A Level Playing Field: School Finance In The Northeast

A LEVEL PLAYING FIELD School Finance in the Northeast Jane Fowler Morse A Level Playing Field A Level Playing Field School Finance in the Northeast Jane Fowler Morse State University of New York Press Published by State University of New York Press, Albany © 2007 State University of New York All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission. No part of this book may be stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means including electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the prior permission in writing of the publisher. For information, address State University of New York Press, 194 Washington Avenue, Suite 305, Albany, NY 12210-2384 Production by Diane Ganeles Marketing by Anne M. Valentine Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Morse, Jane Fowler, 1940– A level playing field : school finance in the Northeast / Jane Flowler Morse. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN-13: 978-0-7914-6931-6 (hardcover : alk. paper) ISBN-10: 0-7914-6931-X (hardcover : alk. paper) ISBN-13: 978-0-7914-6932-3 (pbk. : alk. paper) ISBN-10: 0-7914-6932-8 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Public schools—Northeastern States—Finance. I. Title. LB2825.M56 2007 379.1'10974—dc22 2005036303 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 I dedicate this book to my parents, Eleanor Woolley Fowler and Cedric Weeden Fowler, in grateful appreciation for instilling a sense of social justice in me as I grew up. Although they are long deceased, their deep concern for the welfare of working class people continues to inspire my work. Contents List of Tables ix Preface xi Acknowledgments xv Chapter 1: Education, Inequity, and the Level Playing Field 1 Chapter 2: The Search for a Legal Solution in New York 31 Chapter 3: Sharing in Vermont 67 Chapter 4: Executive Reform in Ontario 89 Chapter 5: The Impact of Poverty on Children’s Performance in School 119 Chapter 6: The Impact of Racism on Children’s Performance in School 153 Chapter 7: Education Funding and Progress 185 Appendixes 223 Notes 231 Bibliography 287 Authorities 315 Index 319 vii Tables Table 5.1: Conditions Affecting Child Health by Race 147 Table 5.2: Conditions Affecting Child Health by Socioeconomic Status 148 ix Preface In 1968, I read Jonathan Kozol’s book, Death at an Early Age. The descriptions of the harm done to children in school appalled me. They also rang a bell. In South Jersey in the late 1940s, I had seen my black friend, Frances, humiliated at school so much that one day she was driven to drink a bottle of ink in reply to our teacher’s asking her, in annoyance, why she was so black. Frances was extremely talented. At ten she could split wood, wash clothes in a bucket, take care of her younger siblings, make Shirley Temple curls on her older sister, and slaughter, pluck, eviscerate, cut up, and cook a chicken on a woodstove. She worked picking crops in the fields in the summer to earn money for her family. It seemed to me that Frances (or Franny, as everyone except her teacher called her) could deal with everything, from her two-year-old brother Jimmy’s tears over the refusal of the grocer to cut him a slice of baloney for a nickel, to the death of her father from expos