Court Victory Little Solace for Fiscally Pinched Districts

By Lonnie Harp

For officials of many of Tennessee's low-wealth school districts, the memory of a summertime victory on finance equity is providing only slim comfort in the face of a difficult autumn of fiscal austerity.

Poor schools in the Volunteer State are beginning the new year under heavy pressure from state-aid cuts that have left them on shaky financial ground and widened the spending gap between them and their better-off counterparts.

Leaders of a group of low-wealth school districts are scheduled to return to court next week to recommend a long-range plan for reducing spending disparities. But most administrators are preoccupied with more pressing concerns about keeping buses running, maintaining classroom programs, and...