I heard this story about a Tsar in Russia, who was told that the province with the most doctors also had the most illness. He promptly ordered all doctors executed.
I'd say that bad schools get more money because they need it. In a school that's practically a war-zone, you need lots of money just to replace the essentials that students wreck.
Bad schools often have good inputs (students per teacher, facilities, etc), but they also have things like ex-students lurking outside the school gate (dealing drugs? signing up gang recruits? heckling the students? who cares); and many of the parents don't exactly help the kids get their homework done.
There are programs (cash transfers to poor parents, if they meet certain conditions) that have been proven to work (through randomised trials - something that Mexican politicians are better at then US ones), but it's more expedient to look for "root causes" (play the blame game) than look for empirical solutions that work (even if you don't understand why).
I'd say that bad schools get more money because they need it. In a school that's practically a war-zone, you need lots of money just to replace the essentials that students wreck.
Bad schools often have good inputs (students per teacher, facilities, etc), but they also have things like ex-students lurking outside the school gate (dealing drugs? signing up gang recruits? heckling the students? who cares); and many of the parents don't exactly help the kids get their homework done.
There are programs (cash transfers to poor parents, if they meet certain conditions) that have been proven to work (through randomised trials - something that Mexican politicians are better at then US ones), but it's more expedient to look for "root causes" (play the blame game) than look for empirical solutions that work (even if you don't understand why).