And boy, do they pull out all the stops to get their state funding too. I'm not sure how other states handle it, but mine has "count day" once each semester (October and February) where funding is generally based on who physically attends school that day (with provisions for absent and suspended students). Many districts, usually the ones that complain the most about a lack of money and insufficient budgets, use all kind of gimmicks, some of them costly, to coax ensure students attend on count day: all-school pizza lunches, jean day, raffles for iWhatever electronic devices, etc. But once the districts get their funding, those students they cared about for 2 days out of the year return to being mere names or student identifiers that get lost in the bureaucracy.
Public school systems, especially those financed by property taxes, have no incentive to use good stewardship when it comes to managing their money because they know property taxes always go up each year to match inflation. Add in the inflated assessments of home values that update each year, and they get guaranteed increases in funding so long as their enrollment stays relatively stable. Various forms of wasteful spending have existed for decades, but the problem became more apparent during the recession from the early 2000s when house prices dropped, taking school tax revenue down with them. Districts that could get away with playing shell games with their finances suddenly found themselves facing significant deficits unless they were willing to bite the bullet and make the needed budget adjustments. Worse, these districts figure they can ask for a millage to make up the difference and spin it as, "Voting no is a vote against the kids and their education."
Meanwhile, private schools that receive little or no government money know how to take what they get from tuition, fundraising, and any other revenue sources and do everything they can to stretch those dollars -- usually without skrimping on the quality of education. They also do it without the needless red tape and layers of leadership seen in their public counterparts.
