studies of court-mandated education reforms show inal positive relationship between additional aid and student outcomes. One of the works Downes reviews, Duncombe and Johnston(2002), found that education reforms in Kansas provided more resources to low-income and low-wealth districts, but it did not have a positive effect on educational adequacy. The authors note that, while low-income districts receive more resources, larger districts with high minority enrollments do not receive an equal share of resources, Most importantly, the authors found that the reforms caused greater inequities in drop-out rates and student assessments. Other studies included in Downes' review had similar results. Most often, school finance reforms have addressed inequity to some degree, but have by and large failed to address adequacy. One major study(Card and Payne 2002) departs from the finding of Downes and others(e.g., Hoxby 1996), and argues that court-mandated school-finance reform has had a that increased levels of court-mandated aid help close the achievement gap between rich and poor districts. The findings of this study are questionable, however, because it uses SAT scores, which do not account for those students who chose not to sit for the SAT In sum, court mandated education reforms have helped to close the gap in funding between high wealth and low wealth districts. The larger issue, however, is that the evidence is mixed on whether these court mandates have helped improve student achievement. One dynamic often overlooked in this line of research is the role that management plays in affecting student achievement. To get a broader understanding of how these reforms operate at the state level and how they affect management and student performance, l present a brief overview of the New Jersey school finance reforms.