Many states and school districts have undertaken important school reform initiatives to prepare children better for the future, but deep funding cuts hamper their ability to implement many of these reforms. At a time when producing workers with high-level technical and analytical skills is increasingly important to a country’s prosperity, large cuts in funding for basic education threaten to undermine the nation’s economic future. Part of the problem is a reduction in federal aid to states, which then gets passed on to the local schools. But the core issue is funding priorities at the state level, and the persistence of the recession itself, which while technically over, has left stubbornly high unemployment and underemployment, and less money in consumers’ pockets, putting a drag on state tax revenues. That means that yes, we can blame Wall Street—and globalization—for some of this. And, of course, ALEC, which is warping public spending priorities as it works at systematically dismantling public education.
Posted on: Sat, 21 Sep 2013 03:05:31 +0000