| Dan Walters is out with a column arguing that our schools have plenty of money already. He describes the education community and Democratic legislators as "howling" about Schwarzenegger's proposed bugdet, which slashes education spending and has already resulted in 20,000 education professionals getting pick slips.
Naturally, the Republicans are attempting to claim that we are already spending too much on school administration costs and education reforms. They point to California's poor scores on standardized tests as a reason to cut school funding even more. Somehow logic seems to be eluding them.
Walters bases his column on numbers released by the Census Bureau, based on what he calls "hard numbers", but when you dig into them, they actually undermine Walter's argument. (check the flip) |
The Census Bureau report strongly refutes the oft-cited "fact" that California is near the bottom in per-pupil school spending. The national average was $9,138 in 2005-06. California was at $8,486, with New York the highest at $14,884 and Utah the lowest at $5,437 - one of 22 states, in fact, that fell below California's level.
In terms of school revenues, California was 25th among the states at $10,264 per pupil, just under the national average. It was above average in per-pupil income from federal and state sources and about $1,700 per pupil below average in local revenues, thanks to Proposition 13, the 1978 property tax limit measure.
Walters is arguing that below average is just peachy. Keep in mind that these figures are not adjusted for cost of living, just straight expenditures. The Education Coalition naturally has a few things to say about these numbers and points out a few details that Walters conveniently skipped over. This is from a press release I received via email, sorry no link.
The Census Bureau numbers show that California still spends $652 less per student than the national average, even though their figures on "student spending" include funds from outside the state that never make it into the classroom, which arguably inflate the figures. The Census Bureau estimates lump in payments made into the state retirement system, as well as federal funding beyond what the state spends. But even including those calculations, California's significantly below-average spending on students is abysmal. By comparison, the non-partisan national publication Education Week issued a report showing that California spends $1,900 less than the national average, because it only includes the actual funds spent by each state on each student.
Back to the cost of living discussion....even though we have extremely high costs, housing in particular, our teachers are still paid below the national average on a per pupil basis: $3,479 in California - compared to the national average of $3,811.
More from the Education Coalition:
The report also shows that California ranks 49th out of 51 states in the amount of funds spent on "general administration," which includes spending on the Board of Education and Executive Administrative Services, including the office of the Superintendent.
Those figures directly undercuts the arguments of the Republicans about our school administration.
California also ranks dead last in funds spent on transportation services, according the Census Bureau. This is a budget item that many school districts are having to cut even further with the proposed $4.8 billion in funding cuts, making it even more difficult for students in both rural and urban areas to get to school.
Remember the heralded studies that the governor put together in advance of his "year of education", guess what they said about education spending? We need more investment in our students and our classrooms not less.
The legislature needs to hold the line on the budget. We cannot afford not to invest in our future. |
