<p>On today’s episode, we continue our “road trip” across PA to look at underfunding’s effects in our more rural communities. Along the way, we hear from folks who reveal that the problem has manifested in ways that are  generational, often racialized, and just about omnipresent all over the state. Plus, a longtime observer of PA rural schools gives us an overhead view of he’s seen over years in PA rural and small town schools. </p>

Episode 4: A Brief History of Underfunding, 1840-2001

Public school funding in Pennsylvania has been on the skids for decades now, but today, it’s doing real harm all over the state. And this isn’t by accident. PA’s legislature has created a system where the kids who need the most, get the least, usually because of where they live.
So much so that across the Keystone State, 86% of public school students are attending schools that are underfunded. And lots of Pennsylvanians are saying enough is enough. Some of them have gone so far as to take the state to court for failure to properly fund our schools — a constitutional right —  with a landmark trial slated to begin in Harrisburg this fall. 
We’ve spent the last few months interviewing people all over the state to find out the history of underfunding in PA, what it’s doing to students, teachers and families all over the state, and where it all could go from here And we’re ready to show you what we’ve found. 
This is Underfunded, and it’s coming soon wherever you get your podcasts. Subscribe now, and visit FundOurSchoolsPA.org to find out more. 
With your hosts: Meg St-Esprit, a mom and a journalist who writes about parenting and education for Pittsburgh’s PublicSource, The New York Times, The Washington Post, and more. And Melanie Bavaria, education journalist who has been covering Philadelphia’s schools for the past several years for outlets like The Notebook, Chalkbeat, Next City, and others.
Underfunded is a project of the Public Interest Law Center, with grant support from the William Penn Foundation.
For more information on the fight to fund public schools in PA, visit FundOurSchoolsPA.org.

Episode 3: Underfunding Everywhere: Ambridge, Slippery Rock, Duquesne, & Beyond (Part 2 of 2)