Americans agree that a child's future should not depend on his or her heritage, parents' income or neighborhood.

Our sense of justice insists that America be the land of opportunity where all citizens are considered equal, that wherever a student comes from or lives he or she should have the opportunity to succeed.

All children must have access to quality education. But how we carry this out has led to an ongoing debate. There are still people who have difficulty accepting that access should be relatively equal for all children. A small but powerful group have been fighting to return us to an unequal system of funding education. This system re-creates a two-tiered, unjust public school system, that provides poor or mediocre education for most children and excellent education for a select few.

Until the recent backwards steps, many schools were beginning to reap the benefits from the state’s earlier commitment to equalize education funding for all of its children. Student achievement improved, taxpayers were more equally sharing the cost of paying for public schools, and businesses were seeing the results of better-prepared graduates.

After a 12-year span of more equitable school funding, changes were made that weakened the system, privileging a few children to the detriment of many.

But we can have a strong public school system that provides an excellent education for all children. We can and we must.

Click on the boxes below for more information. And see IDRA's publication, The Status of school Finance Equity in Texas – A 2009 Update (see related news release).

Also, see our new online flip-book, School Finance Reform in Texas – IDRA Perspectives on Funding Changes Adopted by the 2009 Texas Legislature.