Net-Widening in Schools?: The Collateral Consequences of Safe School Expenditures for Suspension Rates

Concerns about school safety are increasingly commonplace, especially considering the attention garnered by mass shootings and other instances of crime in schools. In response, billions of dollars in federal and state funding have been allocated to assist and support the safeguarding of the school environment and those within the school. However, it remains unclear whether safe school expenditures are consequential for school-related outcomes—specifically, school suspension rates. To fill this void, the current study uses multilevel Poisson and negative binomial regression to analyze school and school district data from the Florida Department of Education, the U.S. Census, the Uniform Crime Report, and the Florida Division of Elections. Findings suggest that safe school expenditures are associated with lower suspension rates for all students. However, the effect of expenditures on Black suspension rates indicates a curvilinear relationship. Safe school expenditures are associated with an initial reduction in the Black suspension rate to a certain threshold; however, once that threshold is met, continual increases in expenditures increase the likelihood of Black suspensions. Although safe school expenditures are associated with lower suspension rates for all students, additional increases in spending on school safety widen the social control net for Black students, thereby amplifying their likelihood of punishment.

FORKLÆDTE PENGE: En diskussion af brugerbetaling i en gratis nicaraguansk folkeskole

On the basis of data collected during fieldwork in the city of León, Nicaragua, this article discusses the paradox of many Nicaraguan parents describing their children’s school as being free of charge despite the fact that they are frequently asked to pay for it. The article shows that, in spite of the constitutional definition of education as free and equal for all Nicaraguans, parents are often asked for economic contributions. By analysing the values surrounding the school I suggest that values of responsibility and solidarity influence the way that parents conceptualize their school expenditures and, in relation to this, confirm the status of the school as free. Furthermore, the article describes how Nicaraguan parents often compare the school to their home and describe the relation between teacher and students by using family terms. Inspired by the theory of the American sociologist James Carrier, I argue that this comparison, in addition to the values of responsibility and solidarity, further influences the way Nicaraguan parents and children experience their economic contributions. Finally, I argue that even though the users of the school describe it as free of charge, it remains necessary to recognize its economic aspects, since a lack of recognition can turn out to have important individual and social consequences for the people involved, especially, for the most economically marginalized families.

AUDIOBOOK ISLAMI UNTUK PENYANDANG DISABILITAS SLB KATEGORI A

<p><em>The Indonesian government has launched a 9-year compulsory education program for all students in Indonesia. The word "all" should have been touching all levels of society including the blind students. However, the fact shows different condition. Many schools still refuse to accept the blind students. In addition, some facilities like </em><em>b</em><em>raille books for the blind students are also still limited while these books become the main pillar of education. They still become such "luxury stuffs" for the blind students in Indonesia.</em><em></em></p><p><em>The cost of producing Braille books equals with fourfold financing regular books. This is because the Braille books need heavier papers, approximately 120 grams for every sheet of paper. To resolve this problem is by creating an audiobook or better known as a "voiced book" for the blind students. The extraordinary school (SLB) of category A is an outstanding school specifying for the blind students in Semarang who desperately need an audiobook.</em><em></em></p><em>This audiobook has many benefits for the blind students of SLB category A. Firstly, it facilitates the students to "read" a book through the hearing sense. Secondly, it minimizes the cost of school expenditures in the book procurement both regular books for teachers or braille books for students. At last, it supports the government program of campaigning ”paperless office”.</em>

A Distributional Difference-in-Difference Evaluation of the Response of School Expenditures to Reforms and Tax Limits

Prior work uses a parametric approach to study the distributional effects of school finance reform and finds evidence that reform yields greater equality of school expenditures by lowering spending in high-spending districts (leveling down) or increasing spending in low-spending districts (leveling up). We develop a kernel density difference-in-difference approach to isolate how tax limits and/or education finance reform affect the full distribution of education expenditures. Simulations of the difference in distributional differences across school finance regimes over time suggest that parametric approaches offer an incomplete description of the distributional impacts of policy changes. Using data for the population of U.S. school districts in 1972, 1982, and 1992, we find that educational reforms and tax limits yield greater equality of expenditures by reducing the number of districts in the tails of the distribution, particularly when both are adopted during the same decade. Our results also suggest that the incompleteness of the parametric descriptions used in prior work can suggest greater variation in the distributional consequences of reform than is actually present.

The Effects of Rate Limits on Property Tax Revenues and School Expenditures: Evidence from Texas

ABSTRACT: In 1993, Texas established a maximum 1.5 percent property tax rate that school districts could impose for purposes of funding their maintenance and operations (M&O). Tax limits are intended to contain government growth and increase the efficiency of government services. Almost all states use property tax limits, and their use continues to increase as states consider ways to decrease the growth in property taxes. This study examines whether the 1.5 percent rate limit lowered the growth of M&O tax revenues and school expenditures, whether these effects differed in the short-run versus long-run, and whether school districts increased other tax and nontax revenue sources to help compensate for lower M&O tax revenues. This study also examines whether the rate limit affected student performance. We use a sample of 1,033 Texas school districts during the period 1994 through 2004, and the Heckman maximum likelihood estimation (MLE) approach to help control for selection bias. We find that the 1.5 percent rate limit decreased the growth of M&O tax revenues and school expenditures, and that expenditures were affected less than M&O tax revenues. Our results suggest that districts helped cushion the rate limit’s effect on expenditures by increasing their debt-related tax revenues. We find only limited evidence that the rate limit’s effects differed in the short-run versus long-run. Finally, we find that student test scores are lower for districts at the 1.5 percent rate limit, and that the decrease in test scores is larger for economically disadvantaged students relative to other students. This suggests that the rate limit is associated with decreases in education quality.