New York has had a long running court battle over equitable funding. The plaintiffs seeking additional funding have won in court, but the legislature and the Governor have ignored the rulings and owe the urban districts $5.5 billion.
Yesterday the Education Law Center won another judgment in court, this time on behalf of the state’s “small cities.” Will the legislature and Governor obey the court ruling?
IN SMALL CITIES FUNDING CASE NY APPELLATE DIVISION COURT UPHOLDS CAMPAIGN FOR FISCAL EQUITY
ORDERS TRIAL COURT TO MAKE DETERMINATION REGARDING FUNDING NEEDS OF SCHOOLS
October 26, 2017
New York’s Appellate Division Third Department issued a groundbreaking ruling today in Maisto v. State, a challenge to inadequate school funding for students in eight New York “Small Cities” school districts.
The Appeals Court unanimously reversed the trial judge’s ruling, which dismissed the case without examining the extensive evidence presented during the two-month trial in 2015. The Court reaffirmed the framework established in the Campaign for Fiscal Equity (CFE) rulings for analyzing claims of violations of New York’s Education Article. The Court made clear that in school funding cases, the trial court must examine the evidence regarding deficiencies in essential education resources, or inputs, student performance, or outcomes, and whether a lack of funding is a causal factor in resource deficits and low outcomes.
The Appeals Court remanded the case to the trial court for specific findings on inputs and causation for each of the eight Maisto districts: Jamestown, Kingston, Mount Vernon, Newburgh, Niagara Falls, Port Jervis, Poughkeepsie and Utica.
Highlights of the Appellate Division ruling include the following:
1. The trial court erred by refusing to apply the CFE standards and failing to examine the extensive evidence presented for each district regarding inputs, outputs and causation;
2. On remand, the trial court must consider a broad range of inputs necessary for a sound basic education, including not only teachers and instrumentalities of learning, but also class size and supplemental services, such as academic intervention services, extended learning opportunities and social workers.
3. The proper standard for establishing causation on remand is whether the plaintiffs showed that increased funding can provide inputs that yield better student performance, evidence the State’s own experts conceded for every district.
“This is a great victory for the 55,000 children in the eight districts, and for children across New York State,” said Greg Little, Education Law Center’s Chief Trial Counsel and lead counsel in the Maisto trial. “The abundant evidence showed massive deficiencies in basic educational resources that deprived these needy students of their constitutional rights. We are confident that after considering the evidence on remand, the court will vindicate the rights of the students in these impoverished districts.”
Billy Easton, Executive Director of the Alliance for Quality Education, said, “Once again, a court has upheld the rights of students to a sound basic education. We hope the legislature and Governor will take heed of this decision, the second in two months, and finally make CFE’s decade-long promise a reality, without further delays or the need for further court cases. New York cannot sacrifice another generation of children to political or legal gamesmanship.”
In addition to ELC’s Greg Little, David Sciarra and Wendy Lecker, the Maisto school children are represented by Robert Biggerstaff and David Kunz in Albany, and Robert Reilly and Megan Mercy of the NYSUT General Counsel Office.
More information about the Maisto case is available here.
Press Contact:
Sharon Krengel
Policy and Outreach Director
skrengel@edlawcenter.org
973-624-1815, x 24
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Reblogged this on David R. Taylor-Thoughts on Education.
LikeLike
The word Education is NOT in the US Constitution, so how is it a Constitutional Right? This violates the 10th Amendment. Everyone should have a right to be taught but not a right to learn. That is the responsibility of the student. Education, like every other form of communication, is a two-way street.
LikeLike
The right to education is included in almost every state constitution, maybe all.
LikeLike
Diane – all.
LikeLike
“Everyone should have a right to be taught but not a right to learn.”
But that’s what education is, the right to be taught. What one does with it is one’s own choice. But how can kids “be taught” when there is no funding for that? If affluent kids get brand new facilities and fully resourced libraries and a comprehensive curriculum and expansive extracurriculars with well paid and respected teachers, while poor kids get moldy buildings with no libraries and curricula narrowed to math and “reading” and no extra curriculars taught by wet-behind-the-ears fresh-out-of college kids with 5 weeks of training, how can you say those poor kids are getting their “right to be taught”? Or are you seriously trying to say it’s okay to underfund poor schools?
LikeLike
This post is about education in NYS — as acknowledged by the fed const 10th amendment, NYS has its own constitution, which provided in 1894 “the legislature shall provide for the maintenance and support of a system of free common schools, wherein all the children of this state may be educated.” Every state has a provision similar to this.
The struggle in NYS (as in many) is to decide how to distribute funds, whether to do it equitably, etc. NYS has expanded interpretation to mean “a sound, basic education”, & more recently “The opportunity for a meaningful high school education, one which prepares them to function productively as civic participants.” However, that decision did not require that the state is obliged to provide students in a school failing to meet reqts the same level of funding they would receive elsewhere.
This decision holds out some hope that addl funds might be forthcoming to right the balance, by stating its support for the Campaign for Fiscal Equality, demanding analysis re: whether addl funds “can provide inputs [incl smaller classes et al] that yield better student performance.”
So it’s all about NYS: no need for you to worry if you’re in one of those states busy downgrading state constitution to require something less than originally intended. Absolutely w/n yr rights, 10th-amendment-wise.
LikeLike
I agree with what I think you’re trying go say here: “Everyone should have a right to be taught but not a right to learn. That is the responsibility of the student. Education, like every other form of communication, is a two-way street.”
But there’s a problem in the way you say it. You seem to imply that everyone is taught the same — thus it’s not the public’s fault if some [poor? black? ESL? disabled?] students ‘choose’ not to learn. Dienne addresses the point that all are not taught the same, but differently according to their local resources: teaching is not ‘the same’ if poorer area schools get comparatively larger classes, poorly-trained/ less-experienced teachers, inadequate/ crumbling facilities, inadequate SpEd resources, few/ outdated books, insufficient school supplies.
And why not “a right to learn”?, when ability to learn is clearly a function of class-size, teacher quality, adequate facilities/ services/ supplies? How are rights to teach and be taught to be parsed separately in one’s [state] right to be adequately educated?
LikeLike
There is no FEDERAL right to education. None at all. see Rodriguez v San Antonio School District (1973).
https://www.oyez.org/cases/1972/71-1332
Education should rightly be left to the states. Another reason to abolish the federal Dept. of Education.
LikeLike
Jail time for politicians ignoring court orders – now!
LikeLike