Prairie State Wire

Illinois ranks among the 10 states with the greatest disparity of funding between its poorest and richest school districts serving elementary and secondary students, according to a new WalletHub study.

The Prairie State earned an overall score of 39.72 in the study, which focused on two calculations: average household income per school district and public school spending per student. The greater the score, the higher the state’s funding disparity between the richest and poorest districts.

In total, 49 states – Hawaii lacked enough data to be included in the analysis – were ranked based on the average equitability of school districts in these states. Those states with the least equity tend to provide more resources to their more affluent school districts and less to districts with lower-income students, according to WalletHub.

The disparities between richer and poorer districts were exacerbated during the COVID-19 pandemic, with lower-income students suffering larger gaps in learning as districts moved to partial or total online education, the study found.

Nearly 13,000 school districts across the U.S. were examined in the WalletHub study.

---

How States Rank on Equity in Education Funding 

Overall Rank (1=Most Equity)	State	Total Score
1	Iowa	15.91
2	Arkansas	15.99
3	North Carolina	16.09
4	Indiana	17.11
5	Florida	17.93
6	West Virginia	18.04
7	Mississippi	18.56
8	Minnesota	19.71
9	South Carolina	19.89
10	Kansas	20.16
11	Nebraska	20.29
12	Wisconsin	21.14
13	South Dakota	21.31
14	Vermont	21.91
15	Wyoming	22.17
16	Tennessee	22.35
17	Alabama	22.99
18	Maryland	23.03
19	Georgia	23.5
20	Utah	24.53
21	Kentucky	24.75
22	Ohio	24.87
23	Louisiana	25.92
24	Texas	26.49
25	Rhode Island	26.87
26	Nevada	26.88
27	Alaska	27.11
28	Michigan	27.45
29	Pennsylvania	27.53
30	Oklahoma	28.18
31	Missouri	28.42
32	North Dakota	28.96
33	Colorado	28.98
34	Washington	29.36
35	Delaware	29.78
36	New Hampshire	29.82
37	Connecticut	29.86
38	New Mexico	30.72
39	Virginia	30.97
40	Idaho	32.25
41	Massachusetts	33.23
42	Maine	34.1
43	New Jersey	34.35
44	Arizona	36.1
45	Oregon	38.43
46	Illinois	39.72
47	Montana	40.91
48	California	41.82
49	New York	46.92

Source: WalletHub.com