The NJEA likes to claim that New Jersey schools are ranked #1 but that claim obscures an important truth: New Jersey gets very little bang for its education buck. New Jersey spends 41% more than the US average but is only 21st among the states when it comes to the academic achievement of all its students. That is, if New Jersey student achievement is disaggregated and academic achievement is compared between similar students (e.g., lower-income students in New Jersey compared with lower-income students in other states), New Jersey is middle of the pack. Perhaps surprisingly, much disparaged states like Mississippi, Florida, and Texas are the top three when it comes to educating all their students.  And they spend far less than New Jersey, so these states get a big bang for their education buck.  New Jersey should look beyond superficial claims like the NJEA’s and focus more on bang for the education buck for all its students.

Education reporter Chad Aldeman has done some excellent analysis in The74 that looks at what states spend on education and their student achievement levels to determine how efficient states are in their education spending — the “bang for the buck” that states and their taxpayers get for each education dollar spent.

NJ 3rd highest per pupil spending at $23,496.  Aldeman first looks at state per-pupil spending and uses the Education Law Center’s data because it is adjusted for cost of living.  New York spends the most at $29,425, or $12,780 above the national average of $16,645. Put another way, New York spends 77% more than the average state. New Jersey comes in third at $23,496, or 41% more than the average state. Perennial academic achievement leader Massachusetts spends 10% more.  At the other end of the spectrum, Texas spends 23% less, Mississippi 26% less, and Florida 28% less. But spending less does not mean poorer results.

NJ 21st in student achievement adjusted for demographics. Aldeman then takes the spending data and compares it to 4th-grade math scores on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) as adjusted by the Urban Institute to account for demographic differences among the states.  This ensures that like demographic groups in one state are compared with like demographic groups in others (e.g., low-income students are compared with other low-income students).  It turns out that Mississippi (#1), Florida (#2), and Texas (#3) do a better job of educating all their students than Massachusetts (#5), New York (#11), and especially New Jersey (#21).

The NJEA likes to claim that New Jersey schools are #1, and it is true that on average New Jersey students score quite well on the NAEP.  That’s because students from wealthier districts score very well and bring the average up, which masks how poorly students from lower-income districts perform. The Urban Institute adjusts for this and compares New Jersey’s low-income students to similar students on other states.

NJ’s spending efficiency is poor: very high spending for mediocre results. That brings us to spending efficiency, or bang-for-the-taxpayer-buck.  All things being equal, a state and its taxpayers would generally prefer to get better results for less money. In the graph below, it’s better to be out to the far right on the X-axis (higher scores) and lower down on the Y-axis (less spending).

As can be seen, New Jersey spends a great deal per pupil and is very high up on the Y-axis, but its demographically-adjusted student achievement is middle of the pack.  So it’s an outlier and not in a good way.  In other words, New Jersey’s spending efficiency is poor.

New York, Vermont, and Connecticut are also negative outliers.  Of the high-spending states, Massachusetts does the best but still trails Florida, Texas, and Mississippi as well as Louisiana and Indiana.

Notice a pattern? New Jersey, New York, Connecticut, and Vermont are all deep blue states with powerful teachers unions.  Florida, Texas, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Indiana are all red states with less powerful teachers unions.

So beware of the NJEA’s touting New Jersey schools as #1.  There’s a lot of room for improvement.