U.S. Education Budget Roiled by Financial Crisis

The result of the presidential election will likely help determine how much money education programs receive in the 2009 federal fiscal year, which begins this week. But a multi-billion-dollar federal plan to assist the financial markets may leave the next president with very little room for major increases for K-12 schools, perhaps for the foreseeable future.

Congress late last week approved a bill extending funding for most education programs and other parts of the federal budget at fiscal 2008 levels through March 6, when the new administration will have been in office for more than a month.

If lawmakers agreed on a fiscal 2009 appropriations bill financing the Department of Education by March 6, it would be up to the new...