Study to focus on funding of Wisconsin schools

What does it cost to adequately fund K-12 education in Wisconsin? A nationally recognized expert in school finance at UW–Madison is leading an effort to address this critical question.

The Rockefeller Foundation of New York has awarded Allan R. Odden, professor in the Department of Educational Leadership and Policy Analysis, $500,000 over two years to determine the costs of educational adequacy in Wisconsin.

The study will be based at the Consortium for Policy Research in Education (CPRE), an initiative funded by federal and private grants and housed at the Wisconsin Center for Education Research in the School of Education.

Odden, who directs CPRE’s Education Finance Research Program, has advised state and education policymakers in Wisconsin and elsewhere on issues of school finance and teacher compensation.

The study addresses the recommendation of the Governor’s Task Force on Educational Excellence, which, in its final report last June, called for a study to determine the adequate level of spending on education for an average child in Wisconsin.

The task force characterized the study as “a way to build a statewide consensus on what we � believe constitutes an adequate education.”

“The goal of the study will be to identify educational programs and strategies that combined will provide every student in the state with an equal opportunity for a ‘sound basic education,'” says Odden.

During the course of the study, the researchers will be advised by a policy task force.

Members of this advisory panel will include state Sen. Luther Olsen, who chairs the Senate Education Committee; state Rep. Debi Towns, who chairs the Assembly Committee on Education; Milwaukee Public Schools Superintendent William Andrekopoulos; and Madison Metropolitan Schools Superintendent Art Rainwater, as well as representatives of the governor’s office, the Department of Public Instruction, school boards, other district administrators, teachers, and the business community.

A second advisory group will consist of school finance policy analysts who have been studying Wisconsin school finance issues.

“I’m pleased to see the Rockefeller Foundation is funding this study,” said Olsen. “The cost of funding education in Wisconsin is at the heart of many issues we grapple with in the state, including the state budget. I welcome the results of this study as a means to guide policymakers and the education community to find strategies to address our challenges.”

In their analysis, Odden and his team plan to take an “evidence-based” approach – a methodology that they used to advise state policymakers in New Jersey, Kentucky, Arkansas, Arizona, and Wyoming. This includes reviewing research and best practices to identify the programs and strategies that would provide “a sound basic education.”

This Wisconsin Supreme Court, in its 2000 ruling in Vincent v. Voight, defined “a sound basic education” as providing “the opportunity for students to be proficient in mathematics, science, reading and writing, geography, and history, and to receive instruction in the arts and music, vocational training, social sciences, health, physical education and foreign language, in accordance with their age and aptitude.”

The study also will include a labor market analysis to determine appropriate and adequate teacher salaries, and, in the second year, will assess the degree to which a more performance-based teacher pay structure should also be part of an adequate education program. The researchers are planning to issue reports in the summers of 2006 and 2007.