School spending ยท Edition 0002
How much did Washington public-school spending per enrollment unit change between 2021-22 and 2024-25, and how much of that change is inflation?
Washington school districts and tribal compact schools report General Fund spending to OSPI's F-196 financial summary. Between the 2021-22 and 2024-25 school years that spending rose 12.5% per enrollment unit, from $17,213.81 to $19,371.31, and the earlier year included $1,015,767,886.56 of selected federal COVID relief spending against $3,491,983.06 in the later year. After adjusting for U.S. consumer prices the increase was 0.8%; after Seattle-area consumer prices it was a 1.5% decrease. The denominator, OSPI's financial-summary enrollment, mixes full-time-equivalent K-12 enrollment with birth-to-five special-education headcounts and institutional programs, so it is not a simple student count. Of the 326 reporting entities the workbook lists, 318 report General Fund spending in 2021-22 and 319 in 2024-25, and 319 and 326 carry an enrollment value in those years.
Washington General Fund expenditures per enrollment unit rose from $17,213.81 in 2021-22 to $19,371.31 in 2024-25, a nominal increase of 12.5%. Statewide General Fund expenditures were $18,468,601,374.12 in 2021-22 and $21,081,063,857.94 in 2024-25. This figure is not adjusted for inflation.
Adjusted for U.S. consumer prices, the increase in spending per enrollment unit is 0.8%. Adjusted for Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue area consumer prices, it is a 1.5% decrease. Both use the mean of each school year's monthly CPI-U readings.
Selected federal relief programs spent $1,015,767,886.56 in 2021-22 and $3,491,983.06 in 2024-25. Excluding this spending, the nominal change is 19.1%, 6.6% after U.S. inflation and 4.2% after Seattle-area inflation. No relief-excluded measure exists for the 2018-19 or 2019-20 windows.
Starting from 2018-19, the nominal change to 2024-25 is 36.0%, 8.3% after U.S. inflation and 4.5% after Seattle-area inflation. Starting from 2019-20, it is 32.1%, 6.7% and 3.3%. Starting from 2021-22, it is 12.5%, 0.8% and -1.5%. None of these three starting years is privileged over the others.
The denominator is OSPI's financial-summary enrollment, which mixes full-time-equivalent enrollment for regular K-12 and other programs with birth-to-five special-education headcounts. It also includes skill-center summer programs, detention centers and other state institutions. It is not a count of individual K-12 students.
The largest per-unit increases came from Basic Education (+$977.79), Special Ed state funding (+$809.37) and districtwide support (+$397.47). The largest per-unit decreases came from ESSER III (-$314.27), ESSER II (-$251.63) and SLFRF enrollment stabilization (-$188.36).
The nominal change and the change after each of the two consumer price indexes, measured from 2018-19, from 2019-20 and from 2021-22, every window ending 2024-25.
3 rendering files; one plotted dataset.
Change in dollars per enrollment unit for the eight largest increases and six largest decreases by program.
2 rendering files; one plotted dataset.
The nominal change, the change excluding the selected relief programs, each of those after each of the two consumer price indexes.
3 rendering files; one plotted dataset.
The 326 reporting entities listed in OSPI's ten-year F-196 financial summary, covering Washington school districts and tribal compact schools. The number that reports a value differs by school year, so the roster is 326 and the reporting count is not: 313 entities report General Fund expenditures in 2018-19, 311 in 2019-20, 318 in 2021-22 and 319 in 2024-25, and 323, 319, 319 and 326 rows carry an enrollment value in those years. Each statewide total is the sum of the rows that carry a value in that year, which equals OSPI's own total row to the cent.
Four school years are read from the workbook: 2018-19, 2019-20, 2021-22 and 2024-25. Each carries its expenditures, its enrollment measure and the ratio of the two. Every comparison is between two of those years, so these are endpoint comparisons and not a continuous annual series. The workbook holds the other school years in this span, including 2020-21, and this edition does not read them. Each inflation window runs from September to August of the same school year.
| Artifact | Kind | Bytes | SHA-256 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Captured statewide aggregates | other | 1457 | cad9e758b08b44cefff7c953edb4386242dcecb098e17d9b50072e2885605cf9 |
| Plotted starting-year comparisons | data | 470 | 889876e77151582edc1b137f6fce24656201ef9c8ddd96bfb6fcb54a9e71a177 |
| The same change from three starting years | figure | 5725 | 20c91b93a8b0c6496555cb345f765244bea52debd296493047bd21a1261be04c |
| The three starting years, detached copy | figure | 152884 | f9fdf545f885b24344a0c4f1be213809fcce1eac83c784a7e4aab5a9ef10e3a5 |
| The three starting years, phone rendering | figure | 7285 | 430c353001bc49c7ce800229f55a17cf2bacc97c292eaff546f82947678005e4 |
| Starting-year figure recipe | calculation_code | 4133 | 54e0eb3348875ecdc7430bbfcf552c5661d065ce31f5ecc0aeb920e8eecb81f5 |
| Shared figure drawing module | calculation_code | 24657 | 4b76dd41e3f872f2a62c4ec4f1d45b2d9d613be759f3d99c3640e727e1c1bdee |
| Inflation window means | other | 1330 | 9a42954208152bc5937fc6f869c2cedd2f57c955309ad23846170d568d2b1eec |
| CPI-U observations used | data | 2482 | a8a4abbc71ace8a713b2580ffe38e8b6c2551e642ac85da12b40549c9f020d1c |
| Figure binding index | check_receipt | 2413 | bd51529b7671721e78782557e1e107f7e3b588c3e8e9a96d264d92d0c89f882d |
| Statewide arithmetic recipe | calculation_code | 3776 | 54e00b2128ff10e4f40eb63d0e7204b96fd28b7294e2404fa3406542edcaf58b |
| Statewide program expenditure | data | 653 | 7c96fcc9109d3d11c3fc04b50c5533782dc3091eae92897db083cb0faa092990 |
| Plotted program contributions | data | 501 | 0540003dc75bf482d2c5794ddbcb9830c5b8db16655906deb73f59a17ab7e4ba |
| Programs behind the change | figure | 10971 | 428ab6ddba877607f376e4ef0ef437665aaf15b8449888a3155f1c6755680b27 |
| The program rows, phone rendering | figure | 9851 | c2c058eb5d3bb2e4060e0fcefa0ab4f606b9c7e8de05a2434d75ebac0d72c810 |
| Program-contribution figure recipe | calculation_code | 2397 | 22ebff55c53eefd326ab92b2f8411f79c5e6f9d433781a84f910f80d981e8c29 |
| Statewide totals by school year | data | 353 | 6d8a1bdb0c0d98d602179b7ba9e6200b6d007a7d8b456e4077692b7cc709960b |
| Four-year source verification receipt | check_receipt | 2390 | e907a2104d7751e33ebb3b571078c5a43457615a0ec170eab54ffb6a22f131ad |
| Source verification receipt | check_receipt | 5195 | 7814e447f29e21a95d4f9c70bb84267c75ed3d670148990a769bfb2ff679f3dc |
| Statewide arithmetic receipt | check_receipt | 1750 | a78e14cc9daf53b9003f81bcb105e98686a14939418b802d33f92afe28fef648 |
| Plotted statewide changes | data | 329 | 28ba56fc6ab9b1da6b434840c66784eb7f648229abe080093057df4d16329383 |
| Six measures of the change | figure | 5145 | 92cb7f51e6e71b590e48a2384ede3eed64d8197f75d61c9b967b811f8e9b1bc8 |
| The six measures, detached copy | figure | 124810 | 0d9807988abb4736f1acaa468b0be3ee7687ce37f04cf9e5b6863feaa1e426ec |
| The six measures, phone rendering | figure | 6613 | c897a1e855264558c5e10ce9cc37a0e74142b539a428f314690bc475f6f20a84 |
| Statewide-change figure recipe | calculation_code | 4382 | 83eaa0173facba7d5dcbea0a6a927c9c090c39aedac58505b34c7a6a1122ba06 |
All 25 downloaded artifact files match the SHA-256 and byte lengths in the published release. This confirms the downloaded files match that manifest; it does not rerun the research checks.
