Many US States Deny Poor Students Adequate Funding – Education Center

Newark Education Law Center Executive Director David Sciarra said that many US states fund their public schools unfairly for political reasons.

WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — Many US states fund their public schools unfairly for political reasons, Newark Education Law Center Executive Director David Sciarra said in a press call.

"What we see is that many of these states have deeply unfair school funding. They have significant economic capacity to actually do better and provide additional funding, but they simply don’t for political reasons," Sciarra said.

Sciarra was participating in a press call of US civil rights and education advocates discussing the release of the fourth National Report Card — an annual report that analyses the level and the distribution of education funding relative to student poverty and the differences between low and high poverty districts.

The Center found that the US states of Nevada, Arizona, California and Oregon had unfairly high funding. By contrast, Pennsylvania, Texas, Illinois and 11 other states had regressive school funding systems. They provided less funding to districts with higher concentration of poor students.

The Education Law Center seeks to ensure that all US students, especially disadvantaged ones, have access to adequate resources, Sciarra said.