text: Education Primary and secondary education Public primary and secondary education in Alabama is under the purview of the Alabama State Board of Education as well as local oversight by 67 county school boards and 60 city boards of education.Together, 1,496 individual schools provide education for 744,637 elementary and secondary students.Public school funding is appropriated through the Alabama Legislature through the Education Trust Fund.In FY 2006–2007, Alabama appropriated $3,775,163,578 for primary and secondary education.That represented an increase of $444,736,387 over the previous fiscal year.In 2007, more than 82 percent of schools made adequate yearly progress (AYP) toward student proficiency under the National No Child Left Behind law, using measures determined by the state of Alabama.While Alabama's public education system has improved in recent decades, it lags behind in achievement compared to other states.According to U.S.Census data (2000), Alabama's high school graduation rate (75%) is the fourth lowest in the U.S.(after Kentucky, Louisiana and Mississippi).The largest educational gains were among people with some college education but without degrees.According to National Assessment of Educational Progress (NEAP), Alabama ranks 39 in reading and 40 in math among fourth-grade students in the rankings from 2022.Generally prohibited in the West at large, school corporal punishment is not unusual in Alabama, with 27,260 public school students paddled at least one time, according to government data for the 2011–2012 school year.The rate of school corporal punishment in Alabama is surpassed by only Mississippi and Arkansas.Colleges and universities Alabama's programs of higher education include 14 four-year public universities, two-year community colleges, and 17 private, undergraduate and graduate universities.