percentage of poor students in the first district outweighs that in the second, earning a higher weight in the formula.

The Education Finance Incentive Grants formula allocates funds based on the number of students in poverty as well as factors that measure a state's education funding equity and effort. These factors attempt to reward states that have high levels of inter-district spending equity and high per pupil spending (i.e. effort) relative to total state spending. As a result, states that already put significant resources in education and ensure a degree of funding equity among districts receive more dollars per poor student. However, research suggests that equity and effort play a small role in the EFIG formula, resulting in a distribution that reflects a straight forward per poor pupil allocation.

To further examine the correlation between student poverty and the EFIG formula, we used a CRS estimate of state-level Title I stimulus funding where 100 percent of funds would be distributed by the EFIG formula. The results were not markedly different than that in the stimulus allocation. Wyoming would receive the most funding per student and Utah would receive the least. Mississippi would come in 43^rd in terms of per poor student funding and New Hampshire would come in sixth under the 100% EFIG allocation.

Only a few states would receive significantly different allocations using the 100% EFIG formula. Although Louisiana ranked 29^th in per poor student funding in the stimulus allocation with $593, it would rank 41^st with $531 per poor student using 100% EFIG. Nevada would move from 33^rd ($564 per poor student) to 46^th ($505 per poor student) in per poor student funding.

These outcomes for the Title I stimulus allocations are unexpected. Funds should flow to states and districts with the neediest populations. Instead, allocations are the result of complicated Title I funding formulas that don't appear to do a great job of providing the maximum benefit to states with large impoverished populations. Admittedly, $13 billion in Title I funds is a small part of the total pot of stimulus funding (as much as $140 billion) aimed for education, but its sole purpose is to improve educational opportunities and outcomes for poor students. We hope that the final stimulus bill enables those funds to do just that.

A spreadsheet containing this data for all 50 states and the District of Columbia can be downloaded here.

Examining Fund Distribution for Title I

Jennifer Cohen — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 18:39:00 -0500

Here at Ed Money Watch and the Federal Education Budget Project (FEBP) we are always working to better understand the distribution of federal education dollars to schools and districts. The Department of Education recently released a report that seeks to do just that for six federal education programs: Title I, Title II, Title III, Reading First, Perkins Vocational Education Grants, and Comprehensive School Reform (CSR).[1]

In general, the report gives a frank assessment of the degree to which federal programs effectively or ineffectively distribute funds to the schools and districts that most need them - those with large low-income populations. The most interesting findings pertain to Title I, the largest source of K-12 federal funding created to provide low-income, high need students with supplementary academic services.

The report suggests that Title I funding formulas do not effectively benefit high poverty schools, contradicting the program's stated goal. Title I is currently distributed through four different formulas: Basic Grants, Concentration Grants, Targeted Grants, and Education Finance Incentive Grants (EFIGs). Although Targeted Grants and EFIGs allow for the most targeted distribution of funds, the majority of Title I funds flow through Basic Grants. Of those Basic Grant funds, only 47 percent appear to flow to districts in the highest poverty quartile. Between 56 and 58 percent of the funds distributed via the other three formulas flow to the highest poverty districts.

The report also finds/suggests that Title I funds are unevenly distributed across grade levels. Although middle and high schools serve 20 and 22 percent of poor students respectively, they receive only 14 and 10 percent of Title I funds respectively. In contrast, elementary schools receive 76 percent of funds while they serve 56 percent of poor students.

In terms of distribution of funds to high poverty schools and districts, the report found that while high poverty districts receive a larger share of federal and state dollars per student, they receive a significantly smaller share of local revenues compared to low poverty districts - a difference of $3,377 on average. Title I funds are not enough to make up for this disparity. Even after including an average of $6,478 in state funds and $1,449 in federal funds, high poverty districts still receive $811 less than low poverty districts per student.

Most surprising is the finding that high poverty schools receive less Title I funds per poor student than low poverty districts - $558 compared to $763. And the amount of Title I funds each high poverty school receives per low income student has remained relatively flat since 1997-98. This suggests that Title I formulas do not effectively distribute funds to districts with the most need. Because districts distribute Title I dollars to schools based on the number of low income students per school, low poverty districts are able to concentrate funds on their small number of poor students. In comparison, high poverty districts must spread their Title I funds across many high poverty schools and the poor students in them.

The report found that poor students in failing schools also receive less support from Title I. Title I schools identified as "In Need of Improvement" by No Child Left Behind receive less funding per pupil than Title I schools not identified as such.

The majority of Title I funds go to support instructional staff, adding an average of two teachers and one teachers aid per school. Title I dollars for instructional staff went farther in high poverty schools, adding 4.5 full time equivalent teachers, than at low poverty schools, which gained 1.7 full time equivalent teachers on average. While this may sound promising, a word of caution: this disparity is likely due to the lower salaries teachers in high poverty schools earn because they are less experienced and have fewer advanced degrees.

On the whole, the report suggests that Title I does not leverage its funds to benefit high poverty schools and districts. High poverty schools continue to receive less money per poor student than low poverty schools. And Title I funds do not close the funding gap perpetuated by disparities in local funding.

Distributing the majority of Title I funds through Basic Grants, instead of more targeted formulas, disadvantages low income schools and districts. These schools and districts educate nearly half of the poor student population and should be equipped to give them the additional services they need to succeed. Congress has an important opportunity to improve the targeting of Title I funds during the reauthorization of No Child Left Behind. We hope that they use this chance to improve the distribution of federal funds to students in high-poverty, high-need schools.

[1] The report is based on data from federal program allocations from FY 2004 appropriations for all 50 states, DC and Puerto Rico, and further fiscal data from a representative sample of 300 school districts and 1,483 schools from the 2004-05 school year. Data was compared to findings from a previous study conducted using 1997-98 data and NCES data from 2000-01. For the analysis, districts and schools were separated into poverty quartiles where districts in the highest poverty quartile served 49 percent of poor students.

Let the Funding Debate Begin!

Jennifer Cohen — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 20:34:00 -0400

Now that Republican and Democratic presidential candidates Senator John McCain and Senator Barack Obama have both released their education agendas, Ed Money Watch has decided to examine the federal education funding implications of both plans. While both candidates' plans leave some questions unanswered, the differences between them on education funding are stark.

Sen. Obama's platform would increase federal funding for K-12 and early education programs by $18 billion annually. The largest share of that new funding-$10 billion-would go to Obama's "zero to five" early education plan to improve the quality and availability of childcare, preschool, and Head Start programs. Obama's proposal would more than double the current federal investment in early childhood programs such as Head Start and the Child Development Block Grant.

Fewer details exist on where the additional $8 billion intended for K-12 education reforms would go, however. Obama proposes significant investments in improving teacher preparation and quality, including $100 million to stimulate school-university partnerships for teacher education, $1 billion for teacher mentoring programs, and an unspecified amount to provide college scholarships of up to $25,000 to recruit 40,000 new teachers. But the campaign hasn't provided a price tag for many other teacher quality proposals, including the most significant ones.

Obama's proposal also includes $200 million for state grants for extended learning time, and would double the current funding level ($1.08 billion) for the 21^st Century Community Learning Centers afterschool program. Obama has also proposed doubling the current $260 million federal investment in education research and development. According to the campaign, these investments will be paid for by cutting programs and utilizing tax loopholes elsewhere in the federal budget to funnel money into education.

Sen. John McCain, in contrast, has said that he will freeze all federal discretionary spending until his administration determines which programs are actually working. Within that set funding amount, he will provide $250 million in grants to states to develop new virtual learning curricula and programs, and provide $250 million in scholarships for low-income students to take online coursework or tutoring. These programs would be paid for in part by repurposing the $267 current federal investment in Education Technology State Grants. McCain would also increase funding for DC's Opportunity Scholarships to $20 million, and reallocate 65% of the $2.9 billion in NCLB Title II teacher quality funds to teacher recruitment and performance pay bonuses.

McCain's platform also talks about providing school principals greater autonomy in their use of federal funds, but is unclear about how he would do that. Senator McCain has voted against fully funding No Child Left Behind and has not yet said whether he will support increases in funding for education programs to keep up with increased student population or inflation.

We look forward to seeing more details on both McCain's and Obama's education funding plans, particularly which programs they plan to cut to make new program spending possible. This is just a taste of the education debate that's yet to come. And if our event last Thursday was any indication, the audience for a conversation on education is large and ready and waiting for more.

Senate and House Appropriations Committees – Solid Numbers Revealed

Jennifer Cohen — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 20:08:00 -0400

Last week, the Senate and House of Representatives Appropriations Committees published their respective versions of the fiscal year 2009 Labor-HHS-Education appropriations bill, which sets funding levels for most federal education programs for the upcoming year. The Senate bill is ready for consideration by the full chamber, while the House bill still awaits full committee approval.

In total, the House bill would provide $63.0 billion for all Department of Education programs funded through the appropriations process. That's an increase of $3.8 billion, or about 6 percent, from fiscal year 2008. The Senate bill would provide $61.8 billion, $2.6 billion (or 4 percent) more than in 2008. Both bills would increase funding more than the president's budget request, which proposed a $28.6 million (or 0.05 percent) increase for the Department of Education.

Of course, these aggregate numbers don't tell us much about funding levels for individual programs, or how the two houses differ in their education priorities. The table below should help shed some light on that matter.

Although President George W. Bush proposed reducing funding for or eliminating numerous education programs, both the House and Senate bills reject most of those cuts. Congress would fund nearly all of these programs - Career and Technical Education, Education Technology State Grants, and 21st Century Community Learning Centers - at roughly their 2008 levels. There are, however, a few exceptions. For example, the Senate committee followed the president's lead and cut all funding for the Smaller Learning Communities program.

In other instances, the committees' bills rejected new programs or funding increases included in the president's budget request. These unfunded programs include Math Now, Adjunct Teacher Corps, and Pell Grants for Kids (which the Senate committee notes is "virtually identical to previous voucher plans that were proposed by the administration but rejected by the Congress."). Both committee bills also cut all funding for the controversial Reading First program, for which the president requested a $600 million increase above fiscal year 2008 levels.

For the biggest education programs, however, both committee bills found some common ground with the president's request. Bush proposed modest funding increases for Title I, IDEA special education, and Pell Grants. Both the House and Senate committee bills would increase funding levels for these programs only slightly more than the president's request. However, Congress' proposed funding levels aren't that far from the president's.

Overall, both the House and Senate committee bills appear to follow a similar strategy: Reject most of the president's proposed cuts, and fund the majority of programs at about the same level as the past year, with modest increases for key initiatives.

The next step (once the House bill is voted out of committee) is a full floor vote in both the House and the Senate and then a conference committee between the two chambers to negotiate the final numbers. Keep checking back with Ed Money Watch as the appropriations wrangling continues...

Encouraging Spending on Parental Outreach for SES

Lindsey Luebchow — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 15:00:00 -0400

Many low-income parents with children in low-performing schools are not taking advantage of free tutoring available to them under No Child Left Behind. Under NCLB's "Supplemental Educational Services" (SES) provision, school districts that fail to meet academic benchmarks for three years must set aside part of their federal Title I grant to provide outside tutoring—but only a fraction of eligible students are using the program.

The Department of Education is trying to figure out how to increase take-up rates for the SES program. As part of a package of new NCLB regulations, the Department proposed this week that districts should be able to use part of their SES funding set-aside to conduct outreach activites to educate parents about the program (this currently isn't allowed). This is a logical, beneficial addition to the SES provision that hopefully will encourage districts to implement more intensive, effective ways to inform parents about SES.

Low Levels of SES Participation...

In the 2003-04 school year, 1,377,000 students were eligible for SES (eligible students are low-income students who are enrolled in schools that have failed to make Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) for three consecutive years). But only 233,000 of those students—a mere 17 percent of eligible students nationwide—participated in SES, according to the most recent National Assessment of Title I.

Other studies of individual states and districts have found similarly low participation rates. While the overall number of students participating in SES has increased in recent years, this is a result of the rising number of failing schools and eligible students, not take-up (see graph to right).

...and Spending

NCLB requires school districts to set aside 20 percent of their Title I grants for SES and school choice (low-income students can also choose to transfer to another school after two years of AYP failure by their school). Administrative costs, such as parental outreach, cannot be included in the 20 percent. If a district does not spend the entire 20 percent set-aside—either because not enough students are eligible or because not enough students choose to participate—it can reallocate the remaining funds to other Title I activities.

A GAO report estimated that districts nationwide spent 42 percent of the total amount set aside for SES in 2004-05. Of course, spending on SES varies from district to district, and in some districts—primarily large, urban districts with significant numbers of failing schools and eligible students—the demand may exceed the funding available for SES. But this is not the norm (in this case, districts must prioritize the lowest-achieving students). In 2004-05, the GAO estimated that 16 percent of districts could not provide SES to all students who requested it with their 20 percent set-aside. In the majority of school districts, SES funds are under-utilized, allowing districts to redirect the unused SES money to other purposes.

Increasing Participation Takes Effort, and Money

Free tutoring should be an appealing option to most parents, so why does only one out of every five eligible students nationwide take advantage of the SES program? Most case studies find that the main obstacle is inadequate parental outreach and engagement.

NCLB requires districts to "promptly provide to a parent or parents (in an understandable and uniform format and, to the extent practicable, in a language the parents can understand) of each [eligible] student...an explanation of the parents' option to obtain SES." This typically means that districts send a letter to parents of eligible students at the beginning of the year.

These letters often fail to explain the SES option in a clear, understandable way. And in some cases they are lost because of high mobility rates for low-income families. In addition, parents can find the task of choosing a SES provider and filling out the requisite paperwork overwhelming. Because districts cannot include administrative costs in their 20 percent set-aside spending, many are discouraged from taking more extensive and effective, but also more expensive, actions to notify parents.

For example, some proactive districts have used a variety of strategies to increase SES take-up. They have: called, visited at home, or held meetings at school with parents; hosted informational events such as SES fairs at which parents can explore provider options; worked with outside community organizations or churches to raise awareness; bought advertisements on radio, television, or billboards, etc.

Given the widespread information problems, it's commonsense to allow districts to use a small portion of the 20 percent set-aside to figure out how to engage more parents and students. The Department proposes allowing districts to spend up to 0.2 percent of the overall Title I grant on parental outreach, or 1 percent of the 20 percent set-aside. In addition, districts that are under-utilizing their SES and school choice funds should be given other options to support low-income children in failing schools: for example, New America's Early Education Initiative, has proposed allowing districts to spend part of this money on high-quality pre-kindergarten for 3- and 4-year olds.

The Department recognizes that many low-income students in low-performing schools are not getting the additional academic support envisioned by NCLB. Encouraging districts to spend more money on parental outreach is a positive step toward reaching more of these students. Next up is accountability: the Department needs to show, conclusively, that this significant federal investment in SES is having a positive effect on student achievement. More to come on SES effectiveness from Ed Money Watch.