Use Cases

These data were compiled to support analyses that are impractical when reports can only be viewed one district at a time or uninspiring when conducted only using the longitudinal data that is already available through DESE’s public data portal. Below are the kinds of questions the data may be able to support along with some things to keep in mind when working with them.

What the data support

Statewide description. Because every LEA’s filings are compiled into single tables, it is straightforward to compare revenues, expenditures, fund balances, or debt across all Missouri districts and charter LEAs for any year.

Trends over time. The ASBR tables cover more than two decades, allowing analyses of how funding sources, spending patterns, and reserves have changed through recessions, the pandemic, etc.

Program-level spending. Project codes identify state and federal program dollars (e.g., Title I, IDEA, school nutrition, pandemic-era relief funds, and others) which makes it possible to examine how targeted funds were spent.

District fiscal condition. Fund balances, transfers, and revenue and expenditure detail can be combined into indicators of fiscal health of the kind used in school finance research.

Building-level spending. Per-pupil expenditures for every school building starting in the 2018–19 school year. Both the ESSA reporting basis and the ADA basis used in state funding are included. Because the tables separate what a building spent from its share of district-level spending, they support questions about how districts distribute resources across their own schools.

Things to keep in mind

Comparing specific codes across many years. DESE’s chart of accounts has changed over time as function, revenue, and project codes are added or retired. As a result, the report format itself may be occasionally revised. For example, revenue lines for federal COVID-relief programs appear in the years districts used them and are absent from 2025–26 filings on because those codes were retired. Before comparing a specific code across a long period, check that the code exists throughout it; broader categories are generally more stable than detailed codes. The Missouri Financial Accounting Manual documents code definitions by fiscal year.

Amended and revised filings. ASBRs are self-reported and undergo a balancing process before being posted, but reports are occasionally updated or corrected. Because releases are frozen snapshots, the same district-year can differ between releases; citing the release you used makes results reproducible.

Coverage. Building-level expenditure reports contain no data before the 2018–19 school year, so the building tables begin there. One LEA (096120, St. Louis Career Education) cannot be captured because of an error on DESE’s portal, and one district-year (115907 in 2009) is excluded because its source file is malformed. The most recent school year in any release is usually partial: districts file over a period of months, so the final year will cover only some LEAs until filings finish arriving.

Buildings with almost no students. A small number of buildings — hospital, juvenile detention, and some early-childhood and special-education co-op sites — report an ADA or September membership at or near zero while still recording expenditures. Their per-pupil figures are therefore enormous, or zero where DESE suppressed the calculation. These are reported exactly as DESE published them rather than corrected; filter on ada and september_membership before ranking or averaging per-pupil spending.

LEAs change. Districts and charter LEAs open, close, and consolidate. lea_id values are stable for a given entity, but long panels will include entry and exit, which is worth handling deliberately in fixed-effects or growth designs.

If you’re weighing whether the data fit a design you have in mind, describe it on the request form — I’m happy to weigh in.