Study team presents draft Arkansas school finance report, urges ESA rewrite, K–3 review and separate special‑education funding

Consultants from the Arkansas School Finance study presented a draft of their 203‑page report to the Senate Education Committee, laying out analyses and recommendations to change how the state funds schools and supports students with the greatest needs. Presenters said the report groups 12 chapters into digestible sections and aims to guide legislative decisions about the state resource matrix and ESA (economically disadvantaged) funding.

Justin, a member of the study team, told the committee the team could not walk through every page in the room and instead would hit key takeaways from chapters two through 12. “We gave you 203 pages of report to read over Thanksgiving,” he said as the session opened, and asked members to focus on the chapter summaries and the green key‑takeaway boxes in each chapter.

The study’s central findings include: individual identification as an economically disadvantaged (ED) student is a stronger predictor of lower academic performance than simply attending a high‑poverty school; Arkansas currently directs ESA funding based on school concentration tiers rather than on individual ED status; spending differences between student groups are relatively…