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Texas has robin hood financing. All the money goes to the state and the state doles it out to school districts.
The affluent districts are complaining though; they want to keep all their money and let the poor districts figure out another way to raise money.
That is what is driving an effort to appeal robin hood financing.
Another thing the affluent school districts are doing is pooling their personal money through the PTA and hiring their own teachers for their schools.
New building and stadiums are bond issues voted on by the residents.
Any city can vote to build a new school but the financing is via municipal bonds and the poor districts just don't have good bond ratings and investors wouldn't buy them.
You don't understand Texas school finance at all. It is flat out false that all money goes to the state for reallocation.
The Robin Hood system establishes a level at which property taxes collected above a certain amount will be sent to the state. The taxes collected below the threshold remain in the local school district. This threshold value is essentially the ratio of (taxable property value)/(average weighted daily attendance). I think the value is about $450,000 right now. Note that Robin Hood funding only applies to taxes used for maintenance and operations. Taxes used for debt service (repayment of bonds) is not subject to Robin Hood.
Hmmm...So what about the (supposed) axiom that "throwing more money at education doesn't work?"
Granted, conservatives are who I hear saying this most of the time...but folks say it as if it's the gospel.
Well it isn't in this county which was once considered the top school districts in the county and one of the wealthiest in a very liberal state with a very liberal county council. Even having the government as being part of their economy isn't helping much either:
That's not to say spending money on schools is all wrong. But in the case for this county, it may have to do with cultural behaviors towards education.
There are many aspects of Texas' Robin Hood program I dislike. But I fully support equalization of basic school funding in Texas. It is immoral for schools in areas with very low taxable property to not have access to a reasonable level of funding.
That Robin Hood was ruled unconstitutional is primarily due to the idea that redistribution of property tax revenue essentially creates a state property tax, which is unconstitutional in Texas. Texas will have to create a new system to fund poor school districts above what they can generate via property taxes. It won't be today's Robin Hood system but the money has to be found somewhere.
That doesn't mean all school systems should have equal funding. Families with money should not be denied the ability to concentrate some of their tax money to the schools their children attend.
It is very likely you have never paid the full cost of educating your children in Texas K-12 schools. Texas spends a bit over $9000 per student per year. I pay more property tax than that - but I had three children (all now through K-12).
And they ARE denied. Many chose certain districts quite awhile back, only to find out that some things remained unfunded because of the money that had to be turned over for redistribution.
I know of two districts in particular--my own home county, which is considered a property-rich district. The amount of money that they couldn't keep was just appalling. It made me sick. The other district was the one that my sister taught in for many years not far from Austin. That district had to cut back on programs for the same reason--redistribution.
One thing that would help our Texas schools enormously would be to not have to provide a free education for illegals and other non-citizens. If they could take this off the table, we'd be much, much better off. These students should have to return to their own countries for their education.
Be glad you don't live in TX, where "Robin Hood" means that property-wealthy districts have to throw a good chunk of their money at poor districts along the border and other places within the state.
It's been found unconstitutional, but they haven't come up with anything to replace it.
All districts should be able to keep all of the money generated by local property taxes for THEIR schools.
As it is, they have to cut back because so much of their money went to some poor district. It is patently unfair that they have to subsidize other districts that don't pay nearly as much.
Many of the poor districts have language problems, cultural problems, too rural to attract quality teachers, etc. If I lived in a normal area, I wouldn't want it going to some area on a periphery.
One thing that would help our Texas schools enormously would be to not have to provide a free education for illegals and other non-citizens. If they could take this off the table, we'd be much, much better off. These students should have to return to their own countries for their education.
The US has been educating children of undocumented aliens, since forever.
In 1982, SCOTUS struck down Texas' attempts to deny and/or charge for the education of children of undocumented aliens.
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