Texas’ Broken Education System: Recapture System’s Impact on EOC Test Results
By: Caleb Newton
Tags: Education Policy, Texas Education Agency, Education, Texas, Texas Education

For decades, the mechanism in which Texas funds its education system has been hotly contested within the state. The policy, known as, “Recapture” or “Robin Hood” is a formula that redistributes funding to districts with low revenue from property taxes. The idea behind the Recapture System is noble, however the formula itself has been described as uselessly complex, so much so that many legislators have even had a difficult time navigating how to fix it.[1] This policy has exacerbated the problem of funding school districts, with many districts either relying almost entirely on state funding or local property tax collections. Both districts with high and low revenue from property taxes feel the effects of the Recapture System since they rely on constantly fluctuating funding amounts. In 2018, $2.1 billion were reallocated from districts with high property taxes to districts with low property taxes.[2] The idea behind the system was parallel to the story of Robin Hood, taking excess tax collections from rich districts and giving it to those in need. However, as the system evolved and Texas grew, flaws began to become apparent. For example, from FY 2002–2020 Austin ISD will have paid $10 billion back to the state because of the funding formula.[3] Districts like AISD critique this system, because despite collecting high levels of revenue from property taxes overall, many areas the district serves is low-income. Thus, they view the policy as taking crucial funding away from areas within their own district that need it as well. School districts across the state with high and low revenue from property taxes have echoed these critiques signifying an investigation into the effects of the Recapture System in Texas must be explored.

Ever since its inception, opponents of the Recapture System have been finding ways to replace and reform the funding mechanism of Texas’ school districts. Right now the charge to repeal the system is being led by areas that are sending thousands of dollars per student back to the state. State representatives from Fredericksburg to Odessa are calling on their fellow legislators to change the State’s educational funding mechanism, but with a state income tax off the able the question of what would replace it still remains.[4]

So what has been the tangible impact of the Recapture System on End of Course standardized exam scores? In the 2017–18 school year, Llano ISD actually gave $11,796 per student in its district back to the State. Despite this loss in educational allocation, 82.6% of Llano ISD’s students still met the standard on their End of Course exams, or EOC. Concurrently, the rural, Freer ISD actually ended up receiving more money from the state yet only had 29.4% of their students meet the standard on their EOC. A weak trend among districts appeared, showing that districts who gave away money actually outperformed their low revenue from property taxes counterparts. The findings from the 2018–19 school year were not much different with Llano sending even more money yet still out performing districts like Freer. The overall trend of this year was more interesting as it showed a bit stronger of a tie to property tax rich areas out performing their poorer counterparts. The conclusion that can be drawn from this analysis is that funding is quite obviously not the determining factor in how well students perform on standardized testing. With property tax rich areas calling for their money to be returned to them a good question to ask them is what do you need it for? With this analysis, the students in these areas have been seen to outperform their lower income counterparts despite having some tax revenue reallocated away from them.

As the second largest state by landmass and population, Texas of course has a very difficult time crafting an education system that can fit every student and teacher. Thus, the limits of this analysis are apparent: the Recapture system isn’t the only variable that can affect a student’s standardized test scores. Factors, such as, distance from schools, student-to-teacher ratio, technology access, and even standardized tests themselves have great sway over how well students perform. Moving forward, the Texas State Legislature must approach education reform with a versatile and holistic mindset. Much of the dialogue about reform in the state is dominated by discussions about the Recapture program. However, this analysis of EOC data shows there isn’t a hard case to prove that the Recapture program is the true cause of ailment within the state.

[1] Aliyya Swaby, “Texas’ School Finance System Is Unpopular and Complex. Here’s How It Works.,” The Texas Tribune (The Texas Tribune, February 15, 2019), https://www.texastribune.org/2019/02/15/texas-school-funding-how-it-works/.

[2] Kecseg, Ross. “Which Texans Paid the Biggest “Robin Hood” Tax in 2018?” Texas Scorecard. June 21, 2018. https://texasscorecard.com/local/which-texans-paid-the-biggest-robin-hood-tax-in-2018/

[3] “Data Interaction for Texas Student Assessments.” Data Interaction, 2020. https://txreports.emetric.net/?domain=4.

[4] Swaby, Aliyya. “Many see “Robin Hood” as a villain. But lawmakers rely on it to pay for schools.” The Texas Tribune. Jan. 31, 2019. https://www.texastribune.org/2019/01/31/texas-robin-hood-recapture-villain-texas-fix-school-finance/#:~:text=Austin%20Independent%20School%20District%20is,collected%20to%20run%20its%20schools.