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If public schools are going to succeed, then many states need to "catch up" when it comes to funding. More funding will attract more teachers, creating a strong

• baldfat 11y ago
  People HATE TAXES. People HATE paying school tax when they don't have children in school or never had children in school. We under value in society 1) Education (We make fun of smart people who lack social graces) 2) Science (Scoff at all science and under fund Space Programs) I ran for local School Board in my city. We are a school district with over 90% qualify for free lunch and extreme poverty. Parents pick Charter School over Public Schools (But Charter Schools under perform on test scores and under pay teachers compared to Public Schools (Money goes to the top in Charter which gets 100% of the child's local funding)) My city per student was the state's lowest at $5,700. The next county over some districts were paying over $28,000 per student. My state has the greatest disparity between haves and have nots. Our school board loves to point to Teacher Union and Teacher Pensions as the problem. How about just give us the money. We need a change in priorities and not freak out about taxes for education. Sadly I don't see this changing and I don't think funding is the number one factor for educational success but it is an easy thing to measure.
  • maratd 11y ago
    > We need a change in priorities and not freak out about taxes for education. People don't freak out over paying taxes for education. Even if they don't have kids in the system. They freak out over throwing money at a broken system and the solution isn't to throw more money at it. Attach a specific dollar amount to a student. Allow that student to go to whichever school they want. End of story. Stop forcing children to go to broken schools.
    • codyb 11y ago
      It's really not that easy. Location and transportation logistics factor in greatly and are hard problems to solve for the disparate network of connections a system like that might create.
    • baldfat 11y ago
      > Attach a specific dollar amount to a student. Allow that student to go to whichever school they want. End of story. Allow it to go where there is little to no public over sight, no public school board or checks and balances, under performing scores, teachers paid $20,000 less with no pension, and CEOs making millions. Charter Schools are a part of the problem with American education. Sure some Charter Schools are good so are some Public School but as a whole Charter Schools are not for America's children but for the non-profit and for profit companies that run them. PUBLIC SCHOOLS are the back bone of our educational system and democracy. Sending to school that take monetary advantage of our tax money with no over sight is wrong for everyone but the people who get the money. Who is running America's Charter School: https://schoolfinance101.wordpress.com/2015/07/22/whos-actually-running-americas-charter-schools/ https://schoolfinance101.wordpress.com/2015/07/22/whos-actua...
      • msandford 11y ago
        Public schools also do plenty of dumb things. It's not as though charter schools have a lock on this. A lot of people want "vouchers" so that private schools are more affordable. And plenty of private schools have a good track record, while having similar per-pupil costs as public schools. If it costs $1000/student/month irrespective of if a child goes to a public school or a private school, why does the state really care which one the child attends? Why not let parents choose the school?
        • baldfat 11y ago
          Charter Schools = They take 100% of the money from the public school and the money follows the student. > why does the state really care which one the child attends? Well I as a tax payer cares. If those school fare even worst and the administration and CEO/President of the foundations makes millions at the expense of children there is a concern. Public Schools work and have worked for decades. We have a problem with inner city schools and a big part is unfair funding, but killing public schools and give it over to various schools with no public oversight just government over sight is scary. We vote on our School Boards and Directors. We can protest and get Administrators removed. Can't do that to these Charters School. Also privatizing schools will make being a teacher an even worst job.
  • LesZedCB 11y ago
    I would happily pay 40-50% income taxes if our system was much more socialized like some of our European counterparts.
    • vkjv 11y ago
      I would happily pay 10-15% income taxes if our system was much less socialized like some of our European counterparts.
  • X-Istence 11y ago
    I know, I know, sample of 1 does not a study make, but I am single, don't have kids and live alone. I wish more of my tax money went to education, if this meant I was taxed a little bit more, then so be it. Education is so incredibly important, and honestly the education system here in the United States is abhorrent. Not due to the teachers mind you, but due to the requirements that are being made by legislators. Testing requirements don't allow for a wide variety of curriculum anymore, students are all taught at the same baseline (lowest common denominator because otherwise it's discrimination) and students are no longer allowed to excel for fear of making their peers uncomfortable. As a country the United States is not teaching students to think for themselves and challenge viewpoints, instead they are becoming complacent followers. Which is perfect if you want people that can easily be controlled.
  • warfangle 11y ago
    > People HATE paying school tax when they don't have children in school or never had children in school. Recently (well, a few years ago), there was a controversy in my home state about the removal of funding for bus transport to and from magnet schools. I went to one of those magnet schools - as did my two older siblings. I brought it up talking to my dad (who still lives there), and he said, "well, I don't have a horse in that race anymore." Meanwhile, those schools' academic ratings are plummeting...
  • Lawtonfogle 11y ago
    >People HATE TAXES. People HATE paying school tax when they don't have children in school or never had children in school. Or maybe I hate paying school taxes because the schools promote sports as far more important than academics. End of last year I went to the awards ceremony for top performing students in academics and sports... the difference in treatment left me feeling ill in my gut. Exercise serves a purpose. I've even remember seeing evidence exercise helps improve learning. And in no way am I against a group of kids playing ball together. But I do not like funding an educational institute which does more to foster sports are being more important than the very stated purpose. Think about some other good goal. Say feeding starving people. Now imagine if you were forced to pay some charity that was grossly incompetent in how it actually worked. Yes, people got fed, but often after they were negatively impacted in other ways. And that is money that could'be been going to better charities, but you aren't allowed to make such a choice.
    • intopieces 11y ago
      >Or maybe I hate paying school taxes because the schools promote sports as far more important than academics. Unfortunately, this is unlikely to change given that sports bring in revenue and academics do not.
      • nmrm2 11y ago
        > sports bring in revenue and academics do not. ?!?! In high schools in the US, academics are intimately linked to funding. Sports are not. I guarantee you no teacher or administrator gives a shit about how much money the Friday night concession stand is bringing in. It probably doesn't even cover the electricity bill for the flood lights. But they do all care a lot about test scores and other (mostly academically-related) metrics that determine how many millions in state/federal funding they receive. Sports are one of many ways that students can use their free time to learn to socialize, lead, and work in a group. Those are all important skills that are hard to teach in a classroom, and running a sports team (or robotics team or programming competition team or chess club) is a hell of a lot cheaper than running a classroom. And often far more enjoyable for everyone involved.
  • reddog 11y ago
    Did you know that the US spends more on education than almost any other country? Only Switzerland spends more per capita and only Switzerland, Norway and Austria spend more per student. http://nces.ed.gov/programs/coe/indicator_cmd.asp http://nces.ed.gov/programs/coe/indicator_cmd.asp Do you think more money is the answer or should we spend smarter?
• dopamean 11y ago
  I'm always find the "more funding" idea to be somewhat dubious. Don't we already spend a ton of money on education? Perhaps even more per pupil than other developed countries?
  • cschneid 11y ago
    At the teacher level, they are underpaid. My girlfriend is a high school teacher w/ 4 years experience, a masters degree in her topic, and works 12+ hours a day (not kidding, seriously all day). She makes $35k / year. If she wasn't lucky enough to have an engineer paycheck behind her life, she simply wouldn't be able to do the job. It's likely that funding gets allocated in stupid ways, but the whole process is inherently expensive. Managing thousands of employees, dozens of buildings, updating equipment, training, etc, etc. It's a hard problem, and we've basically just decided that only "dedicated" workers should do it, which is code for "willing to be underpaid compared to qualifications".
    • twoodfin 11y ago
      At the teacher level, they are underpaid. My girlfriend is a high school teacher w/ 4 years experience, a masters degree in her topic, and works 12+ hours a day (not kidding, seriously all day). She makes $35k / year. How much do teachers in her school system who have 25 years experience make? The union-mandated tenure system, which prevents young, talented teachers from making even vaguely competitive salaries, but rewards older, mediocre teachers with "time served" is part of what's stopping "more money" from being the answer. Higher teacher salaries under the current system would largely reward the oldest, not the best.
      • PretzelFisch 11y ago
        If you put more money into the system, you could be pretty sure that the teachers would not see more than a dime of it. Tenure is what prevents schools from removing a higher cost experienced teacher and replacing them with a cheaper no experienced teachers.
• clarkmoody 11y ago
  > If public schools are going to succeed Under what circumstances would you consider that public schools are a failure and that we should try another approach?
  • geggam 11y ago
    The current circumstances indicate a really high failure rate. Another approach would be prudent.
  • zardo 11y ago
    In the case that they don't provide a world class education for all students. Why should we settle for less than that?
• jpereira 11y ago
  Wouldn't more funding in public schools just eventually lead to more expensive private schools which leads to there being new standards set for education? We've seen this recently with a college degree becoming the new high school diploma in regards to the job market.
  • ticviking 11y ago
    That has nearly as much to do with changing standards. While I was completing my teaching credential I watched the standards process dumb things down so schools could achieve an "acceptable pass rate"
• marincounty 11y ago
  "If public schools are going to succeed, then many states need to "catch up" when it comes to funding. More funding will attract more teachers, creating a stronger candidate pool. If you look at the average funding per student by state, Texas isn't doing so hot [1], especially for being the second largest state [2]. There's definitely more to it than just funding, but I think that would be a good starting point." I used to think on these lines too. After talking to two teachers in different districts, they both said the same things. More money is fine, but it usually goes to Administration. The two teachers I knew, and talked to, lived and taught in California. They were both tenured. I talked to them a decade ago. They were both making, I belive 150k a year. At the time, they weren't complaining about wages. In fact, they had no complaints. Maybe, they just got lucky? I don't think money is the answer? (Actually, I just remembered--my ex'es mother-inlaw was a school teacher, and she told me countless times the money always goes to bloated Administration. I don't know why I just remembered her? She taught high school back east.)
• rebootthesystem 11y ago
  > More funding will attract more teachers, creating a stronger candidate pool Without the ability to get rid of bad teachers as quickly and easily as one can fire bad engineers in the private sector money isn't going to fix a damn thing. It might even make it worst. Fix that part first.
  • panzagl 11y ago
    In Colorado teachers can be fired at the drop of a hat (or, more likely, not be asked to come back next year). I can assure you this hasn't kept the state off of the bottom of the academic performance lists.
    • rebootthesystem 11y ago
      You are right. The problem is far more complex. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10229785 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10229785
• Kinnard 11y ago
  Public schools are not going to succeed. I spent 12 years in some of the best public schools and two at an elite boarding school. People are too attached to the good intentions behind the model to accept that a new one has to be found. A lot schools/districts that are better spend less money per student than schools that are worse. You should ask David Tarver about it.
• jcromartie 11y ago
  Aren't some of the worst performing school districts also the most expensive?
• 13thLetter 11y ago
  So it's kind of unfortunate that when people see a system full of ignorant jerks, they have been trained to always think "let's give the ignorant jerks more money," and never think "let's fire the ignorant jerks." The incentives are completely upside down when one's entirely avoidable screwups are used as an excuse to ask for more money. That's how we get the current state of public education and, frankly, most levels of government in the United States: hideously expensive bureaucracies run by ignorant jerks for their own benefit.