Title I funds to schools based on their concentrations of students in poverty. Title I program regulations require districts to rank each of their schools from those serving the highest to the lowest percentage of low-income children. Districts must serve, in order of poverty, schools enrolling more than 75 percent of students from low-income families. The regulations allow districts to make decisions on serving the remaining schools based on their rankings. Because charter schools do not always fit easily within the administrative and funding structures designed to provide funds for disadvantaged students, their participation in Title I and other federal programs available to public schools has not been fully resolved in many states and districts.
Charter schools face an additional obstacle.
Because Title I funding is typically based on enrollment data from the previous year, newly created schools are not eligible for Title I funds in their first year of operation. Respondents who answered affirmatively were then asked if they were receiving Title I funds. Exhibit E-1 presents the data from the survey. The exhibit draws on data from 362 open charter schools that provided information on Title I eligibility. Consequently, for the purpose of this analysis, we will focus on reported eligibility for Title I, rather than reported receipt of Title I funds.