If you’re one of those people who go all out for “states rights,” you should make sure the states get it right.
In general, poor students come to school with greater educational deficits than children from more affluent families. They tend to come from homes where the adults have less education, the home has fewer books, education is less highly valued—and they often arrive at school under-fed, under-slept and over-stressed. It makes sense for the state to spend extra money on their educations to deal the multiple problems those children face. At the very least, as much money should be spent on their educations as on children who come to school with more advantages.
But, according to the National Center for Education Statistics, about half the states spend less on school districts in poor areas than districts in more affluent areas. However, once federal funds are added in, the disparity evens out. Which, using conservative logic, is a good reason to cut federal spending on education, or at least give the money to states as block grants so they can spend more of it on rich kids. That’s what Republican leaders in Congress are trying to do with the revision of No Child Left Behind.
The Washington Post has an excellent graphic charting spending state by state. When you just look at state and local funding, 23 states spend less on their poorest districts than their most affluent districts. The worst offender by a wide margin is Pennsylvania, where 33.5 percent less goes to the poorest districts. The national average is 15.6 percent less, with Arizona coming in at 14.1 percent less.
When you add federal funding into the mix, the disparity shrinks to 1.7 percent, still favoring the rich districts, but only by a little. With the Fed’s help, Arizona spends 5.5 percent more on its poorest districts.
Here’s the thing. At the very least, state and local funds should equalize spending between all districts, and a more sensible funding formula should swing the balance toward districts with a large number of poor children by adding funds for compensatory education. Federal dollars like Title 1 funds weren’t created to restore balance. Their purpose is to help states give an added educational resources to children who need it most.
This article appears in Mar 12-18, 2015.
Move your kids to a charter school and live a carefree life. Public schools have been caught trying to monopolize education.
And they are doing a damn poor job of it.
David your focus is always on money (spending). If money made a difference then every rich kid would be a saint. I want to hear about outcome based education and reform that will transform kids from those poor neighborhoods to high achievers. Why is Flowing Wells District so high performing and TUSD not so much? It comes down to leadership and culture. FWD under Superintendents like Hendricks and Corkill set in motion a culture that has continued to shine.
David,could you tell us how much federal money is “added in” for charter schools to supplement the shortfall of cash? Also how many low income children attend charter schools as a percentage of charter enrollment?
It seems to me that students and parents are “money blind” to income proportions once they take the responsibility upon themselves to research and select a school that fits their needs.
For that reason I have become pro choice in education.
There is no real evidence charter schools do better than regular public schools. The overall results are they do worse. There are some that do better but as a whole no. I can’t figure out why the ones who do the same or worse continue because some are for profit and if I remember correctly this experiment was suppose to end if the money drained from regular public schools did not prove to be beneficial . There are countless studies about this but I am posting one that is long but it contains a lot of information. The only study that I have found that says something different was put out by charter schools. The one I am posting is not affiliated with public or charter schools. https://www.google.com/search?q=evidence+c… THis study does focus on Arizona because we have so many charter schools compared to other states and we led in creating them in many ways.
Now back to the article. It appears because of the information that David S presented and the information I posted and other studies, Republicans seem to be working against what is best for all children. Using money in the most efficient way(not with all charter schools for sure- a lot of waste with opening and closing and generally poorer scores) and giving more to wealthier districts does not benefit the most children. Aren’t we here for all children? Don’t we all want our money spent in the best way possible? Is there a deep prejudice? Children are children and they all deserve the best education possible. Let’s quit wasting money on poorly performing charter schools for profit and balance out how we spend the money so it benefits all.
I didn’t post the link correctly about the charter schools and how they generally perform not as well as regular public schools. THis is the direct link: http://www.hks.harvard.edu/pepg/PDF/Papers…
I think TUSD is doing very well…. We cannot directly compare school districts because demographics differ but this shows how much TUSD is improving.
http://www.tusd1.org/contents/events_lette…
Doug Martin showing so much improvement is very encouraging.
The more I read, the more I see that you can’t just throw money at the problem. Out of state auditors on contract hires seem to be a must these days.
Top heavy bureaucracies in a any public sector need to be trimmed at some point.
I do wish there were more independent studies on the pros/cons of Charter Schools and State Vouchers. It doesn’t help that David continuously attacks the one charter school, BASIS, that seems to actually outperform every every school, due to some mysterious grudge. I mean, it’s not like public schools don’t employ Honor/AP/Gifted schools within themselves.
Money does matter. Why do you think the Governor and so many other rich people send their kids to private schools that cost $15,000 or more a year to attend?
The only thing incorrect about this blog is referring to these politicians as conservative. They are not conservative. They are perfectly willing to spend taxpayers money on all the things that they want such as prisons. And they really don’t believe in local control; for once they get power, they want to dictate to local school boards. Heck, they even want to tell cities what bags can and cannot be used in their local grocery stores. At the least, they are corporatists who, in private, see themselves as benevolent dictators.
Sorry, it is about money, because the extra resources needed in a school where children live in poverty, cost money. Most money in education goes to pay needed personnel. When my former school had plenty of money, we had six extra reading teachers, a librarian, and a counselor. We had small class sizes in Kinder, and a teacher’s aide in each room. We were labeled Performing Plus by the state.
As the depression hit, and the money went away, so did the extra resources. Couple that with larger class sizes, and the loss of great teachers, and the school became a D.
Cause and effect.
Charters are an interesting topic and some of the points raised here are worth responding to, but I will wait until Safier posts on charters to comment on that topic.
On the topic of this post (the need for funding supplements to meet the needs of the most vulnerable populations in our schools):
Safier is right: these funds are needed and they should be maintained. However, the continued delivery of these funds should be combined with adequate supports to transparency so the public can see that the funds are being applied in ways that actually benefit those they are intended to benefit.
TUSD’s desegregation funds are, like federal Title 1 funds, supposed to be used to support the needs of certain populations within our schools. Also like Title 1 supplements, deseg funds are under threat from Republican legislators who would like to eliminate them. Advocates for the plaintiffs in TUSD’s desegregation case have long complained that deseg funds are being treated by the district a a slush fund and are not being applied in areas where they actually benefit minority students. The lack of public trust surrounding this issue is one of many reasons why financial transparency is essential and why the TUSD board needs to install an internal auditor reporting to the public’s elected representatives.
If we are to successfully argue for the maintenance of deseg and Title 1 funding supplements against those who would like to eliminate them, we need to be 100% transparent and ready to prove that the funds received to date were properly applied and that they did actually benefit the populations they were supposed to benefit. If we can demonstrate a direct link between application of the funds and a tangible benefit to the targeted groups, it will be easier to make the case for maintaining the supplements.
RE Robin B.’s third post above:
Improved test scores prove an improvement in test scores, not an improvement in our schools. Too often what happens when test scores are improved is “teaching to the test” and other practices narrowly focused on increasing scores have replaced more beneficial instructional practices. Most “teachers” I know are well aware of this, and understand “Campbell’s Law.”
Not familiar with it?
From Diane Ravitch’s blog:
“Everyone interested in understanding how the ceaseless pressure to raise test scores can corrupt the tests should be familiar with Campbell’s Law.
This is an adage written by social scientist Donald T. Campbell in a 1976 paper. It says:
“The more any quantitative social indicator is used for social decision-making, the more subject it will be to corruption pressures and the more apt it will be to distort and corrupt the social processes it is intended to monitor.”
You can access the complete blog here:
http://dianeravitch.net/2012/05/25/what-is-campbells-law/
David, David, David. You continuosly get it wrong with articles such as this. In your favor you DID comment about how it’s done in Az but the cited article is a hack job intended to send a skewed message and bait for all those suckers who buy into it.
This article has been out a while and when I first read it I wondered if it had been edited because there was some very important information missing; primarily the graduation and college rate for the example states. Besides, despite what you note about federal dollars in Az you will even more quickly note out the other side of your mouth how bad Az schools are. Try as you might you just can’t have it both ways.
With very little effort it is entirely possible to find similar articles with completely opposite positions such as; despite the disparate tax rate there is little evidence it really matters. Summaries for two parent households and the positive difference there, even among the “poor”. Which schools do better & why. Does discipline matter?
Like the article, your own post is incomplete.
What we saw in our school last school year was an increase in scores — and an increase in policy changes that seemed intended to raise scores. Unfortunately, these new policies didn’t always serve the learning needs of our students, and the most challenged kids were the most negatively affected. We thought there were funding supplements (both deseg & Title 1) that could have been used to install support programs, and probably should have been used. At the time, we wondered why this wasn’t happening.
If an “independent” internal auditor (one who would report to elected school board members) could answer questions like this and could help students who need extra support receive the benefit of the deseg and Title1 funding supplements available to our schools, I support all districts of a certain size that receive deseg and Title 1 funds having one. It ought to be legally required, rather than a matter for boards to vote “yes” or “no” on. If you get the funding supplements, the scrutiny about how they’re being applied comes with the $$$. Policies like this are for the protection of the vulnerable kids these funds are supposed to benefit.
Unfortunately, the AZ Dept. of Ed. does not provide sufficient regulation and oversight of our schools. This is true of the management of our public districts as well as of the charters and privates that receive tax credit funds. Message to our legislators: the “invisible hand” does not work in the management of educational systems. All it produces is damaged kids. But I guess that’s what they want: more “clients” for their private prison systems.
Personal agendas have not solved the problems within public edcation. I notice that none of you addressed the question about federal funding of state charters. Why not?
The USPS is a great story of a public turnaround. Because of competition.
Until public schools identify that their main faults are NOT funding they can not change the perception of their funding sources. Taxpayers are sick and tired of over funding these failings.
Too little for way too much.
Betty, first of all I support you talking to as many people as you can at the school(s) about the needs you feel need to be met. I think most schools try really hard but some do get missed and I encourage parents to be as vocal as they need to be. All administrators that I know try very hard to meet as many needs as possible. I call people all the time.
The other issue that you address is the auditor. I too favored an auditor until I learned a few things. I asked Michael Hicks specifically if there was a reasonable suspicion that money was used inappropriately in any way. He just said, “Have a nice day”. So I kept looking for information. I talked to legislators, and people who have been in the district even longer than I have with a lot of knowledge about TUSD and how it is being run. I learned it will cost almost $500,000 for the auditor and I thought Whoa! THis is being demanded by someone(s) who can’t say specifically what they are looking for? THat is a lot of money expected to just pull out of an already strapped school system. Then I read the Mr. Hicks was also demanding that there be no school board member present. Ok… I changed my mind. It sounds like a witch hunt.
You can see pages and pages of how the district spends money that are as easy as pie graphs as well as complicated explanations about what is going one. I think they do a great job. Even Governor Ducey mentioned while explaining his awful budget something like… I know TUSD has had a lot of cuts and really they do well compared to other districts in how much is directly affecting the children but no they still get cuts in fact they get even more cuts(my summary but that was the gist).
Test scores prove: Seems like people want it both ways. Use the test scores if their system does well, say they are worthless if they are not doing well or they are out to prove that no matter what happens, public education is bad.
I happen believe that one thing that is an indicator is improvement. Using the same measure and showing increases does have some value. I happen to support one standardized test a year for accountability and you can other get other information also. I also know in TUSD there are people from on high… coming in all the time during testing…. It is very difficult to get away with much….Of course portfolios and teacher generated tests are very good. THe public seems to want some indicator that can show what is happening without too much time spent.
So if we have to ‘prove ‘ all the time that public education is valuable, then that is the best way. Seems like there is always someone trying to ‘get’ public education.I encourage all… go in the schools, volunteer, become a part of that community. It can be extremely rewarding and insightful.
There are some administrators who are able to keep the needs of the most vulnerable kids in their schools on the view screen in how they apply funds. The current Superintendent of Flowing Wells seems to be one of them; I am a fan of his.
However, for those of you who haven’t had the opportunity to view how decisions about where to apply funds are made in schools, I will say this: there will always be some administrators who will put their own career interests (in terms of maximizing outcome data, test scores, rankings, etc.) above the best interests of vulnerable students.
This is one reason why oversight and checks and balances on administrators’ power are always a good idea in school systems, and this is as true of where and how deseg and Title 1 monies are applied as it is in other matters. This is public admin 101. In organizations of a certain size, positions like internal auditors reporting to governing boards are in place in part to PREVENT malfeasance, just like police forces are in place in part to PREVENT crime. There doesn’t have to be a “reasonable suspicion” of recent wrongdoing to justify the installation of these kinds of positions. Having these kinds of supports to transparency and accountability is part of understood “best practice” in the fields of auditing and accounting, as various commenters who have professional credentials keep explaining. And having these kinds of supports in place is especially important in underfunded districts like TUSD that have chronic problems with public trust and a desperate need to pass bonds and overrides.
Why we seem to have such a hard time getting this across to certain groups locally (and to Robin B.) is hard to understand.
Another thing that is hard to understand: why does the amount it will take to install an internal auditor keep going up? First we heard $250K, then $450K, now $500K….pretty soon they’ll be telling us it will take a million. Stay tuned.
The only problem that I can see with an independent internal auditor is that it does make the assumption that the Board –or the power players on it–can distinguish themselves from the Superintendent. With this Board (and, to be fair, with many others that I have watched) and this Supe, anything reported to the Board might as well be reported to the Supe. Don’t worry, Robin B., there is NO CHANCE OF A WITCH HUNT , even with an independent internal auditor, when the Board majority represents the Supe better than it represents the electorate! (And my test for that is simple, by the way, because the current Board majority could well be re-elected for reasons having little to do with competency. My test is that a budget override for TUSD gets passed. And believe me, I would LOVE to be proven wrong about voter sentiment and wake up one day to a well-funded TUSD!)
I know, I have been calling for such a position for some time now,and I will continue to. And yes, the price does fluctuate depending on the source (and for some sources, on when you ask!) . But the position might be well be paid for out of the $10,000 a year bonuses that some are receiving that were never explained to the Board before they voted (what they heard was “no changes–no raises here” about the contracts which they voted on sight unseen. Well, Okay, I’ll give you that, a $10,000 bonus isn’t technically a raise I suppose, but it certainly looks like sleazy dealing from SOMEone. Even the union, though, later said “oh Board members vote on unseen contracts all the time!”) So its a very tight little bunch over there! And an independent auditor’s head might be spinning from so many possible irregularities to investigate.
But even if I got my wish, there would still be this little problem of very little space or autonomy between the majority Board members and the Superintendent. All I can say is, that must be some very powerful juju to be on the hiring committee of a Supe because it sure seems like many who get that opportunity then cannot allow a single problem or issue with their personally hired Boss to surface. Some of the questions that have not been asked by the members of the board majority are just amazing! All of which is to say that independent thinking appears to be in short supply throughout the powers that be at 1010.
To A Teacher Who’s Seen It All: You ask where the $250,000 cost of an internal auditor comes from. I cite the sources in an earlier post: http://www.tucsonweekly.com/TheRange/archi…. The Gibson audit said TUSD should spend $350,000 the first year, then $250,000 after that. When Pedicone was superintendent, CFO Yousef Awwad said he thought one auditor would not be enough to do the job. Put together the cost of, say, two auditors, including salaries and benefits, then add in the support of a secretary or two, and you come up with $250,000 pretty easily.
Thank you, David, for the back story on Pedicone and Awwad and the $250K figure.
Actually, though, I believe the commenter’s question above was not where the $250K figure came from, but, “why does the amount it will take to install an internal auditor keep going up? First we heard $250K, then $450K, then $500K…”
Recently Maria Ines Taracena quoted Cam Juarez as follows:
‘”Of course, we want an internal auditor, but there is no money, how am I going to justify that? When you look at the base pay of this position. You end up somewhere in the $400,000 [sic], if we are talking about benefits, an administrative assistant for the auditor…” he says.’
http://www.tucsonweekly.com/TheRange/archives/2015/03/10/tusds-cam-juarez-responds-to-anonymous-letter-focus-on-budget-cuts-to-education-not-attacking-us
Now the ubiquitous commenter “Robin B.” says she has talked with “legislators, and people who have been in the district even longer than I have with a lot of knowledge about TUSD and how it is being run. I learned it will cost almost $500,000 for the auditor.”
Perhaps Mr. Juarez and Ms. Beelen will now give us an explanation of where the $400K and $500K figures came from, as you have so kindly done for the $250K figure.
Cost of Auditor… I have to say with a smile, if I am ubiquitous(which I am ) you must be too because how else would you know that?
The cost came up with talk similar to David S.writing except when others figured the amount in total terms for 2 years it was 500,000. However even 250,000 is a lot for this district. I just want it to be on the up and up if it truly will help some people relax and focus on the education of children which sure seems to be missed here often. I said from the beginning, I am for it if it isn’t a witch hunt and there are real reasons to believe it could become one.
I have personally known students who left a public school to attend a charter school for a couple years. When they returned they were obviously behind others their age, and many told me (because I asked) that they asked to return, and that they thought the schoolwork “was for babies.” Not true for all charters, but true for
more than a few.
And I know students that were failing and lost in the public school maze. They left for a charter and found everything they needed.
It works both ways. Education efforts should know no boundaries.