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Institute of Education Sciences

New Analysis Reveals Differences in Parents’ Satisfaction With Their Child’s School Across Racial/Ethnic Groups

September 1, 2021 NCES Blog Editor FAQs, Findings, General Share on TwitterShare on FacebookShare on Google+

The National Household Education Surveys (NHES) program collects nationally representative, descriptive data on the educational activities of children and families in the United States. Specifically, NHES’s Parent and Family Involvement in Education (PFI) survey collects data about how families of K–12 students connect to their child’s school. Parents are asked questions about their involvement in and satisfaction with their child’s school as well as school choice.

This blog expands on the PFI First Look report, and more analysis of race and ethnicity in education and early childhood is available in new web tables.

The results from 2019 PFI survey—which was administered before the coronavirus pandemic—show differences across racial/ethnic groups1 in parents’ satisfaction with their child’s school. Overall, White students tended to have parents who were “very satisfied” with their child’s schools, teachers, and academic standards at the highest rates. 

Satisfaction with schools

In 2019, about two-thirds (67 percent) of White students had parents who were “very satisfied” with their child’s school (figure 1). This percentage was higher than the percentages for Hispanic students (64 percent), Asian or Pacific Islander students (61 percent), Black students (59 percent), and “Other race” students2 (57 percent).

A higher percentage of Hispanic students had parents who were “very satisfied” with their child’s school (64 percent) than did Black students (59 percent) and “Other race” students (57 percent).

Figure 1. Percentage of students enrolled in kindergarten through 12th grade whose parent/guardian reported being "very satisfied" with the student’s school, by student’s race/ethnicity: 2019

\1\"Other race" includes non-Hispanic students of Two or more races and non-Hispanic students whose parents did not choose any race from the categories provided on the race item in the questionnaire.
NOTE: Race categories exclude persons of Hispanic ethnicity.
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Parent and Family Involvement in Education Survey of the National Household Education Surveys Program (PFI-NHES), 2019.

Satisfaction with teachers

Sixty-six percent of White students had parents who were “very satisfied” with their child’s teachers in 2019 (figure 2). This percentage was higher than the percentages for Hispanic students (62 percent), Black students (60 percent), “Other race” students (58 percent), and American Indian or Alaska Native students (49 percent). The percentage for Asian or Pacific Islander students was not measurably different from the percentages for any other racial/ethnic group.

Figure 2. Percentage of students enrolled in kindergarten through 12th grade whose parent/guardian reported being "very satisfied" with the student’s teachers, by student’s race/ethnicity: 2019

\1\"Other race" includes non-Hispanic students of Two or more races and non-Hispanic students whose parents did not choose any race from the categories provided on the race item in the questionnaire.
NOTE: Race categories exclude persons of Hispanic ethnicity.
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Parent and Family Involvement in Education Survey of the National Household Education Surveys Program (PFI-NHES), 2019.

Satisfaction with academic standards

In 2019, about 64 percent of White students had parents who were “very satisfied” with the academic standards of their child’s school (figure 3). This percentage was higher than the percentages for Black students and Hispanic students (60 percent each), Asian or Pacific Islander students (56 percent), and “Other race” students (55 percent). The percentage for American Indian or Alaska Native students was not measurably different from the percentages for any other racial/ethnic group.

Figure 3. Percentage of students enrolled in kindergarten through 12th grade whose parent/guardian reported being "very satisfied" with the academic standards of the student's school, by student’s race/ethnicity: 2019

\1\"Other race includes non-Hispanic students of Two or more races and non-Hispanic students whose parents did not choose any race from the categories provided on the race item in the questionnaire.
NOTE: Race categories exclude persons of Hispanic ethnicity.
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Parent and Family Involvement in Education Survey of the National Household Education Surveys Program (PFI-NHES), 2019.

Explore the NHES Table Library to find more data about differences in parents’ satisfaction with their child’s school.

[1] Race categories exclude students of Hispanic ethnicity, which are all included in the Hispanic category.
[2] "Other race" includes non-Hispanic students of Two or more races, and non-Hispanic students whose parents did not choose any race from the categories provided on the race item in the questionnaire..

 

By Rachel Hanson and Jiashan Cui, AIR

New Data Reveal Public School Enrollment Decreased 3 Percent in 2020–21 School Year

July 26, 2021 NCES Blog Editor Datasets, Findings, General Share on TwitterShare on FacebookShare on Google+

NCES recently released revised Common Core of Data (CCD) Preliminary Files, which are the product of the school year (SY) 2020–21 CCD data collection. CCD, the Department of Education’s primary database on public elementary and secondary education in the United States, provides comprehensive annual data on enrollment, school finances, and student graduation rates.

Here are a few key takeaways from the newly released data files:

Public school enrollment in SY 2020–21 was lower than it was in SY 2019–20.

Overall, the number of students enrolled in public schools decreased by 3 percent from SY 2019–20 to SY 2020–21. Note that Illinois did not submit data in time to be included in this preliminary report. The SY 2019–20 and SY 2020–21 total enrollment counts for California, Oregon, American Samoa, and the Bureau of Indian Education do not include prekindergarten counts.

The rate of decline in public school enrollment in SY 2020–21 was not consistent across all states.

Within states, the largest decreases were in Mississippi and Vermont (5 percent each), followed by Washington, New Mexico, Kentucky, New Hampshire, and Maine (each between 4 and 5 percent) (figure 1). Eighteen states had decreases of 3 percent or more; 29 states had decreases between 1 and 3 percent; and the District of Columbia, South Dakota, and Utah had changes of less than 1 percent.

Lower grade levels experienced a greater rate of decline in public school enrollment than did higher grade levels in SY 2020–21.

Public school enrollment decreased by 13 percent for prekindergarten and kindergarten and by 3 percent for grades 1–8. Public school enrollment increased by 0.4 percent for grades 9–12.

Most other jurisdictions experienced declines in public school enrollment in SY 2020–21.

Public school enrollment decreased in Puerto Rico (6 percent), Guam (5 percent), and American Samoa (2 percent). The Virgin Islands, however, experienced an increase of less than 1 percent.

To access the CCD preliminary data files and learn more about public school enrollment in SY 2020–21, visit the CCD data files webpage.

National Spending for Public Schools Increases for the Sixth Consecutive Year in School Year 2018–19

June 15, 2021 NCES Blog Editor Findings, General Share on TwitterShare on FacebookShare on Google+

NCES just released a finance tables report, Revenues and Expenditures for Public Elementary and Secondary Education: FY19 (NCES 2021-302), which draws from data in the National Public Education Financial Survey (NPEFS). The results show that spending1 on elementary and secondary education increased in school year 2018–19 (fiscal year [FY] 2019), after adjusting for inflation. This is the sixth consecutive year that year-over-year education spending increased since 2012–13. This increase follows declines in year-over-year spending for the prior 4 years (2009–10 to 2012–13).

Current expenditures per pupil2 for the day-to-day operation of public elementary and secondary schools rose to $13,187 in FY19, an increase of 2.1 percent from FY18, after adjusting for inflation (figure 1).3 Current expenditures per pupil also increased over the previous year in FY18 (by 0.9 percent), in FY17 (by 1.7 percent), in FY16 (by 2.8 percent), in FY15 (by 2.7 percent), and in FY14 (by 1.2 percent). In FY19, education spending was 11.8 percent higher than the lowest point of the Great Recession in FY13 and 6.1 percent higher than spending prior to the Great Recession in FY10.

Figure 1. National inflation-adjusted current expenditures per pupil for public elementary and secondary school districts: FY10 through FY19

NOTE: Spending is reported in constant FY19 dollars, based on the Consumer Price Index (CPI).
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data (CCD), "National Public Education Financial Survey," fiscal years 2010 through 2018 Final Version 2a; and fiscal year 2019, Provisional Version 1a; and Digest of Education Statistics 2019, retrieved January 8, 2021, from https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d19/tables/dt19_106.70.asp.

Without adjusting for geographic cost differences, current expenditures per pupil ranged from $7,950 in Utah to $24,882 in New York (figure 2). In addition to New York, current expenditures per pupil were highest in the District of Columbia ($22,831), New Jersey ($21,331), Vermont ($21,217), and Connecticut ($21,140). In addition to Utah, current expenditures per pupil were lowest in Idaho ($8,043), Arizona ($8,773), Nevada ($9,126), and Oklahoma ($9,203).

Figure 2. Current expenditures per pupil for public elementary and secondary education, by state: FY19

NOTE: These data are not adjusted for geographic cost differences.
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data (CCD), “National Public Education Financial Survey (NPEFS),” FY19, Provisional Version 1a and “State Nonfiscal Survey of Public Elementary/Secondary Education,” school year 2018–19, Provisional Version 1a.

These new NPEFS data offer researchers extensive opportunities to investigate state and national patterns of revenues and expenditures. Explore the report and learn more.

[1] Spending refers to current expenditures. Current expenditures comprise expenditures for the day-to-day operation of schools and school districts for public elementary/secondary education, including expenditures for staff salaries and benefits, supplies, and purchased services. Current expenditures include instruction, instruction-related support services (e.g., social work, health, psychological services), and other elementary/secondary current expenditures but exclude expenditures on capital outlay, other programs, and interest on long-term debt.
[2] Per pupil expenditures are calculated using student membership derived from the State Nonfiscal Survey of Public Elementary/Secondary Education. In some states, adjustments are made to ensure consistency between membership and reported fiscal data. More information on these adjustments can be found in the data file documentation at https://nces.ed.gov/ccd/files.asp.
[3] In order to compare spending from one year to the next, expenditures are converted to constant dollars, which adjusts figures for inflation. Inflation adjustments utilize the Consumer Price Index (CPI) published by the U.S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics. For comparability to fiscal education data, NCES adjusts the CPI from a calendar year to a school fiscal year basis (July through June). See Digest of Education Statistics 2019, table 106.70, retrieved January 8, 2021, from https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d19/tables/dt19_106.70.asp.

 

By Stephen Q. Cornman NCES; Lei Zhou, Activate Research; and Malia Howell, U.S. Census Bureau

Highlights of 2015–16 and 2016–17 School-Level Finance Data

April 29, 2021 NCES Blog Editor FAQs, Findings, General Share on TwitterShare on FacebookShare on Google+

NCES annually publishes comprehensive data on the finances of public elementary and secondary schools through the Common Core of Data (CCD). For many years, these data have been released at the state level through the National Public Education Financial Survey (NPEFS) and at the school district level through the Local Education Agency (School District) Finance Survey (F-33).

Policymakers, researchers, and the public have long voiced concerns about the equitable distribution of school funding within and across districts. School-level finance data provide reliable and unbiased measures that can be utilized to compare how resources are distributed among schools within districts.

Education spending data are now available for 15 states[1] at the school level through the School-Level Finance Survey (SLFS), which NCES has been conducting annually since 2014.[2] In November 2018, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) approved changes to the SLFS wherein variables have been added to make the SLFS directly analogous to the F-33 Survey and to the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) provisions on reporting expenditures per pupil at the school and district levels.

Below are some key findings from the recently released NCES report Highlights of School-Level Finance Data: Selected Findings From the School-Level Finance Survey (SLFS) School Years 2015–16 (FY 16) and 2016–17 (FY 17).

 

Eight of the 15 states participating in the SLFS are able to report school-level expenditure data requested by the survey for a high percentage of their schools.

The initial years of the SLFS have consistently demonstrated that most states can report detailed school‑level spending data for the vast majority of their schools. In school year (SY) 2016–17 (FY 2017), most states participating in the SLFS (8 out of 15) reported school-level finance data for at least 95 percent of their schools (figure 1). With the exception of New Jersey,[3] all states were able to report at least partial SLFS finance data for more than 78 percent of their schools, ranging from 79 percent of schools in Colorado to 99 percent of schools in Oklahoma. In addition, the percentage of students covered by SLFS reporting was more than 99 percent in 9 of the 15 participating states. 

Figure 1. Percentage of students covered and percentage of schools with fiscal data reported in the School-Level Finance Survey (SLFS), by participating state: FY 2017

 

The SLFS can be used to evaluate school-level expenditure data based on various descriptive school characteristics.

The SLFS allows data users to not only view comparable school-level spending data but also evaluate differences in school-level spending based on a variety of school characteristics. In the report, SY 2016–17 (FY 2017) SLFS data were evaluated by charter status and urbanicity. Key findings from this evaluation include the following:

  • Median teacher salaries[4] in charter schools were lower than median teacher salaries in noncharter schools in all 7 states that met the standards for reporting teacher salaries for both charter and noncharter schools (figure 2).
  • School expenditures were often higher in cities and suburbs than in towns and rural areas. Median teacher salaries, for example, were highest for schools in either cities or suburbs in 9 of the 10 states that met the standards for reporting teacher salaries in each of the urbanicities (city, suburb, town, and rural) (figure 3).  

Figure 2. Median teacher salary for operational public elementary and secondary schools, by school charter status and reporting state: FY 2017

Figure 3. Median teacher salary for operational public elementary and secondary schools, by school urbanicity and reporting state: FY 2017

Median technology‑related expenditures per pupil were also highest for schools in either cities or suburbs in 9 of the 11 states that met the standards for reporting technology-related expenditures in each of the urbanicities, with schools in cities reporting the highest median technology-related expenditures per pupil in 6 of those states.

 

The SLFS can be used to evaluate and compare school-level expenditure data by various poverty indicators.

The report also evaluates and compares school-level spending by school poverty indicators, such as Title I eligibility and school neighborhood poverty level. Key findings from this evaluation include the following:

  • In SY 2016–17 (FY 2017), median teacher salaries were slightly lower for Title I eligible schools than for non-Title I eligible schools in 7 of the 8 states where standards were met for reporting both Title I eligible and non-Title I eligible schools. However, median personnel salaries per pupil were slightly lower for Title I eligible schools than for non-Title I eligible schools in only 2 of the 8 states where reporting standards were met.    
  • Median personnel salaries per pupil for SY 2016–17 were higher for schools in high‑poverty neighborhoods than for schools in low-poverty neighborhoods in 7 of the 12 states where standards were met for reporting school personnel salaries.

 

To learn more about these and other key findings from the SY 2015–16 and 2016–17 SLFS data collections, read the full report. The corresponding data files for these collections will be released later this year.

[1] The following 15 states participated in the SY 2015–16 and 2016–17 SLFS: Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Michigan, New Jersey, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, and Wyoming.

[2] Spending refers to “current expenditures,” which are expenditures for the day-to-day operation of schools and school districts for public elementary/secondary education. For the SY 2015–16 and 2016–17 data collections referenced in this blog, the SLFS did not collect complete current expenditures; the current expenditures collected for those years included expenditures most typically accounted for at the school level, such as instructional staff salaries, student support services salaries, instructional staff support services salaries, school administration salaries, and supplies and purchased services. As of SY 2017–18, the SLFS was expanded to collect complete current expenditures.

[3] In New Jersey, detailed school-level finance reporting is required for only its “Abbott” districts, which comprised only 31 of the state’s 699 school districts in SY 2016–17.

[4] “Median teacher salaries” are defined as the median of the schools’ average teacher salary. A school’s average teacher salary is calculated as the teacher salary expenditures reported for the school divided by the number of full-time-equivalent (FTE) teachers at the school. Note that this calculation differs from calculating the median of salaries across all teachers at the school, as the SLFS does not collect or report salary data at the teacher level.

 

By Stephen Cornman, NCES

Accessing the Common Core of Data (CCD)

January 4, 2021 NCES Blog Editor FAQs, General Share on TwitterShare on FacebookShare on Google+

Every year, NCES releases nonfiscal data files from the Common Core of Data (CCD), the Department of Education’s (ED’s) primary longitudinal database on public elementary and secondary education in the United States. CCD data releases include directory data (location, status, and grades offered), student membership data (by grade, gender, and race/ethnicity), data on full-time equivalent staff and teachers, and data on the number of students eligible for the National School Lunch Program (NSLP). 

This blog post, one in a series of posts about CCD data, focuses on how to access and use the data. For information on using NSLP data, read the blog post Understanding School Lunch Eligibility in the Common Core of Data. 

CCD Data Use

CCD data are used both internally by ED and externally by the public. For example, within ED, CCD data serve as the sample frame for the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) and are the mainstay of many tables in the Digest of Education Statistics and The Condition of Education. Outside of ED, CCD data are used by researchers, the general public (e.g., realtor sites, The Common Application, Great Schools), and teachers who need their school’s NCES school ID to apply for grants.

Data Structure and Availability

CCD data are available at the state, district, and school levels, using a nested structure: all schools are within a parent district and all districts are within a state. CCD does not include any student- or staff-level data.

Most CCD data elements are available for school year (SY) 1986‒87 to the present.    

Unique Identifiers Within CCD

NCES uses a three-part ID system for public schools and districts: state-based Federal Information Processing Standards (FIPS) codes, district codes, and school codes. Using these three parts, several IDs can be generated:

  • District IDs: 7-digit (FIPS + 5-digit District)
  • School IDs:
    • 12-digit (FIPS + District + School)
    • 7-digit (FIPS + School) (unique from SY 2016‒17 on)

NCES IDs are assigned to districts and schools indefinitely, making them useful for analyzing data over time. For example, for a longitudinal school-level analysis, a school’s 7-digit ID should be used, as it remains the same even if the school changes districts. These IDs can also be used to link CCD district and school data to other ED databases.

Accessing CCD Data

There are three ways to access CCD data: the CCD District and School Locators, the Elementary/Secondary Information System (ElSi), and the raw data files. Each approach has different benefits and limitations.

  • CCD District and School locators
    • Quick and easy to use
    • Many ways to search for districts and schools (e.g., district/school name, street address, county, state)
    • Provides the latest year of CCD data available for the selected district(s) or school(s)
    • Tips for optimal use:
      • If you are having difficulty finding a district or school, only enter a key word for the name (e.g., for PS 100 Glen Morris in New York City, only enter “Glen Morris” or “PS 100”)
      • Export search results to Excel (including all CCD locator fields)

  • Elementary/Secondary Information System (ElSi)
    • quickFacts and expressTables: view most-requested CCD data elements at multiple levels
    • tableGenerator: combine data across topic areas and years to create a single file
    • Create “tables” that act like databases and include all of the roughly 100,000 public schools or 20,000 districts
    • Export data to Excel or CSV
    • Tips for optimal use:
      • Save and edit queries using the navigation buttons at the top of the screen
      • popularTables provide links to frequently requested data

 

Interested in learning more about CCD or accessing CCD data at the state, district, or school level? Check out the CCD website and use the District and School locators, ElSi, or the raw data files to find the data you are looking for.

 

By Patrick Keaton, NCES