Of all the areas within public elementary and secondary education that are experiencing rapid change, none is experiencing more turmoil than school finance. In part, this is the result of the action of state courts and state legislatures. Innovative proposals and new funding mechanisms are changing the traditional landscape of school district financing. This activity in states has created a renewed interest in school funding at the federal level.

Developments in School Finance contains papers by presenters at the annual National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) State Data Conference. The Conference attracts several state education department policy makers, analysts, and data providers from each state, who are offered training sessions and updates on developments in the field. The presenters are experts in their respective fields, each of whom has a unique perspective or interesting quantitative research to bring to bear on emerging issues in school finance. The reaction of the participants to these presentations was overwhelmingly positive. We hope that will be your reaction as well.

This report is the third publication of the proceedings of the State Data Conference. The papers are intended to promote the exchange of ideas among researchers and policy makers. Because the views are those of the authors, the papers may provoke discussions, replications, replies, and refutations. If so, the publication will have accomplished its task. There would be nothing so satisfying to the Center as promoting and contributing to the field of school finance.

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