Dec 31, 2014 3 min read

In November, we reported on a lawsuit filed in Commonwealth Court by six school districts and other interested parties who are challenging the way in which the state finances education, a system that creates a clear and depressing delineation between Pennsylvania’s haves and have-nots.

A new study shows just how dire the situation is, and that it was allowed to worsen during the four years Republican Gov. Tom Corbett has been in office.

The Associated Press analyzed state figures on education spending, income and attendance, and found plenty of evidence to corroborate the findings of other studies that place our state among the worst in the nation in support for its schools.

The AP wrote that Pennsylvania “already plays one of the smallest roles in school funding of any state, leaving poorer school districts too reliant on inadequate and often-shrinking local tax bases. … Bringing the poorer districts into parity with their wealthier counterparts could easily require an additional $1 billion or more.”

The AP study found that in the current school year, schools in the top half of the ranking of average resident income are spending nearly $1,800 more per student than those in the bottom half.

That’s an astounding figure. Even more disconcerting is that the size of that gap has grown by 140 percent, or more than $1,000 per student, since the 2010-11 school year.

Taking it further, the AP found that districts in the highest 20 percent of the resident income rankings are spending more than $4,000 more per student than schools in the bottom 20 percent.

As the AP noted, Corbett’s predecessor, Democrat Ed Rendell, tried to close the gap by increasing state aid to our public schools by about $2 billion annually. Enter Corbett, who presided over a reduction in state education assistance.

Of course, when the state money dried up, more affluent districts were able to better address the loss by relying on their stronger local tax bases, while the poorest districts could do next to nothing about their plight.

Said Jim Buckheit of the Pennsylvania Association of School Administrators, “As these cuts went into place, the only options the (poorer) districts had was to cut.”

The Associated Press isn’t the only entity pointing out Pennsylvania’s failures in education funding.

The AP reported that in a study published last summer by the Center for American Progress, Rutgers University education professor Bruce D. Baker determined that when it comes to inequities in school finance, Pennsylvania and Illinois come in dead last.

Corbett was asked about the growing chasm between what wealthy schools and poor ones can spend on educating their students, and the AP said he recognized it as a matter of great concern. So, Corbett knows it’s a serious issue. He just chose not to do much about it.

The governor is right about one thing. He indicated to the AP that the Legislature’s “political role” in divvying up school aid will scuttle any attempt to shift money from rich districts to needy ones.

Of course, trying to convince Pennsylvanians that paying more in taxes to fix this problem also would be an uphill fight.

So it may be that the best hope for confronting this issue head-on is the pending case in Commonwealth Court.

We wish the plaintiffs the best of luck.