One of the most significant dilemmas in the U.S. education system stems from several factors, including funding gaps and systemic inequality, which lead to inequitable access to resources.
Undoubtedly, there’s a funding gap between schools in substantial and impoverished neighborhoods. Schools in prominent districts benefit more, providing students with better resources, more experienced teachers, and countless opportunities. Conversely, schools in less affluent areas struggle to secure adequate funding and have limited access to technology and learning resources.
According to American University’s School of Education, “The financing systems of public schools in the US ensure that community wealth disparities carry over into education. By relying largely on property taxes to fund schools, which can vary widely between wealthy and poor areas, districts create funding gaps from the word go. Affluent areas end up with well-funded schools, while low-income areas end up with poorly funded schools.”
Students in disadvantaged communities often lack access to the same resources and opportunities as their more privileged peers, creating a widening gap in educational outcomes, according to The Commonwealth Institute writer Chris Duncombe.
“Students in high poverty schools have less experienced instructors, less access to high-level science, math, and advanced placement courses, and lower levels of state and local spending on instructors and instructional materials,” Duncombe wrote in 2017.
Oftentimes, many potential educators are discouraged from entering the profession because of financial constraints, leading to classrooms that are often overcrowded and under-resourced. In some schools, there is a significant shortage of teachers, which can be attributed to reduced salaries and various other factors. Additionally, since teacher salaries are largely affected by the value of properties in the school district, more affluent areas can usually pay their teachers more, while poorer communities cannot.
“The bulk of a school's budget comes from property taxes that are paid by those living in the community,” social studies teacher Candace Winfrey said. “This means the poorer, less developed the community, the less funding schools receive, and vice versa. This explains the major differences you see between schools like Crispus Attucks, Ben Davis or Arsenal Tech compared to Zionsville, Carmel or Westfield.
According to The Commonwealth Institute, in the 2013-2014 school year, average teacher salaries in high-poverty schools was about $46,000 compared to more than $57,000 in low-poverty schools.
“The students are the ones who feel the impact of these disparities, and the consequences are worse outcomes when it comes to attendance, school performance and graduation rates,” Duncombe wrote. “Only about one-third of high-poverty schools were fully accredited by the state.”
There are systematic measures set in place to ensure that children of middle- or lower-class backgrounds are less likely to succeed if the world turns against them.
According to a recent EdBuild study, predominantly white districts are typically smaller, yet still receive $23 billion more than districts that are predominantly students of color. This results from the tendency to draw district lines around small, affluent islands of well-funded schools within larger, poorer areas that serve mostly students of color.
Redlining plays a huge role in the educational lack of systemic fairness. Redlining refers to the policies enacted in the 19030s by the government that led to withholding home-loan funds or insurance from neighborhoods considered “poor economic risks,” neighborhoods that were made up of mostly people of color.
“Through the denial of home loans, generations of Black families were unable to move up or move out of these communities, which are typically lower-income and underdeveloped,” Winfrey said.
According to Winfrey, redlining has long-term damaging effects on the education system.
“Children in redlined communities typically attend underfunded and underperforming schools because redlining systematically caused a lack of investment in said communities,” she said. “It is a prime example of how the legacy of racism still actively harms people in 2025.”
The crisis of the American education system affects the economy in many ways, through funding gaps and systemic inequality. The educational system is far from perfect, and achieving improvement requires that lawmakers and the Department of Education address these systemic issues to realize the vision of an ideal American educational system, though the future of the D.O.E. remains unclear.