A 'Bombshell' Ruling on Education Funding in Wyoming

Last week, a Wyoming trial court ruled in a 186-page opinion that the state was underfunding its public schools in violation of the state constitution and ordered the state legislature to modify the school funding system. Local coverage described the ruling as a bombshell that was already putting pressure on lawmakers to address school funding shortfalls. And at a time when the Trump administration is asserting unprecedented influence over public education — often without legal basis — the ruling was also a striking reminder that most educational policy is actually set and implemented at the state and local levels.

The Wyoming ruling drew on decades of state precedent going back to 1980, when the Wyoming Supreme Court first declared that public education was a fundamental right under the state constitution and held that the state’s then-existing school finance system violated the right to equal protection in the state’s constitution. In subsequent litigation that lasted from 1992 until 2008, the court ordered a series of further changes to the state’s school financing system. In last week’s decision, the Wyoming trial court found that the state had failed to satisfy the minimum standards established in that line of cases by neglecting to adequately fund salaries for teachers, cover critical services like nutritional programs, and account for inflation, among other things.

The principles governing the right to education in Wyoming reflect a demanding — and at least to me, inspiring — view of what states owe to their students. According to the state supreme court, the Wyoming Constitution requires that education funding be “the best that we can do,” not merely “as best [the legislature] can amidst other competing priorities” and that the quality of education in the state must be “both visionary and unsurpassed.”

Grand declarations of principle, of course, can mask Sisyphean challenges in using litigation to realize educational excellence. While most state courts have ruled that education rights are judicially enforceable, what follows has often been lengthy iteration between courts and state legislatures, sometimes spanning decades, about what constitutes compliance.

But even with these challenges, this Wyoming case — and similar lawsuits recently filed in Kentucky and on appeal in New Hampshire and North Carolina — have been very much on my mind over the past few weeks as President Trump has issued sweeping executive orders and other policy changes targeting education. Recent orders seek to promote “patriotic” education and bar schools from teaching about concepts like structural racism or recognizing transgender identities. The U.S. Department of Education announced in February that it has terminated more than $600 million in teacher training grants that promoted “divisive ideologies.” Other orders seek to direct more resources toward vouchers and charter schools. 

State Court Report’s Erin Geiger Smith recently interviewed Suffolk University law professor Joshua Weishart, an expert on education rights, about how Trump’s actions are affecting education and what it might mean for the states. According to Weishart, “the federal government has no direct authority over curriculum matters,” but pressure from the administration can give states and localities an excuse to “self-censor and preemptively change their programs.” On the other hand, states also have the power to push back. As one example, they can “include DEI in their academic standards and curricula.” We must “pay closer attention to the interplay of federal and state law,” Weishart argues.

When it comes to school funding, potential federal cuts would be devastating. States receive an average of 10 percent of their funding from the federal government, according to Weishart, but in some states the percentage can be as high as 20 or 25. States are among the entities challenging such funding cuts in federal court, and the extent to which cuts will fully materialize remains to be seen. But ultimately, state constitutions impose obligations on states to provide an adequate education, regardless of what support comes from Washington. Weishart’s ultimate assessment: The current pressure from the federal government “puts enormous strain on the whole state government, from the legislature to the judiciary. It’s not going to be pleasant or welcome.”

Alicia Bannon is the director of the Judiciary Program at the Brennan Center for Justice and editor in chief for State Court Report.

Suggested Citation: Alicia Bannon, A 'Bombshell’ Ruling on Education Funding in Wyoming, Sᴛᴀᴛᴇ Cᴏᴜʀᴛ Rᴇᴘᴏʀᴛ (Mar. 06, 2025), https://statecourtreport.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/bombshell-ruling-education-funding-wyoming