Las Vegas, NV (KXNT) - Nevada public schools are the most poorly funded in the country, according to a study released this week by the Education Law Center.
The ELC's 2022 “Making the Grade” report examines public school funding in all 50 states and the District of Columbia and grades each on three categories: funding level, funding distribution and funding effort.
Nevada was the only state in the nation to receive an "F" in all categories, the study said.
The Silver State ranked 47th in per-pupil funding, 44th in "funding effort" from both state and local funding as a percentage of the state Gross Domestic Product and last in "funding distribution," which is the percentage difference in per-pupil funding in high-poverty districts relative to low-poverty districts.
Nevada funds its students $4,370 less per pupil than the national average of $15,446, the study found, giving it a ranking of 47th in "funding level."
The study also found that although Nevada had already been around the bottom of the rankings in previous studies, public school funding still decreased since 2008 after adjusting for inflation.
The study, which primarily focused on the fiscal impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on U.S. public schools, claimed that most states did not have a system ready that would help school districts properly respond to the pandemic.
"The pandemic exposed a stark reality to the nation: many schools, especially those in districts serving low-income communities, were not equipped to handle the task of continuing education in the midst of a public health crisis," the study said.