















































The Education Policy Bookshelf


The Education Policy Bookshelf

An Annotated Bibliography of Selected Studies

MEGHAN E. RUBADO
Temple University

Baker, Bruce D., David G. Sciarra, and Danielle Farrie. Is School Funding Fair? 
A National Report Card. Newark, NJ: Education Law Center, 2015.

This report presents findings of a state-by-state comparative anal-
ysis of public school finance in the United States. It examines the 
level and distribution of school funding within each state in rela-
tion to student need. This edition (the fourth) of the report card is 
based on data from 2007 through 2012. The report notes that 14 
states have regressive school funding. These states, which include 
Pennsylvania, provide less funding to school districts with higher 
concentrations of poor students.

Center on Regional Politics (CORP) of Temple University. A large selection of 
policy briefs, reports, and presentations related to public education is available 
through the CORP website (http://www.cla.temple.edu/corp/publications/) 
Among them are these:

Atherton, Michelle J. “How Pennsylvania Funds Public Schools: 
The Story of the State Share.” An issue memo published by CORP, 
2014. Available at http://www.cla.temple.edu/corp/files/2012/12/State 
-Share-Issue-Memo.pdf.

COMMONWEALTH, Volume 18, Issue 1 (June 2016). © 2016 The Pennsylvania Political Science Association. 
ISSN 2469-7672 (online). http://dx.doi.org/10.15367/cjppp.v18i1.98. All rights reserved.



96 MEGHAn E. RUBADo

Atherton, Michelle J., and Meghan E. Rubado. “Hold Harmless Edu-
cation Finance Policies in the U.S.: A Survey.” A policy brief pub-
lished by CORP, 2014. Available at http://www.cla.temple.edu/corp 
/files/2014/12/HH-Policies-Policy-Brief.pdf.

Hartman, William, and Timothy Shrom. “Forecasting Fiscal Futures 
of Pennsylvania School Districts: Where Law and Current Policy 
Are Taking Our Public Schools.” A policy brief published by CORP, 
2015. Available at http://www.cla.temple.edu/corp/files/2015/05/Fiscal 
-Futures-Hartman-Shrom-Web.pdf.

Leckrone, J. Wesley. “The Politics of Educational Change: What Can 
We Learn from the School Consolidation Acts of 1961 and 1963?” A 
policy brief published by CORP, 2015. Available at http://www.cla.tem 
ple.edu/corp/files/2015/04/School-Consolidation-Leckrone-web.pdf.

McNulty, Eileen H. “Growth and Stability in Public School Revenue 
Sources: Can We Have Both?” A policy brief published by CORP, 
2014. Available at http://www.cla.temple.edu/corp/files/2012/12/Policy 
-Brief-2-Web.pdf.

Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. “Basic Education Funding Commission 
Final Report and Recommendations.” 2015. Retrieved from http://basiceduca 
tionfundingcommission.pasenategop.com/files/2014/08/final-report-061915 
-.pdf.

This report presents the findings of the Basic Education Fund-
ing Commission, which was created by the Pennsylvania General 
Assembly in 2014 to examine the existing funding formula and 
provide recommendations for a new formula to distribute state 
funds in the BEF appropriation. The report recommended a for-
mula that distributes state funds according to student and school 
district factors. The formula includes factors reflecting student 
and community differences such as poverty, local tax effort and 
capacity, and rural and small district conditions.

———. “Special Education Funding Commission Report.” 2013. Retrieved 
from http://archive.pasbo.org/Special%20Ed%20Commission%20FINAL%20
REPORT.pdf.

This report presents the findings of the Special Education Fund-
ing Commission, which was created by the Pennsylvania General 



The Education Policy Bookshelf 97

Assembly in 2013 to examine the distribution formula for state 
aid for special education. The report recommended a new formula 
that includes weighing factors that reflect varying levels of student 
needs (high, moderate, and low), as well as community factors, 
such as poverty, property tax levels, and rural and small district 
conditions.

Duffy, Mark. “Local School Governance in Philadelphia: A Look at History 
and Research.” Philadelphia, PA: Research for Action, 2014.

Recognizing that school district governance in Philadelphia has 
long been a subject of debate, the author examines the history of 
Philadelphia school governance; surveys the governance struc-
tures in a sample of other large, urban school districts; and reviews 
research on various models of district governance. The other cities 
surveyed are Baltimore, Boston, Chicago, Denver, Detroit, Hous-
ton, Los Angeles, Milwaukee, New York, and San Diego.

Eichel, Larry. “Governing Urban Schools in the Future: What’s Facing Phila-
delphia and Pennsylvania.” Philadelphia, PA: The Pew Charitable Trusts Phil-
adelphia Research Initiative, 2016.

This report presents the results of an analysis comparing key 
elements of Philadelphia’s school governance system with those 
of 15 other major urban districts. The districts—serving Atlanta, 
Baltimore, Boston, Chicago, Cleveland, Denver, Detroit, Hous-
ton, Indianapolis, Los Angeles, Miami-Dade, Milwaukee, New-
ark (NJ), New York, and St. Paul (MN)—were chosen for their 
size and their demographic and economic similarities to Phila-
delphia.

Fischel, William A. The Homevoter Hypothesis: How Home Values Influence 
Local Government Taxation, School Finance, and Land-Use Policies. Cam-
bridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2001.

Fischel argues that homeowners, regardless of their status as par-
ents of schoolchildren, have a strong economic incentive to sup-
port local public schools with their property taxes for investments 
that make sense. If neighborhood schools are strong, and if prop-
erty taxes and crime rates are low, then the value of homeowners’ 
principal assets—their homes—will rise. Given their interest in 
home value, homeowners pay attention to local government, not 
only to protect their quality of life, but also to protect the value of 



98 MEGHAn E. RUBADo

their largest assets. The book makes a case for local control of the 
fiscal and regulatory functions of government.

———. Making the Grade: The Economic Evolution of American School Dis-
tricts. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2009.

This book makes the case that the historical development of 
American school districts reflects citizens’ desire to make their 
local communities attractive to outsiders. This has resulted in a 
standardized, interchangeable system of public education not 
overly demanding for students or teachers. Fischel focuses on bot-
tom-up processes generated by individual behaviors and provides 
a new perspective on education reform that emphasizes how pub-
lic schools form the basis for the localized social capital in Ameri-
can communities.

Goldstein, Dana. The Teacher Wars: A History of America’s Most Embattled 
Profession. New York: Doubleday, 2014.

Goldstein tells the history of public school teaching in the 
United States, demonstrating a pattern of recurring questions 
related to the profession: Who should teach? What should be 
taught? Who should be held accountable for learning outcomes? 
These questions are not new, she shows, and neither are the hot-
button policy debates over merit pay, using test scores to evalu-
ate teachers, and recruitment of top quality graduates into the 
field. These approaches have been tried before without produc-
ing widespread change. Goldstein maps out an emerging effort 
with the potential to make a real difference in improving learn-
ing outcomes: drawing on the best practices of existing public 
school teachers.

Hanushek, Eric A., and Ludger Woessmann. The Knowledge Capital of 
Nations: Education and the Economics of Growth. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 
2015.

The authors argue that the knowledge of a nation’s workforce is 
an essential contributor to that nation’s long-term prosperity. But 
researchers and politicians often rely on poor proxies, such as 
average years of schooling or graduation rates. These proxies do 
not help explain economic performance because they do not mea-
sure knowledge. The authors find that a better measure of educa-



The Education Policy Bookshelf 99

tional outcomes (scores on international tests, like PISA) correlate 
strongly with economic performance.

———. Universal Basic Skills: What Countries Stand to Gain. Paris: OECD 
Publishing, 2015.

This OECD report documents the quality of educational outcomes 
in various nations and estimates the long-run economic gains of 
improving access to education and raising the quality of these out-
comes. The report shows that many lower-performing countries 
could meet the goal of universal basic skills over the next 15 years, 
if they could replicate the approaches, practices, and records of 
rapidly improving education systems.

Hartman, William T. “Analysis of Special Education Enrollments and Fund-
ing in Rural and Urban School Districts in Pennsylvania.” Harrisburg, PA: 
Center for Rural Pennsylvania. 2015.

This report examines special education student enrollments in 
rural and urban school districts and in charter schools in Pennsyl-
vania. It includes a fiscal analysis of the expenditures and revenues 
from state, federal, and local sources, and it describes the long-
term fiscal impacts of special education on school district bud-
gets and state and federal funding levels. The research covers the 
period of 2002–2003 through 2012–2013 and uses financial and 
enrollment data from the Pennsylvania Department of Education.

Kamenetz, Anya. The Test: Why Our Schools Are Obsessed with Standardized 
Testing—but You Don’t Have to Be. New York: PublicAffairs, 2015.

This book addresses the dramatic increase in standardized testing 
over the past 20 years—the tradeoffs it has created, the limita-
tions and flaws of the tests, and the options for parents, teachers, 
and citizens who want better educational outcomes. It presents 
the stories of families, teachers, and schools to demonstrate how 
the testing game is played and won, and suggests what better tests 
might look like in the future.

Karoly, Lynn A. “The Economic Impact of Achievement Gaps in Pennsylva-
nia’s Public Schools.” Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corp., 2015.

This report, commissioned by Temple University’s Center on 
Regional Politics, projects that Pennsylvania could realize tens 



100 MEGHAn E. RUBADo

of billions of dollars in additional economic growth and move 
its students to the top of world and U.S. rankings by closing test 
score gaps based on race and ethnicity, family economic status, 
and parental education. The study documents the magnitude of 
the gaps and estimates the economic consequences of those gaps.

Klein, Joel. Lessons of Hope: How to Fix Our Schools. New York: HarperCollins 
Publishers, 2014.

This memoir by the former chancellor of the New York City schools 
tells the story of the city’s campaign to improve public education. 
In 2002 New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg won control of the 
city’s school system, and in a controversial move, he appointed Joel 
Klein, an accomplished lawyer from outside the education estab-
lishment, to lead the effort. Klein describes his eight-year mission 
to improve outcomes by demanding accountability, eliminating 
political favoritism, and fighting the teachers union. Klein’s ini-
tiatives are linked to more school choice, higher graduation rates, 
and improved test scores. He takes readers through the problems 
in public education, his ideas for tackling them, and the challenges 
he faced to make them reality in New York.

McKinsey and Company. “The Economic Impact of the Achievement Gap in 
America’s Schools.” Los Angeles: McKinsey, 2009.

This report quantifies racial and socioeconomic gaps in educa-
tional outcomes in the United States, as well as gaps between U.S. 
student outcomes and those of higher-performing countries, and 
connects these gaps to projected long-term economic losses to the 
American economy. The report estimates the gaps shortchange 
potential gross domestic product by trillions of dollars.

Peterson, Paul E. and Martin R. West. No Child Left Behind? The Politics and 
Practice of School Accountability. Washington, DC: Brookings Institution, 2003.

This scholarly assessment of the 2002 No Child Left Behind Act 
examines the law’s origins, the political and social forces that shaped 
it, the potential issues that will surface with its implementation, and 
the law’s likely consequences for American public education.

Portz, John, Lana Stein, and Robin R. Jones. City Schools and City Politics: 
Institutions and Leadership in Pittsburgh, Boston, and St. Louis. Lawrence: 
University of Kansas Press, 1999.



The Education Policy Bookshelf 101

This examination of the relationship between civic capacity and 
educational outcomes focuses on three rustbelt cities. The authors 
explore sources of variation across the cities in levels of civic sup-
port for public education. Pittsburgh has had the most success in 
educational reform, followed by Boston, while St. Louis has lagged. 
The authors argue that successful reform is tied to cross-sectoral 
coalitions, organizational arrangements in the business commu-
nity, leadership quality, and municipal institutions and culture.

Ravitch, Diane. The Death and Life of the Great American School System: How 
Testing and Choice Are Undermining Education. New York: Basic Books, 2010.

A national bestseller, this book evaluates current educational 
reform ideas, including charter schools, vouchers, and test-based 
accountability. Ravitch, an education policy analyst and research 
professor at New York University, once supported such reform 
policies, but she carefully explains why these efforts have failed to 
bring about improvements in the American education system and 
how they may instead do harm.

Ripley, Amanda. The Smartest Kids in the World: And How They Got That 
Way. New York: Simon and Schuster Paperbacks, 2013.

To explore why American students perform worse than so many 
other countries on international tests, Ripley’s book explores 
the experiences of three American teenagers who spent a year 
in other countries that have rapidly improving educational sys-
tems: Finland, South Korea, and Poland. She notes the features 
of the systems that differ dramatically from that of the United 
States. An example: in Finland, to become a teacher, one must 
be an absolute top student and enroll in a competitive and rig-
orous teacher-training program. Teachers in these systems are 
more universally talented, well trained, well paid, and respected 
professionals.

Roza, Marguerite. Educational Economics: Where Do School Funds Go? Wash-
ington, DC: Urban Institute Press, 2010.

This book examines education finance from the perspective of 
the public school. Roza outlines the problems created by the com-
plexity of the many educational funding streams, which include 
local, state, and federal sources, many of which are tied to specific 
programs or expenses. This system not only makes finance data 



102 MEGHAn E. RUBADo

confusing, it also prevents schools from matching their spending 
to their specific priorities. Roza argues that giving schools more 
flexibility in use of funds would allow them to spend more effec-
tively and respond creatively to challenges.

Russakoff, Dale. The Prize: Who’s in Charge of America’s Schools? New York: 
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing, 2015.

This book presents the results of an investigation into the efforts 
to reform the public schools of Newark, New Jersey, following the 
2010 donation of $100 million by Mark Zuckerberg, cofounder 
and CEO of Facebook. The donation announcement launched an 
attempt by Mayor Cory Booker and Gov. Chris Christie to create 
a national model for education reform. Russakoff ’s investigation 
covers a range of issues in education reform, including charter 
schools, testing, accountability, and philanthropic donors. She 
shows how the existing power structure of the Newark political 
machine blocked attempts by Zuckerberg, Booker, and Christie to 
engage the community and make meaningful changes.

Stone, Clarence N., Jeffrey R. Henig, Bryan D. Jones, and Carol Pierannunzi. 
Building Civic Capacity: The Politics of Reforming Urban Schools. Lawrence: 
University of Kansas Press, 2001.

Past and current attempts to reform urban education have failed, 
the authors argue, largely because many cities lack “civic capac-
ity”—the ability to build and maintain a broad social and political 
coalition across all sectors of the urban community in pursuit of 
a common goal. The book draws upon a study of 11 U.S. cities, 
including Pittsburgh. The authors argue that a shared vision of 
problems and solutions among the large majority of important 
actors in a city is crucial for positive outcomes. Drawing on data 
from several cities, the authors make the case that effective civic 
coalitions can be built.

Taylor, Paul, and Pew Research Center. The Next America: Boomers, Millen-
nials, and the Looming Generational Showdown. New York: PublicAffairs, 
2014.

Drawing on Pew public opinion surveys and demographic data, 
this book outlines dramatic changes in the American population 
and a widening gap between boomers and millennials. Taylor 
examines these shifts and their implications: the aging of Ameri-



The Education Policy Bookshelf 103

can society has led to political polarization, a stressed social safe-
ty net, and a daunting challenge for elected leaders; how to keep 
faith with the old without bankrupting the young and starving 
the future.

Tough, Paul. How Children Succeed: Grit, Curiosity, and the Hidden Power of 
Character. New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing, 2012.

Tough argues that the qualities that matter most in determining 
life outcomes of children have to do with character: skills like 
perseverance, curiosity, optimism, and self-control. The charac-
ter traits important in turning children into happy, successful 
adults come from encountering and overcoming failure, he argues. 
Tough explains why both rich and poor American children are 
missing out on these character-shaping experiences. Rich parents 
tend to protect their children from encountering failure, while 
poor parents may be unable to provide the support children need 
to overcome failure.

Tucker, Marc S., ed. Surpassing Shanghai: An Agenda for American Education 
Built on the World’s Leading Systems. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Education 
Press, 2011.

This edited book looks at strategies that are used in nations that 
are achieving the best educational outcomes in the world. The 
first part of the book describes in detail the educational systems 
of Shanghai, Finland, Japan, Singapore, and Canada. The book 
analyzes the contributing factors to success across the cases and 
proposes policies and practices of these top-performing systems 
that could be implemented in the United States.




