CommenTerry: Volume Twenty-four | Eastern North Carolina Now

    Publisher's Note: These posts, by Dr. Terry Stoops, and aptly titled CommonTerry, appears courtesy of our friends at the John Locke Foundation. A full account of Dr. Stoops's posts, or him mentioned as a credible source, are listed here in BCN.

The most and least productive school districts in NC

    This week, the Center for American Progress, a liberal think tank located in D.C., released a new report on educational productivity. This study attempts to gauge the effectiveness of school district spending, that is, "bang for the buck."

    Educational productivity rankings for all 115 North Carolina school districts are included in the Facts and Stats section below.

    Center for American Progress (CAP) researchers published their first report on educational productivity three years ago. I discussed the 2011 CAP study and the concept of educational productivity several times, most recently here and here.

    Educational productivity measures the relative return on investment (ROI) for schools and school districts. As Boser explains, it represents "how much academic achievement a district gets for each dollar spent relative to other districts in their state." To ensure an apples-to-apples comparison among districts, he adjusted the data to account for differences in cost-of-living, household income, English language proficiency, and special education services. Boser also calculated more sophisticated ROI measures, but those are not included in the chart below.

    In addition to ROI, I included the primary input (spending) and output (student achievement) variables for each district. The "Achievement Index" represents the percentage of students who scored proficient or above on reading and math tests given to students in fourth-grade, eighth-grade, and high school during the 2010-11 school year. I also listed the 2010-11 average per pupil expenditures used in the study.

    As legislators continue to hash out budget adjustments for the coming year, all stakeholders should be reminded that it is not how much we spend on public education. Rather, it is how we spend it that matters most.

    Facts and Stats

    Note: The lower the ROI score, the higher the productivity. For example, districts that scored a "1" had the highest achievement and lowest spending. Districts that earned a "6" had the lowest achievement and highest spending.

    Source: Center for American Progress, "Return on Educational Investment: 2014; A District-by-District Evaluation of U.S. Educational Productivity," July 2014

    Acronym of the Week

    ROI -- Return on Investment

    Quote of the Week

    "But as a nation, the United States cannot pretend that education dollars are endless, and we must address the issue of spending effectiveness." - Ulrich Boser, "Return on Educational Investment: 2014; A District-by-District Evaluation of U.S. Educational Productivity," Center for American Progress, July 9, 2014.

    Click here for the Education Update archive.