ABSTRACT
What will the new millennium mean for education finance? One assumption is that the future will be like the most recent past, although this common assumption has often proved erroneous. In this 2001 AEFA Yearbook, our learned contributors have sketched out a broad range of potential directions in education finance that they anticipate for the future. Much of this thinking diverges from previous paradigms. Rossmiller sagely notes this caveat:
Projections of school enrollments and expenditures require one to assume that the trends that have been witnessed in the recent past will continue into the future. Whether these projections withstand the test of time will depend, in large part, on several emerging trends and factors that may alter in significant ways the amount of money devoted to support public education, and the way in which that money is allocated to districts, schools, and classrooms in coming years. Among these trends and factors are the outcomes of school finance litigation, whether the property tax is reduced or replaced as a source of school revenue, the implementation of new and emerging technologies to deliver educational programs and services, policy initiatives to reduce class size, changes in teacher compensation practices, the growth of charter schools and voucher programs, and almost certainly a number of other factors yet to be identified.
