Education

Shadow School Choice: When Public Schools Turn Students Away 

  • Rachel Langan
  • March 19, 2025

Summary The School District of Philadelphia outsources special education to private schools when the district is unable to meet the student’s special education needs. The U.S. Department of Education guarantees…

Fact Sheet

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Education

2025 State of Education Spending in Pennsylvania

  • January 22, 2025

Overview The national trends impacting education in Pennsylvania in 2025 include an impending fiscal cliff, under-enrolled schools, and population decline, all of which lead to school closures…

Backgrounder

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Education

Pa. School Funding Reaches $22,000 per Student in 2023

  • May 20, 2024

Pennsylvania Public School Spending Is Growing Over the last decade, state spending on Pennsylvania public schools reached all-time highs year after year. Pennsylvania per-pupil public school funding increased to $21,985…

Fact Sheet

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Education

Myth vs. Fact as Wolf Announces Education Plans

  • February 2, 2016

Myth vs. Fact as Wolf Announces Education Plans Pa. Spends $3,400 More Per Student than the National Average February 2, 2016, HARRISBURG, Pa.—Today at 2 p.m., Gov. Wolf…

Press Release

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Education

Wolf Misleads About Education “Cuts”

  • Nathan Benefield
  • December 29, 2015

On Christmas Eve, Gov. Tom Wolf posted a blog attacking Republicans and the “extremist” budget now sitting on his desk—which passed the Senate on a bipartisan 33-17 vote. Wolf…

Media

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Of Volkswagens and Public Schools

  • Nathan Benefield
  • June 29, 2015

In a story by Capitolwire (paywall), state Rep. Curtis Thomas is quoted as saying, “We cannot ask children to give us Cadillac performance when you give them Volkswagen dollars to…

Media

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Education

School Funding Reform & Weighted Student Funding

  • James Paul, Nathan Benefield
  • December 4, 2014

Thank you for the opportunity to offer testimony to this commission on the important topic of reforming how we distribute state funding for education. Our written testimony will focus on…

Testimony

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Education

6 Trends in Public School Spending

  • Nathan Benefield, Priya Brannick
  • June 24, 2013

The Pennsylvania Department of Education recently updated files from public schools’ annual financial reports and enrollment reports. Here are six key trends from those data.

Memo

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Education

Millions Funneled to Lobbyists by Public Schools

  • April 12, 2011

Harrisburg, PA – The Commonwealth Foundation announced today preliminary results from extensive Open Records Requests that found more than $59 million dollars of taxpayer money is being funneled through…

Press Release

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