If you want to do a computer-assisted story about schools, you have hit the jackpot. Probably no other beat offers such a wealth of data at so little cost. Schools and colleges use data to track spending, and meet state and federal reporting requirements. At U.S. News, we have documented school segregation, inequities in a key federal grant program, and the run-down condition of school buildings. Computerized records were vital to our Dec. 13, 1993 cover story "Separate and Unequal," documenting how special education programs are segregated, rife with misspending, and harming children.
Doing "Separate and Unequal"
The basic data for "Separate and Unequal" was the survey of racial makeup of schools, done every two years by the U.S. Department of Education's Office of Civil Rights. It encompasses districts with more than 25,000 students, and a random sample of about a third of the smaller districts. The most recent data is for 1992. Historical data goes back to 1968.
The survey includes the number of students by race and gender by school. It also has a racial breakdown for those in special education, gifted programs, and those receiving corporal punishment. Journalists should get the additional documentation for the survey, which shows what data is missing. There are some major omissions and quirks.
We supplemented this data with state records. Connecticut, for instance, includes many more details.
We used this data to show that black kids are more likely to be in special education than white kids. It also showed that black kids are more likely to be labeled mentally retarded, while white kids get the less stigmatizing label of learning disabled. We found tremendous variation in the type of education for these students. Some are included in regular classrooms. Others spend all day in separate classrooms, which makes them feel inferior.
We also examined the high cost. Early research shows reimbursement formulas often influence the number of children in special education.
Chapter One inequities
The Johnson administration established Chapter One as the cornerstone of federal education policy. It is supposed to provide money to schools to enhance opportunities for impoverished students. At $6.2 billion a year, it is now the largest single federal school aid program.
The money is distributed using a convoluted formula inequity. In the end, schools can use the money as they please. Said one Connecticut official: "Chapter One, that doesn't have anything to do with poverty. It's for reading scores."
The federal government has no central database for where Chapter One money goes. So we asked 42 states to supply us with their data. They all complied amazingly fast - within a week. We then hired a temp to input the numbers, and we check each of the 12,538 entries. We compared the results with three federal databases that show poverty and per pupil spending per district. We found Chapter One money going to schools that were spending as much as $20,000 a student. We found places like Beverly Hills and Scarsdale, N.Y., still get Chapter One funds, though they are wealthy communities with few poor students.
School segregation
For the 40th anniversary of Brown V. Board of Education, we looked at school segregation. We profiled the four districts whose cases led to the landmark Supreme Court decision. We did two kinds of analyses. We produced detailed statistics, and looked at the racial makeup for both the school systems and their communities.
We also looked at school segregation nationwide, using data that goes back to 1968. Then we followed the methodology of Harvard University Professor Gary Orfield, who recently found that schools were becoming more segregated for the first time since the 1960s. We measured segregation by the percent of blacks in schools that are more than 50 percent minority.
Rundown school buildings
We used three years' worth of the Census Survey of Governments, Education Finance Record, to examine spending for school construction. We combined this with racial and poverty data to show that minority inner-city schools spend less than white suburban districts.
Penny Loeb can be reached at (202) 955-2640, or send email to ploeb@capcon.net.
Where to get data
For the Office of Civil Rights racial makeup survey, call (202) 205-9566.
For reports on special education spending, call the Center for Special Education Finance (415) 493-3550. For poverty, get the 1990 School District Census. Call (202) 219-1731.
For more on poverty and racial makeup, call for Common Core, (202) 219-1522
For spending, get the Census Survey of Governments, Education. Finance Record. Call (301) 763-4502.
For historical racial data, call the National Archives, (301) 713-6630.
There are countless other databases available. Check the Abstracts of the Summer Data Conference of the National Center for Educational Statistics. Call (202) 219-1522.
The U.S. Office of Educational Research has a directory of dozens of databases compiled during the last two decades. Call (800) 424-1616.
Many of these databases are in the NICAR library. Call NICAR at (314) 882-0684.
We used FoxPro to examine the data.
Also, be sure to get your local school budgets on a computer diskette, or create your own spreadsheet. Look where spending goes up or down. Compare spending on art versus football, or girls' sports versus boys' sports. Get test scores. And collect data on crimes committed in schools - several places have started to gather this information, including Florida and New York City.