School Consolidation in Nebraska: Economic Efficiency vs. Rural Community Life

Joan M Blauwkamp,John Anderson,Peter J Longo

doi:10.4148/ojrrp.v6i1.1309

Abstract

We examine the factors driving rural school consolidations, focusing our analysis on Nebraska. We consider statutory and case law, the school financing formulas that drive consolidation and the efforts by rural citizens to challenge those financing formulas in courts. We analyze how rural school consolidations have been framed in newspaper coverage, in order to see the dominant understandings of the cost-benefit tradeoffs in consolidating rural schools. Finally, we study three cases of rural Nebraska school districts for the insights these cases provide as to the challenges of sustaining rural community schools and the effects of consolidation on the students and the communities. Our conclusion is that schools play a vital role in sustaining rural community life, although the costs to the community when schools are consolidated are more difficult to quantify than the economies of scale that motivate those consolidations.

Highlights

High-school students at an average of 97%, compared to the statewide average of 85% (Funk & Bailey, 1999, p. 12)
School consolidation deprives rural communities of a vital site of community life, and it fragments and destroys relationships that are vital to the maintenance of community life
The Coalition argued that Nebraska‟s school financing law is inadequate in providing small schools with the resources necessary to provide the quality education mandated by the Nebraska Constitution: To show that the funding was inadequate, the Coalition alleged that the plaintiff districts were unable to (1) adequately pay and retain teachers; (2) purchase necessary textbooks, equipment, and supplies; (3) replace or renovate facilities; and (4) offer college-bound courses, advanced courses for high-ability students, technology, and other extra-curricular courses, or adequate services for special education, English language learners, and vocational programs (273 Neb. 531, p. 536)

Summary

Introduction

High-school students at an average of 97%, compared to the statewide average of 85% (Funk & Bailey, 1999, p. 12). With their populations dispersed, have a more difficult time staying within the caps if they maintain local schools rather than consolidating to create larger student bodies and use fewer teachers.

Results

Conclusion