Opinion ID: 1113751
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 13

Heading: equal educational opportunity

Text: The ACE and Harper plaintiffs (hereinafter, plaintiffs) contend that, as a factual matter, Alabama schoolchildren do not receive substantially equal (or equitable) educational opportunities in the state's public schools. The Court agrees. The Court understands the term educational opportunities to mean, in the broadest sense, the educational facilities, programs and services provided for students in Alabama's public schools, grades K-12, and the opportunity to benefit from those facilities, programs and services. [9] Equal educational opportunities need not necessarily be strictly equal or precisely uniform, whether these opportunities are discussed in terms of school funding, of the programs purchased with such funds, or of the actual educational benefits offered. Equality of benefit does not import identity of benefit, which is obviously impracticable. Southern Railway Company v. St. Clair County, [124 Ala. 491] 27 So. 23, 27 (1899). For example, as testimony at trial indicated, schoolchildren who have different educational circumstances, needs and aptitudes may require different school resources and facilities which, in turn, may entail different costs. This may be most obvious in the case of children with disabilities and children otherwise disadvantaged. Thus, the Court, in reviewing the evidence, has focused its inquiry broadly on the issue of substantial equity and fairness in the way the state's system of public schools allocates educational opportunity to its students. In this area, the Court finds that Alabama's public school system falls dramatically short. Although equal educational opportunity cannot be measured exclusively in terms of public school funding, there is no question that educational facilities, programs and servicesfrom field trips to computerscost money to provide, so disparities in school funding must play a major role in the Court's analysis. Indeed, the state of Alabama has itself historically linked equitable school funding to equal educational opportunity. Prominent twentieth century examples are the so-called Equalization Fund of 1927 and its successor, the Minimum Program Fund of 1935 (still in effect, though ineffective, today), which sought to equalize educational opportunity. See Ala.Code §§ 16-13-50, et seq. Accordingly, it is appropriate to begin an analysis of equal educational opportunity in Alabama's public schools by examining the issue of equity in school funding. Plaintiffs offered trial testimony from a number of nationally prominent school finance experts which indicated that, by virtually any measure, schoolchildren in wealthier school systems in Alabama are allocated considerably more funding per pupil than are children in poorer school systems. For example, the Mountain Brook city school system, which ranked highest in state and local revenues of Alabama's 129 school systems in the 1989-90 school year, had $4,820 available in state and local revenues to spend per pupilmore than double the resources available to the Roanoke city schools, the lowest revenue system, which had only $2,371 per pupil. This disparity of $2,449 (more than 2 to 1) per pupil represented a difference in revenues of $61,225 per classroom of 25 students in a single year. Disparities of this kind in revenues were also reflected in disparities in expenditures. Governor Hunt argues that it is misleading to assess school funding disparities by looking at the gap between the top and bottom systems. He maintains that a small number of wealthier systems, which he calls outliers, far outstrip the other systems in revenues and expenditures, and that these less typical systems somehow skew or bias the analysis. The Court disagrees for several reasons. First, children fortunate enough to be enrolled in these wealthier systemsand there are some 31,000 pupils in the outlier systems identified by defendant [10] are still state public school students attending state public schools. Clearly, the very best and very worst provision that the state makes for students among schools in its school system is a highly relevant matter for inquiry when the issue is differential treatment within the state system. The fact that some local systems do particularly well compared with others is hardly a reason to exempt those systems from constitutional analysis. Second, experts testifying on behalf of plaintiffs did not limit their analysis to the extremes of the funding continuum, in any case. On behalf of the ACE plaintiffs, Dr. Kern Alexander, a nationally recognized authority on school finance and a University Distinguished Professor at Virginia Tech, reviewed funding disparities not only in the top and bottom systems in terms of revenues and expenditures but also among what he identified as the five wealthiest and five poorest systems, [11] finding a difference of almost $29,700 per classroom of 25 students in one year between the average total state and local revenues of these five wealthiest and five poorest systems. Dr. Alexander testified further that the 20 percent of students receiving the most funds in Alabama had 78 million more education dollars spent on them in a single year than did the 20 percent of students in the lowest funded systems. For the Harper plaintiffs, Dr. Margaret Goertz, also a nationally recognized school finance expert and a visiting research professor at the Eagleton Institute of Politics, Rutgers University, analyzed funding disparities among school systems which she grouped by wealth into five quintiles, each containing twenty percent of the students. She found a difference of $790 per student available to those systems in the first and fifth quintiles. This disparity amounted to some 4.4 million additional dollars in a single year for an average-sized system of 5,530 students in the wealthiest quintile compared with the poorest quintile. Dr. Goertz also testified that funding disparities in Alabama schools were, in fact, systemwide, with sizable differences among all the quintiles in her analysis. The Court finds, based on this testimony, that disparities in public school funding in Alabama do not just affect those students in the very wealthiest and very poorest systems; instead, the effects of these disparities are widespread and systemic. Governor Hunt, however, argues that plaintiffs overstate the extent of differential treatment among students in another way, by excluding federal aid from their analysisaid which has the effect of reducing wealth-based disparities somewhat in Alabama schools because poorer systems tend to receive more federal funds than do wealthier systems. Defendant maintains that, properly analyzed, funding differences in Alabama schools are not sufficiently disparate to be deemed inequitable either in their own terms, or as compared with school funding disparities in other states. Again, the Court disagrees. Although the Court is persuaded (and plaintiffs do not dispute) that including federal revenues in an equity analysis would make funding disparities appear somewhat smaller, the Court declines to credit such funds to the state's account. Federal aid represented less than 11 percent of combined federal, state and local school revenues in 1990-91, and it is undisputed that a large portion of this aid is used for non-instructional purposes such as school breakfast and lunch programs. [12] Testimony at trial showed that much of the federal aid that is employed for instruction is categorical aid, targeted toward specific population groups (e.g., Indian education) or programs (e.g., ROTC). Further, some portion of this earmarked instructional aid, such as money allocated for adult basic education or Head Start, is not even spent on grades K-12. And, to the extent that the remaining federal funds do finance instruction within the public schools, the evidence showed that these funds typically do not pay for the schools' basic educational programs, but for remedial or compensatory services aimed at bringing disadvantaged children up to the same starting line, as it were, with their peers. In short, the Court finds that federal aid does not close the gap between wealthier and poorer school systems by financing basic, system-wide school programs or facilities and, thus, it cannot be held to mitigate the disparities in resources that are of primary concern among these systems. Nor are federal revenues intended to have this effect; by law, these funds may be used only to supplement, not to supplant, the public schools' regular program. See, e.g., 34 C.F.R. § 300.230 (1991). Perhaps most importantly, the state of Alabama does not collect or, for the most part, control these revenues, which are not available to advance state educational goals but rather serve (sometimes transitory) federal mandates. The issue before the Court is whether the state meets constitutional mandates in providing public schools, not the federal government. Accordingly, the Court finds that plaintiffs' equity analyses are proper in excluding federal aid. Further, the Court finds no merit to defendant's suggestion that the funding differences proved by plaintiffs are not sufficiently great to be deemed significant or inequitable. On their face, the disparities in funding cited above appear to the Court quite clearly to be constitutionally meaningful ones. Dr. Goertz testified, for example, that the $790 per pupil difference between the top and bottom quintiles (that is, taking into account 40 percent, or more than 270,000 students) in her analysisone of the more conservative figures citedamounted to a disparity of some $18,000 per classroom in a single year. [13] Dr. Goertz indicated that this amount would buy new textbooks for six class sections, five laminated wall maps, one globe, four bulletin boards, twelve microscopes, and an increase in the teacher's salary to that paid in the top quintile, with some $11,500 left over. In fact, the expenditure figures provided by defendant's own expert, Dr. Michael Wolkoff, which included federal aid, reflected a $55,575 difference per classroom of 25 between the wealthiest and poorest system in a single year; without the outliers, this gap was still $33,775. Even Dr. Wolkoff admitted that these amounts might look like a lot of money to the teacher at the bottom. Further, plaintiffs presented testimony at trial that disparities such as these have been evident for at least the past 20 years. The Court finds that the cumulative and, as Dr. Alexander described it, intergenerational effect of differential funding in Alabama public schools is unquestionably significant. Moreover, defendant's own evidence suggested not only that this funding gap is not closing, but that it has actually widened substantially in the last six years. In addition, the Court finds that the comparatively greater educational need shown by plaintiffs to exist in many of the poorer systems further exacerbates the effect of these funding disparities. In concluding that the differential school funding of which plaintiffs complain is meaningful and substantial, the Court has considered Governor Hunt's argument that greater disparities than those shown in Alabama exist in some other states. This may indeed be truealthough the Court agrees with plaintiffs that it is misleading to draw dollar-for-dollar comparisons of school funding disparities between states like New Jersey, which ranked first in the nation with $9,447 in expenditures per pupil in 1990-91, and Alabama, which was forty-ninth in spending in the same year, with an average of $3,551 per pupil. In fact, a smaller disparity in a low-spending state like Alabama may make a bigger difference in educational opportunity than a larger disparity in a higher-spending state like New Jersey. The issue is the marginal utility of these dollars in each state. Just as a dollar lost to a poor person may be more meaningful than a dollaror even ten dollarslost to a rich person, the disparities in Alabama can only be understood in the context of this state's very low level of educational spending. [14] In any case, school funding problems in other states do not excuse Alabama's own poor performance. Regardless of how our school funding disparities compare with others outside our borders, they are clearly substantial and of profound concern here at home. [15] Even if school funding disparities are significant in Alabama, Governor Hunt argues that they are not the state's responsibility, but the result of local mismanagement or local choice not to fund schools. However, in deposition testimony admitted at trial, defendant could not point to any particular local school systems that had mismanaged or wasted money. See Hunt Deposition at 102-03. Certainly, defendant offered the Court no systematic evidence that poorer school systems are more prone to wastefulness than are wealthier systems. Thus, defendant's allegations concerning local mismanagement fail for lack of proof. [16] Governor Hunt's suggestion that funding disparities are primarily attributable to local choice or preference is also unpersuasive. This argument has taken two forms. First, defendant introduced evidence at trial concerning the defeat of local tax referenda, and offered testimony attributing the variation in school spending to differences in a local millage rates, [17] rather than local wealth, with the implication that citizens in the lower spending school systems just do not try hard enough to tax themselves for schools. Plaintiffs responded that millages alone, considered without regard to tax capacity, do not accurately reflect tax effortthat is, how much local citizens tax themselves for schools in relation to their wealth. [18] Experts testifying on behalf of plaintiffs said that the poorer systems actually put forth more tax effort [19] for schools than did the wealthier systems, and concluded that lower funding in poorer schools is primarily a function of fiscal capacity and wealth, not effort. [20] Plaintiffs also argued that defendant's analyses of the relationship of spending disparities to tax millages and to local wealth were flawed because defendant's expert improperly sought to explain disparities in total school expenditures, which include state and federal funds, by differences in local millages and local wealth, and because he used certain sales tax data incorrectly. After reviewing the testimony, the Court finds plaintiffs' evidence persuasive on this point. Second, Governor Hunt has suggested that local citizens vote down tax referenda primarily because they do not want better schools, or have no confidence that more money will improve schools. However, defendant presented no evidence in support of this contention. Plaintiffs, on the other hand, offered testimony that local tax referenda are in some cases defeated for racial reasons in systems in which whites have fled the public schools. Testimony at trial indicated that opposition to public school taxes in some parts of the state is led by parents and supporters of all-white private schools schools that the state of Alabama supported at the time of their establishment. Thus, in some areas of the state, opposition to school taxes may be motivated by opposition to integrated education rather than opposition to education generally. Further, tax initiatives have historically failed, according to plaintiffs' experts, for reasons unrelated to the educational needs of schoolchildren: for example, most voters do not have children in the public schools, land-owning interests organize to defeat these referenda, or there is low educational aspiration in some areas. The point is, in the Court's view, that the state, in framing its school finance system, can easily anticipate differences in local tax decisions for a wide variety of reasons. The Court finds that by setting low requirements for local effort, and failing to equalize local funds with state dollars, the state has allowed educational opportunities for schoolchildren to hinge on local tax decisions. For this reason, the state cannot hide behind the claim that it is local citizens who cause school funding disparities, and deny its primary responsibility for the present system and its results. This point, which concerns the structure of Alabama's school finance system itself, bears further explanation. It is clear from testimony at trial, particularly that offered by Dr. Ira Harvey, who has written the leading history of school finance in Alabama and who testified on behalf of plaintiffs, that state funds do not today play their intended role in the school finance system. Since Alabama's statewide public school system was established in 1854, revenues for schools collected at the state level have been intended in varying degrees to equalize, or compensate for, differences in local school funds. This concept achieved its greatest refinement in Alabama in 1935, when the legislature enacted the Minimum Program Fund, a so-called foundation program which was widely regarded as among the leading equalization plans in America. Such programs require a certain level of local tax effort for schools, and then allocate state funds in inverse proportion to local revenues to equalize funding so as to pay for a state-determined minimum education program for all students. Local revenues beyond the minimum level (not, in concept, a bare minimum, but instead funds sufficient for an adequate education) are not equalized. Although the Minimum Program Fund remains on the books as the chief allocation mechanism for public school funds in Alabama, see Ala.Code §§ 16-13-50 et seq., with the stated purpose of promoting equalization of educational opportunity for all children in the public elementary and high schools, id. at § 16-13-51(a)(1), it no longer works as intended. This is true, according to Dr. Harvey, for two reasons. First, less than one percent of local school funds are now equalized with state revenues, in part because the level of required local effort (the local millage designated to be balanced by state funds) has not been adjusted since 1938, and it no longer represents a large portion of total local school revenues. Further, only a small partsome $4.7 million of the limited local effort that the state does require is actually equalized, because of an unusual historical circumstance. The 1939 Alabama legislature, concerned that property values and, therefore, local school funds from ad valorem taxes were decreasing as a result of the depression, decided to freeze the assessed valuation of property in the state at $938,297,005 (the 1938 level) for purposes of calculating required local effort. Although, according to Dr. Harvey's testimony, property values have in the succeeding 53 years increased to approximately $20 billion, the equalization requirement for local funds has never been recalculated. [21] Second, Dr. Harvey testified that the state equalization program also fails to operate as intended because roughly 60 percent of state school appropriations now bypass the Minimum Program Fund, which was originally designed as the primary vehicle for distributing state school funds. Similarly, substantial (albeit unquantified) pork barrel appropriations from monies controlled by the governor and the legislature go directly to some school systems without regard to local resources. Because they bypass the Minimum Program Fund, these state allocations are not adjusted to take local wealth into account (that is, they are not inversely proportional to local funds). In particular, two kinds of appropriations from the Alabama Special Education Trust Fund, the primary repository of state school revenues, fall into this category: the financial assistance program and fringe benefits paid by the state to local school employees. In brief, the financial assistance program is a group of line item appropriations earmarked by the legislature for specific educational purposesfor example, to fund guidance counselors or instructional suppliesand allocated directly to local boards of education based either on the number of students or the number of employees in each local school system. If the number of students is the basis of allocation, then every school system receives a pro rata share of the allocation, regardless of wealth; in other words, such funds are not properly allocated in inverse proportion to local revenue. If the number of employees is the basis for allocation, then more of these funds actually go to the wealthier than to the poorer systems, because wealthier school systems can hire more personnel from local funds and thus, draw more state money from the line item appropriations. The same is true for fringe benefits (health insurance, retirement, etc.) paid directly by the state to local school employees which, again, offer the most benefit to wealthier systems that can afford to pay for additional staff with local funds. The extraordinary result of these departures from the original intent of the school finance system, according to Dr. Harvey, is that not only do state funds now fail to compensate for variations in local funds, the state actually allocates more state dollars to the wealthier systems than to poorer systems, thus exacerbating the inequalities. [22] For example, as Dr. Harvey testified, Hoover, one of the wealthiest systems in the state, collected $2,532 per student in state revenues in 1990-91, while Roanoke, one of the poorest systems, received only $1,985 per student. This result is the direct opposite of the intended effect of state funds. Thus, the Court finds that state school funds are clearly part of the problem, not part of the solution, and the state cannot simply pin the blame for current funding inequalities on local school revenues. In any case, the distinction urged by defendant between local and state funding for schools is an artificial one. By law, all public school taxes are state taxes, and all public school funds are state funds, whether collected at the state or local level. See Mobile, Ala.-Pensacola, Fla., Bldg. & C.T.C. v. Williams, 331 So.2d 647, 648 (Ala.1976) (public school funds are state funds whether they come from the state treasury or local taxation); State v. Tuscaloosa County, 233 Ala. 11 [611] 172 So. 892, 894 (1937) (public school funds, as between the county and the State, are State funds); Williams v. State, 230 Ala. 395, 161 So. 507, 508 (1935) (County and district school taxes ... go to the maintenance of state schools, parts of the system of state schools, just as other public school funds.); Hamilton v. Pullman Car Mfg. Corporation, 231 Ala. 7, 163 So. 329, 330 (1935) (It is true that in a sense a public school tax is a state tax and that a municipality acts as an agent of the state in levying, collecting and disbursing that tax.). For this reason, the appropriate funds to consider in evaluating state funds for education are funds raised for schools from both state and local sources. Accordingly, the Court finds that funding disparities in Alabama's public schools are substantial and meaningful, that these disparities are strongly related to the relative wealth of local systems, and that the state must shoulder responsibility for the differential treatment of schoolchildren that such disparities represent. What remains to be discussed is whether differences in school funding actually translate into differences in opportunities offered to public school students in the form of educational facilities, programs and services. The Court finds that what common sense suggests in this regardthat school systems with greater resources are generally able to provide more and better educational opportunities than those with fewer resourceswas amply confirmed by plaintiffs' proof at trial. Evidence to this effect came from several sources: a systematic disparity study of schools in 15 selected school systems, data analyzed by Dr. Goertz and Dr. Alexander, the testimony of State Department of Education and local school officials, and parents, teachers and studentsand, not least, admissions from Governor Hunt himself. The disparity study introduced at trial by plaintiffs was conducted by three education experts: Dr. Steven Ross of Memphis State University, Dr. Landa Trentham of Auburn University and Dr. James McLean of the University of Alabama. Drs. Ross, Trentham and McLean sent teams to examine school facilities, staff levels, curriculum, and school supplies and equipment in Alabama's seven highest and eight lowest [23] funded school systems as measured by local revenues. In these systems, the observers reviewed 45 elementary, middle and high schools, finding sharp differences in educational conditions and resources between the wealthier and poorer systems. Dr. Ross' testimony was graphic and troubling: for example, he saw deplorable restroom facilities in many schools, visited an elementary school gym fashioned from a portable classroom with holes in the floor, and witnessed children at one poorer elementary school playing on imaginary playground equipment. Dr. Ross testified that in his extensive studies of schools he had never before seen conditions as inadequate as those prevailing among some of Alabama's poorest schools. The Court heard testimony that Dr. Ross' team found an eleven year difference in the mean age of buildings in the state's wealthier and poorer schools, and that the external condition of those buildings, including walkways, parking lots, driveways, and windows, as well as provisions for personal safety and security, were considerably superior in the better funded systems. Photographs showed safety problems in less affluent schools, including deteriorating structures and beer cans, broken glass, mud and even cow manure on school grounds. Safety features such as ramps for students with disabilities, crossing guards, entrance and exit signs and auto pick-up points were also much less in evidence at poorer schools. Further, the condition and appearance of the interior of these facilities such as floors, lockers, water fountains, ceilings and restrooms were considerably better in the wealthier schools, and restroom supplies such as soap, towels and toilet paper were much more likely to be available. Dr. Ross testified that poorly maintained restroom facilities can impair students' sense of well-being andto the extent that students are reluctant to use dirty facilities that do not supply soap, towels and toilet papermay cause anxiety and physical discomfort that adversely affect learning. Interior lighting levels were also better in more affluent schools, as was the general condition of classroom facilities measured in terms of classroom appearance, student and teacher desks, shelf space, and other resources. For example, 46 percent of poorer schools, compared with nine percent of wealthier schools, had exposed pipes. Less affluent school systems were far more likely to have only window units available for air conditioning, while wealthier schools typically had central air and heat. Better funded schools also enjoyed superior communications resources in the form of public address systems and telephones for public, student and faculty use. Classroom resources such as student lockers, audio-visual screens, globes, maps, encyclopedias, file cabinets and wall clocks were also more amply provided to students in wealthier schools, as was the case with media center resources such as overhead projectors, VCR players, and carousel projectors. Fifty percent of wealthier schools had audiovisual production facilities, compared with only 17 percent of poorer schools. Science labs were nearly twice as available to students in higher funded schools, and lab equipment was superior in quality and quantity. Similarly, in terms of special classroom facilities set aside for music, band, art and language labs, wealthier schools fared dramatically better than did poorer schools. Students at more affluent high schools were also consistently offered more and better basketball and tennis courts, running tracks, football, baseball and soccer fields, physical education equipment, spectator stands and player benches, and these facilities tended to be in better condition. At the elementary level, the story was the same: children at the wealthier schools again fared far better than their counterparts in poorer systems. In terms of attractiveness, spaciousness, and cleanliness, the libraries in the more affluent schools again exceeded those at poorer facilities. Dr. Ross described libraries at low wealth schools that had few books; those books that were available were in poor condition, not properly catalogued and often out of date. At one poorer facility Dr. Ross visited, the latest encyclopedia available was a 1975 World Book. Similarly, disparities were evident in school auditorium facilities, with sound systems, microphones and stage lights far more prevalent in better funded schools. Poorer schools also had inferior health care facilities and first aid supplies. According to Dr. Ross, in terms of staff levels and staff development, many more wealthy schools than poorer schools had a full-time librarian available, and some of the poorer schools had no librarian at all. Poorer schools had considerably higher pupil-teacher ratios. Principals in better funded schools were paid 26 percent more on average than those with the lowest funding; teachers' salaries exhibited a 13 percent differential. More affluent schools offered teachers appreciably more travel money for professional development, allocated more time for planning, and required less fundraising by teachers. Similarly, Dr. Goertz found systematic disparities among the quintiles she examined in the number of administrators, counselors, librarians, principals, total teachers, regular program teachers, aides and total non-certificated staff available, with the poorest systems experiencing the lowest staffing levels. From the standpoint of curricular and extracurricular offerings, the more affluent schools also outstripped their poorer counterparts. Students in wealthier schools had more opportunity to participate in extracurricular activities such as the student newspaper, student government, or special enrichment programs, according to Dr. Ross. They were also far likelier to be offered the option of taking instrumental and vocal music, foreign languages, computer training, and courses in drama, debate and psychology. In addition, the percentage of students enrolled in college preparatory courses such as advanced math, advanced science, foreign language, and advanced placement was greater in the wealthier schools surveyed by Dr. Ross than in the poorer schools. Dr. Alexander confirmed this point, testifying that the five wealthiest school systems in Alabama had at least twice the percentage of students enrolled in advanced math and advanced science than did the five poorest systems in the 1989-90 school year. He found that almost a fourth of the students in the five most affluent school systems were enrolled in advanced foreign language courses in the same period, as opposed to 2.3 percent of students in the five lowest wealth systems. Dr. Goertz also testified that a greater number of students were enrolled in advanced math, advanced science, foreign language, and advanced placement classes in the higher quintiles in her study than in the lower ones. Further, the Court heard testimony concerning stark disparities in the ability of richer and poorer systems to offer students the advanced diploma program, the requirements of which students must, beginning in 1995, complete to be eligible for admission to the University of Alabama. Dr. Alexander found that 49 percent of high school students in the wealthier systems were enrolled in advanced diploma courses, compared with 29 percent of students in poorer systems, and a vastly higher percentage of graduates of more affluent systems held advanced diplomas than in the poorest systems. DeWayne Key, superintendent of the Lawrence County school system and the initiator of this lawsuit, testified that three schools in his county cannot offer the advanced diploma this year; the same is true for at least one Monroe County high school, according to Homer Williams, the principal of that school. Not a single student graduated from the Lee County school system with an advanced diploma in 1991. Dr. Ross testified that the educational resources and opportunities available to students in the schools he studied had an impact on student achievement as measured in test scores. He found, for example, that the percentage of students passing the Alabama Basic Competency Test, a test of reading, math and language skills, was substantially greater in the more affluent schools than in the lower wealth schools. Accreditation records bear out this evidence of disparities among Alabama schools. For example, according to State Department of Education documents, all the schools in the wealthier systems of Mountain Brook City, Homewood City, and Vestavia Hills City are accredited by both the state of Alabama and the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools. In contrast, Lee County, a poorer school system, has no school accredited by the Southern Association. Six of eight schools in Choctaw County, five of eight schools in Lowndes County, and five of seven schools in Wilcox County are not state-accredited. A number of other witnesses, many of whom actually work or go to school in the state's poorer school systems, confirmed the testimony concerning unequal educational opportunity offered by plaintiffs' experts at trial. Superintendent DeWayne Key, for example, told the Court about deficiencies in educational opportunity in Lawrence County where, of the twelve schools that have libraries, only seven have full-time librarians, while two others have half-time librarians, one is staffed by an aide or volunteers, and two libraries are closed entirely. He cited examples of schools within the Lawrence County system without school nurses, schools that must share guidance counselors, schools that could not offer foreign language or the advanced diploma, schools with more than 40 students per class in some grades, and schools in which teachers had to sacrifice planning time in order to keep up with course overloads. In the same vein, Superintendent Toreatha Johnson testified concerning problems in Choctaw County with old and inadequate buildings, erosion, unsanitary bathroom facilities and leaking roofs, and told the Court about schools without any gym facilities, central air conditioning, librarians, guidance counselors, music or art programs, or science labs. Alice Lyles, a parent in Choctaw County, and Andrea Dasis and Besstina Lyles, a fifteen year-old and eleven year-old student there, respectively, discussed the shabby and inadequate condition of many buildings in Choctaw County schools, problems with heating and cooling, the lack of counselors, organized sports, music, art, foreign language, computers and science labs in school, and unsanitary bathroom facilities. Sophia Madison, a parent in Wilcox County, spoke of problems in her county with a lack of counselors, physical education, playground equipment, art, music or drama classes, air conditioning, computers and library books. Morris Moody, a high school principal from Bibb County, testified that his school had poor bathroom facilities, limited space, little playground equipment, no auditorium, inadequate science equipment, and outdated library books. Jesse Todd, a Dallas County principal, testified that his school had no infirmary, no auditorium, no science equipment, no art, music or foreign language, limited classroom space, and teachers compelled to spend time in fundraising for basic school supplies. And Homer Williams, principal of Monroe Senior High School, testified that his school entirely lacks advanced math, advanced science, science labs, or a certified librarian, and the school's basketball team plays on a half-court gym. The Court also heard testimony that disparities in educational resources and opportunities exist not just among local school systems, but within these systems as well. Dr. Martha Barton, assistant state superintendent of schools for instructional services, indicated that such disparities are evident among schools within the same system but on opposite sides of the tracksa difference, as she put it, between the haves and have-nots, which she said frequently in Alabama means the difference between black and white. Dr. Anita Buckley-Commander, Governor Hunt's education advisor, admitted that intra-system disparities existed among the schools she viewed. And Dr. Ira Harvey told the Court that the boundaries of the separate school tax districts within a local school system have, at times, been used to gerrymander taxable wealth into the predominantly white districts at the expense of black citizens. The Court finds as fact the foregoing undisputed evidence of disparities in educational opportunity offered in Alabama schools. Finally, according to evidence introduced at trial, the state school system is inequitable because it fails to accommodate the special needs of particular students and schools. The Court received testimony that the current school funding formula is inequitable to students in rural areas because it fails to reflect the costs related to low population density to the detriment of the affected students. Transportation costs and other non-instructional expenses represent a disproportionate share of per pupil expenditures in rural counties. In addition, rural students are disadvantaged because they generally live in areas without large shopping centers and are thus unable to generate substantial sales tax revenues for support of their schools; the state funding formula does nothing to equalize sales tax revenues available to local systems. Moreover, property in rural counties is assessed and taxed at extremely low rates. The Court finds that these inequities in financial resources translate into deficiencies in educational opportunity in such areas as textbooks and library books, computer software, overcrowding and high teacher-pupil ratiosespecially in the lower gradesand poor upkeep of buildings and buses. In addition to the already overwhelming evidence of differential treatment cited above, the Court finds the testimony of state education officials at the highest levels particularly telling in this regard. In other states facing equity funding lawsuits, these are typically the very officials who have vigorously defended the equity of the system under challenge. Perhaps uniquely, this was not the case in Alabama. Dr. Barton confirmed at trial that there are wide differences in materials, supplies, teachers, teacher training, courses offered and overall resources available among Alabama schools. Superintendent Wayne Teague also testified that some schools have better facilities and educational conditions than others, and that children in Alabama do not receive equal educational opportunity, a point about which his department has repeatedly warned. As to special education, state officials have forthrightly acknowledged the stark disparities in the opportunities provided to disabled children of this State that are directly attributable to the wealth of the school system these students attend. These disparities exist in spite of state laws requiring appropriate instruction and special services for all disabled children and federal law which places the ultimate responsibility for special education upon the state. The testimony at trial offered by expert witnesses reviewing Alabama's education program and State Department of Education officials who work daily with the program, clearly show that the special education program in Alabama, in their own words, is an exercise in crisis management. In spite of the efforts of state and local officials, it is clear that the quality of a child's special education programfacilities, instruction, special or related services such as speech, physical and vocational therapydepends entirely upon the system in which the child attends school. It is commendable that wealthier systems direct local money into a state program that is inadequately funded, but these efforts only underscore the disparities in special education programs between the wealthy and the poorer systems. Governor Hunt's witnesses were largely silent on the subject of disparities in educational opportunities manifested among Alabama school systems in course offerings, staff, physical plant, and other facilities and services. Dr. Michael Wolkoff, Governor Hunt's chief witness on the equity issue, had never visited an Alabama public school and declined to speculate as to the point at which funding disparities might have a substantial effect on school programs themselves. Dr. Buckley-Commander, who had viewed some of these facilities, was compelled to acknowledge the disparities she found. And Governor Hunt, for his part, conceded the existence of substantial differences among schools and among school districts in Alabama in the quality of education being provided to students. See Hunt Deposition at 16. Based on the foregoing evidence, the Court finds that the significant disparities in school funding in Alabama are reflected in meaningful disparities in educational opportunities available to Alabama schoolchildren. The Court finds further that, as a result, the quality of educational opportunities available to a child in the public schools of Alabama depends upon the fortuitous circumstance of where that child happens to reside and attend schoola situation that Governor Hunt himself, according to his own testimony, cannot condone. See Hunt Deposition at 10, 13. In addition to its general finding of significant school funding disparities, the Court further finds funding disparities in special education. The State of Alabama funds programs for children with disabilities primarily through additional allocation for special education and special education teacher unit funds. [24] In the 1990-1991 school year, the State of Alabama distributed $98,166,350 in teacher unit money (excluding fringe benefits) and $28,430,144 in additional allocation money to Alabama's public school systems. Since 1972, the State of Alabama has used a school system's total enrollment to determine how much state money that system receives to educate children with disabilities. Under this total enrollment method of distributing special education funds a system receives money earmarked for the education of children with disabilities based on the number of non-disabled and disabled children enrolled. As Mr. Barry Blackwell, Coordinator for financial and legal support at the division of special education of the State Department of Education testified, the total enrollment method results in school systems with larger percentages of special education students receiving less money per pupil than school districts with fewer special education students. In the 1990-1991 school year, Alabama school systems with enrollments of children with disabilities between five and 9.9 percent averaged $1,756 per child in state funds earmarked for special education. During the same year, systems with special education enrollments between 20 and 24.9 percent averaged only $848 per child. In fact, during the 1990-1991 school year, state funding for special education ranged from a high of $2,087 per pupil in Macon County to a low of $643 per pupil in Carbon Hill City. As long as percentages of special education students vary from system to system, the total enrollment method will result in school districts with high percentages of children with disabilities receiving less per pupil than districts with relatively lower percentages. The Court finds that this is a substantial disparity resulting in inequitable funding for the education of children with disabilities. The total enrollment method is not based on the needs of special education students and does not take into account the number or the cost of educating those children. Mr. Blackwell further testified that the State Board of Education voted to change the method of distributing funds in a manner to be phased in over the next two years. State funds for special education will be allocated based on a weighted child count. Under this system, school districts with more children who spend the largest part of the school day in restrictive settings separate from their non-disabled peers will receive more funds to defray the greater cost of these intensive placements. School systems which educate children with disabilities with their non-disabled peers will receive less money. It is undisputed that the effect of this change will be to inject some degree of equity into the funding distribution for children with disabilities. However, the distribution system adopted by the State Board of Education only serves to reduce funding to some systems and to increase funding to other systems. Even with this redistribution of funds there will still be available only 70 percent of the funds needed for special education teacher units and related service personnel to serve currently identified special education students. Even assuming that this system will work as hoped, the testimony is clear that it does not address other fundamental problems with the equity and adequacy of the Alabama special education program. For instance, testimony showed that, at a minimum, approximately 750 additional teacher units are needed for special education students. Important parts of a special education program that are necessary to meet the requirements of state and federal law, such as state administration staffing, monitoring and special education teacher training remain inadequate and, for the less affluent systems, inequitable. The Board has made efforts to tie special education funding to the cost of providing those services. It is not clear, however, that this change will cure the inequities in funding. First, the new distribution system will take two years to implement. Second, as Dr. David Rostetter, expert witness for the plaintiff sub-class testified, basing revenues on more restrictive placements may encourage school systems to isolate children with disabilities from non-disabled schoolchildren. Such an outcome would result in violation of the obligation under state and federal law to educate children with disabilities in the least restrictive environment appropriate. Dr. Wayne Teague testified that the state will have to monitor closely the impact of the weighted child count method of distributing special education funds on placement of children with disabilities and may change the system again. Therefore, the Court is not prepared to find that the inequities in the total enrollment method of distributing funds have been remedied by the change to the weighted child count method. Governor Hunt argues that local school boards, rather than the state, are responsible for providing students with disabilities an appropriate education. However, it is clear that substantially all critical decisions regarding allocation of special education funds rest with the state. The state distributes the majority of the total special education revenues used locally. The state altered the mechanism for allocation of this money from total enrollment to weighted child count. The state is the only entity capable of monitoring the effects of this change. As a practical matter, it is clear that meaningful change in special education funding is and must be the responsibility of state, and not local, authorities.