School districts propose education tax referenda to attain funding additional to their state-allocated funds. This research examines educational finance across public school dis-tricts to understand the mechanisms that influence the proposal and approval of such refer-enda. The focus is on how these mechanisms operate differently in rural and urban settings. The results suggest that few school districts take advantage of educational tax referenda, with rural school districts being more likely to do so than urban school districts. School districts that do choose to propose a referendum will very likely gain voter approval. We find also that racial diversity, competition from private schools, and school district size operate differ-ently in urban and rural settings.