TiDbit 25-02: K-12 Education in NYS

Terminology and Definitions

English Language Learners (ELL)

Students who by reason of foreign birth or ancestry speak or understand a language other than English or understand little or no English and require support to gain proficiency in English.

Instructional Expenditures

The sum of salaries paid to K-12 teachers, instructional salaries for pupil personnel services, curriculum development and supervision, BOCES instructional services, tuition paid to other school districts or entities, other instructional salaries and expenditures, community service, and operation and maintenance.

Need-to-Resource Capacity Categories

There are seven defined categories of school districts, based on the need-to-resource capacity (N/RC) index. This index measures a district’s ability to meet student needs based on the amount of local resources available. The index value for a district is the ratio of the estimated poverty percentage (expressed in standard score form) to the Combined Wealth Ratio (expressed in standard score form).

Three of the categories are grouped without use of the index:

NYC Public Schools
Large City Districts (Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse, and Yonkers)
Charter Schools

The remaining four range from low to high, and the high need-to-resource districts are broken up by geographic classification:

High N/RC Urban/Suburban Districts: those with an index score of 1.1835 or above, with at least 100 students per square mile, or enrollment greater than 2,500 with 50+ students per square mile

High N/RC Rural Districts: those with an index score of 1.1835 that have less than 50 students per square mile, or less than 100 students per square mile and enrollment of less than 2,500.

Average N/RC Districts: All districts between 0.770 and 1.1835 on the index.

Low N/RC Districts: All districts under 0.770 on the index.

It is important to note that low and average district categories include all geographic classifications (e.g. not all rural districts are high need).

Number of School Districts

The count of school districts used in the introduction (730) is from the NYSED public data page and includes the 32 geographic districts and special districts in NYC. However, at the state level, NYC is one large district and is sometimes counted as such. There are also several districts that exist in boundary only but do not have enrolled population, as well as districts with enrolled population but without boundaries. Therefore, the official number of school districts varies by source.

Transportation Expenditures

General Fund and Special Aid Fund expenditures for transportation which include transportation services, bus purchases, garage building (excluding capital expenditures), contract transportation and transportation provided by BOCES.

More detailed definitions on expenditures can be found here.

Locale Types

We collapsed the twelve-category locale code from NCES (found here) into the four primary classifications: Rural, Town, Suburb, and City. The NCES classification is an extension of the standard urban and rural criteria defined by the Census Bureau.