Determining the Cost of Providing an Adequate Education for All Students
Exactly how much a quality education should cost, one that adequately educates all students, has been at issue for generations.
This report commissioned by the National Education Association sheds light on issues surrounding the "costing out" of an adequate education. Specifically, the intention of this work is to make the methods most often used to cost out educational adequacy more accessible to policymakers, education advocates, and others who are seeking to remedy inadequacy and inequity in education funding.
An education costing-out or “adequacy” study answers two fundamental questions that address the adequacy of funding for public schools:
- What is the cost of providing an adequate education to all students in the public school system?
- How should resources be allocated in order to provide an adequate education to all public school students, regardless of need or circumstance?
The report provides a critical overview of the principal methodologies that have been used to address the two fundamental questions. It further details three key steps that define a comprehensive approach to determining the cost of an adequate education and demonstrates how these have been incorporated into state studies conducted in California, New Mexico, and New York.
Finally, the report provides an in-depth description of how study results can be used to develop adequate and equitable state funding formulas to inform policy debate.
