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Sounds like you're at Crossroads High in Concord, or La Paloma in Brentwood.

I am actually somewhere in between, Sink

And you aren't imagining things about the gap between the richer and poorer districts. It is very real. One of the key sources of funding in any given district is property tax(that is why the passage of Prop 13 had such a devastating effect on public education), which is of course based on the value of the property . Therefore, the schools that are in an area with low property values have fewer dollars available to them, and those are the areas that have the least going for them. It would be irresponsible of me to claim that this is the sole cause of the problem, but as I stated in my earlier post, it is all so intertwined and interconnected...but the dominoes start falling there IMHO. The mismanagement and fiscal irresponsibility is magnified in the poorer districts, which also happen to be the districts that need to maximize every dollar they get and can least afford those losses.

Another source of funding, by the way, is based on Average Daily Attendance (or ADA). This is based solely on attendance. If a student misses school for any reason other than illness (not including Dr. appointments), the school loses money, or more accurately, isn't given the money it would otherwise earn. And where do you think the higher rates of absenteeism occur? I don't have any hard numbers, but I think that poorer districts have a higher rate isn't too far a stretch.

I wish I had some better answers for you (and others) regarding why things are in as dire shape as they are. You might find some interesting info at www.edsource.com, such as funding sources (e.g. Lottery money accounts for less than 2% of school funding), per pupil expenditures, rankings etc.

Of course, seeing as I am part of a known terrorist organization, take what I say with a grain of salt...
:evil