Go to Alaska 's report card. Most of it will go to urban areas, where educators have long claimed that the old finance formula was shortchanging their schools. That system is to be fully implemented in 2002, when high school students will have to pass an exit examination to receive a diploma, and poorly performing schools could be subject to state intervention. Like the old formula, the new finance system takes into account the higher operating costs of rural districts that must ship in everything by plane and of small schools that have no economies of scale. But it gives somewhat less weight to those factors.
Urban districts come out on top as Alaska rewrites the way it hands out state aid.
The new law also continues providing extra aid for students who need special services. That effectively decreases the amount of state support for special, bilingual, and vocational education. Each district is guaranteed as much aid in future years as it now gets, as long as enrollment does not drop. Districts guaranteed those minimums, however, must forgo 40 percent of any additional aid they receive for new students, drastically limiting future funding increases. But vocational education eventually may be a casualty.