Abstract: The paper reviews the theoretical underpinning and technical framework for approximating students’ educational cost differentials by taking individuals’ background characteristics into account. The study addresses the issue of how much more cost a poor student needs to achieve the same academic performance by employing weighted formula widely-used in existing literatures, as children born in poor families or neighborhoods where challenges are inevitable need extra public expenditures to reach the same level of accomplishments, which need to be financially equalized across schools or broader geographic units. Hedonic price theory tailored for equalizing differences will serve as the theoretical foundation for interpreting education cost differentials for those disadvantaged pupils. The article provides both conceptual framework and empirical strategy for providing quality education service across different geographic spaces, and sheds light on how to evaluate local governments’ efforts in targeting population in poverty and helping them out as well.

Key words: pupils from poor families or regions, compensate education cost differentials, hedonic price theory, target student population in poverty and help them out