Selected Findings: Fiscal Year 2009

• Regular school districts had median total revenues per pupil of $11,620 in fiscal year (FY) 2009 (table 1). The federal range ratio² was 1.9, which indicates that the magnitude of the difference between total revenues per pupil at the 5^th ($8,323) and 95^th ($23,971) percentiles of districts was approximately 190 percent of the value at the 5^th percentile.
• Adjusting for inflation, median per pupil revenues decreased by 1 percent or more in 13 states and increased by 1 percent or more in 27 states from FY 08 to FY 09 in regular school districts (table 2).
• For regular school districts, median current expenditures per pupil were $9,791 in FY 09 (table 3). Median current expenditures per pupil on instruction and instruction-related activities in regular school districts were $6,275.
• Adjusting for inflation, median per pupil current expenditures for regular school districts decreased by 1 percent or more in 6 states and increased by 1 percent or more in 38 states from FY 08 to FY 09 (table 2).
• In FY 09, 5 percent of regular school districts in the United States had current expenditures per pupil of $7,355 or less, while 5 percent had current expenditures per pupil of $19,103 or more, with a federal range ratio of 1.6 (table 4).
• In FY 09, 78 percent of regular school districts were unified school districts, providing both elementary and secondary education services and instruction (table 5). Unified districts had median current expenditures per pupil of $9,571, with a federal range ratio of 1.4.
• Table 6 compares median current expenditures for the regular noncharter school districts (i.e., districts which do not contain any charter schools) and independent charter school districts in the 25 states that have such districts. In these states, median current expenditures per pupil ranged from $6,906 in Utah to $16,408 in the District of Columbia for regular noncharter school districts in FY 09 (table 6). Median current expenditures per pupil ranged from $4,492 in South Carolina to $14,767 in the District of Columbia for independent charter school districts in the same set of states.
• In the 25 states that had both independent charter school districts and regular noncharter school districts (i.e., districts which do not contain any charter schools), independent charter school districts had a larger federal range ratio for spending compared to regular noncharter school districts in FY 09 for the four expenditure categories³ for which the federal range ratio could be calculated (table 7). For example, the federal range ratio for total expenditures per pupil was 1.7 for regular noncharter school districts and 2.3 for independent charter school districts in these 25 states.
• In FY 09, current expenditures per pupil in the 100 largest public school districts ranged from a low of $5,658 in Alpine School District, Utah, to a high of $19,146 in New York City School District, New York (table 8).
• In FY 09, local education agencies received approximately $57 billion from the federal government for public elementary and secondary education (table 9).

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² The federal range ratio is the difference between the amount per pupil of the district at the 95^th percentile and the district at the 5^th percentile divided by the amount per pupil for the district at the 5^th percentile. More information about the federal range ratio can be found in Appendix A: Methodology and Technical Notes and in Appendix B: Common Core of Data Glossary.
³ These four expenditure categories include total expenditures, total current expenditures, instruction and instruction-related expenditures, and support services expenditures. Total expenditures do not include payments to private schools and charter schools. Total current expenditures include instruction, instruction-related, support services, and other elementary/secondary current expenditures, but exclude expenditures on capital outlay, other programs and payments to state and local governments, interest on long-term debt, and payments to private and charter schools.