• Selected Papers in School Finance: 1997-99
• Federal Forecasters Directory: 1999
• Schools and Staffing Survey (SASS)
• Snapshots of Public Schools in the United States: Results From the Schools and Staffing Survey
• Snapshots of Private Schools in the United States: Results From the Schools and Staffing Survey
• Teachers on Teaching: Results From the Schools and Staffing Survey
• The Condition of Education: 1998 Supplemental and Standard Error Tables

This publication is the latest in the Selected Papers in School Finance series, for which NCES commissions papers that address issues of interest to the education finance research community. The papers are intended to promote the exchange of ideas and raise awareness of leading research in education finance.

There are five papers in this publication. Continuing the NCES tradition of commissioning papers to address problems of education finance measurement, the first two papers address advances in measuring and adjusting for education inflation. The other papers examine the relationship between spending at the school-district and school levels; private sources of funding for public education, of which surprisingly little is known; and the existing attempts to estimate the cost of educational outcomes and the implications for policymakers and researchers.

This directory is a publication of the Federal Forecasters Conference. The conference, a collaborative effort of forecasters from federal agencies in the U.S. government, provides a forum for sharing information on forecasting issues. One of the conference's objectives is to build a core network of forecasters whose cooperation furthers the use of forecasting as an important tool in the 21st century. The current directory lists forecasters from both federal agencies and the private sector as of June 24, 1999.

The Schools and Staffing Survey (SASS) is the nation's largest sample survey of the characteristics and conditions of America's public and private schools and the teachers and principals who work in them. Additionally, SASS surveys the universe of Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) schools and, beginning with the 1999-2000 administration, will survey the universe of charter schools. Initiated by NCES in the mid-1980s, SASS offers a source of data for policymakers, educators, education researchers, and the general public.

For this, the fourth administration, SASS shifts emphasis from teacher supply and demand issues to the measurement of teacher capacity and school capacity, both central to the recent school reform agenda. At the same time, this new version retains or expands many of the topics covered in previous administrations, maintaining the capability for trend analysis.

This 31-page booklet provides an overview of survey components, sample characteristics, and operating procedures for the 1999-2000 SASS. The booklet outlines key elements of the SASS redesign, including the research and evaluation efforts that underlie the changes. A list of NCES publications about SASS is also included.

In order to assemble a complete picture of K-12 schooling in the United States, the NCES Schools and Staffing Survey (SASS) asks for information from a random sample of public and private schools, their principals, and a subset of their teachers. Public schools' districts are also surveyed. This 21-page booklet was written for respondents to the School District, Public School, and Public School Principal questionnaires. Using information from SASS, the booklet presents a few snapshots of public schools. It contains information about professional development for teachers, instruction for limited-English-proficient students, perceptions of problems in schools, principals' and teachers' influence on school policies, site-based decisionmaking, and average class size by state.

The NCES Schools and Staffing Survey (SASS) collects data from teachers, principals, and schools in both the public and private sectors. This 21-page booklet was written for respondents to the SASS Private School and School Principal questionnaires. The booklet contains overview information about types of private schools, school level and size, perceptions of problems in schools, principals' influence on school policies, influence of principals and others on establishing curriculum, high school graduation requirements, and college application rates. Author affiliations: J. Kwon, M.N. Alt, and R.R. Henke, MPR Associates, Inc.

The NCES Schools and Staffing Survey (SASS) is a set of integrated questionnaires that collect information about public and private schools and the staff who work in them. To help provide an accurate picture of K-12 schooling in the United States, a random sample of teachers at each surveyed school receives the Teacher Questionnaire. Written for respondents to the Teacher Questionnaire, this 21-page booklet provides a few snapshots of teachers' work lives at both public and private schools. It contains information about total working hours and time spent teaching core subjects, control and influence in the classroom and in the school, professional development activities, job satisfaction, and average class size.

The Condition of Education is an annual, congressionally mandated report produced by NCES. For those people who wish to examine in greater detail the issues presented in the main volume of The Condition,this volume provides additional information. It includes all tables and notes that were prepared for The Condition of Education: 1998, including supplemental tables and notes that were omitted from the main volume due to space limitations. Standard errors for all survey estimates are also included in this supplemental volume. All supplemental information and standard errors are also contained in the electronic version of The Condition of Education: 1998 (NCES 1999-022, available at http://nces.ed.gov/pubsearch/pubsinfo.asp?pubid=98013).