When it comes to education spending in Minnesota, there never appears to be enough dollars at play. Gov. Walz and the teachers’ union continually call to “fully fund” public schools, yet the catchphrase is not accompanied with a specific price tag and consistent budgetary increases from the legislature don’t ever end up being enough despite education spending being the state’s biggest general fund expenditure.
How does the general public feel when they hear this message? Do they think the state spends too little on public schools? Do they even know how much the state spends on average per student in public schools? (Statewide, around $16,700 on average. This varies by district.)
While not specific to Minnesota, an April poll of 2,251 U.S. adults found that the general public and school parents greatly underestimate per-student spending in public schools. When they learn how much their state spends, they are much less likely to say their state’s per-student spending is too low.
One long-standing debate in education is how much money matters. Minnesota is pretty middle-of-the-pack in terms of education spending relative to spending across the country.
Its achievement results lag a number of lower-spending states that serve similar student demographics. There are also examples of states that spend far more than Minnesota and have higher achievement results, and there are states that spend less than Minnesota and perform worse.
State’s per-pupil spending (left) and NAEP reading performance (right)
Metro Area, https://www.bea.gov/data/prices-inflation/regional-price-parities-state-and-metroarea; and US Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data, https://www.nces.ed.gov/ccd/files.asp#Fiscal:1,LevelId:2,SchoolYearId:36,Page:1.
What does this tell us? As I have documented over the years, how money is spent matters far greater than how much is spent. More money doesn’t guarantee better results. Prominent education economist Eric Hanushek has long argued this as well.
There are clearly policy decisions and financial investments that certain states are making that are paying off, and Minnesota leaders have an opportunity to learn from them to help turn around our achievement challenges. Florida is one strong example. Over the last two and a half decades, three strategies have defined its legislative agenda, according to researchers Kathryn Perkins, Paul Powell, and Jeff Wasbes with the American Enterprise Institute: “focusing on early education and ensuring all students read by third grade, developing assessment structures that monitor progress rather than impose high stakes, and building an increasingly robust school choice ecosystem.”
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Knowing that, on average, Minnesota spends roughly $16,700 per public-school student, if you were asked the poll question above whether public school funding is “too low,” “about right,” or “too high,” how would you respond? Share your thoughts below!