In this graphic, each dot represents a school district in a given state. Greater distance between dots indicates greater disparities in funding.
This graphic, produced by NPR for a series on public school spending, is based on an Education Week Research Center analysis of federal data that shows spending levels per student in most U.S. school districts for fiscal year 2013. The school finance analysis comes from Education Week's Quality Counts 2016, which provides details on how states allocate funding to public schools and grades them, taking into account overall spending and the equity with which that funding is distributed among districts.