School consolidation legislation was discussed today during a joint hearing of the House and Senate Education Committees. This legislation unilaterally removes local control and input from the decision making process, the same tactic Gov. Snyder has taken throughout his first term. Rather than reaching a public consensus, they prefer to circumvent local control to accomplish their desired end. These bills fail to provide objective criteria for determining whether a district has the ability to adequately develop and implement a deficit elimination plan. Those powers are simply left to the discretion of the state superintendent and treasurer. In the case of Buena Vista, this legislation may very well be in violation of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which serves to preserve and protect the democratic rights of disenfranchised communities. The people arguing for consolidation are the same individuals who advocated for the creation of 278 charter schools and prematurely removed the cap on charters which now account for more than a third of all school districts in Michigan. Most troubling are the unknowns, how will ISDs, the state superintendent, and state treasurer manage their newly designated authority? How will school districts accommodate the needs of these new students and put the proper systems in place on such short notice? Neighboring districts receiving students from Pontiac could receive up to 11,000 new students. As a former educator, I can tell you this isn’t something that can occur over night. Fifty-five of Michigan’s 549 public school districts are currently operating with annual deficits. Another 50 school districts will be operating with annual deficits as soon as next year. This accounts for 20 percent of our state’s public school districts. We’re no longer talking about an outlying 1 percent or urban centers that have been plagued by rapidly declining enrollment. We’re talking about urban, suburban and rural school districts that are experiencing financial distress despite two and a half years of “relentless positive action” and “fiscal accountability.” In reality, we’ve experienced two and a half years of austerity measures in the interest of corporate tax breaks. We need to be having a sincere conversation about the fact that real per-pupil foundation allowances have declined 25 percent since 2002. We need to have the courage to acknowledge the negative impact competition and for-profit interests are having on our public education system. So long as we have competition in our public education system we will have winners and losers. I don’t believe any child should lose out on their education. Again, we need to ask ourselves, what would we do if these were our children?
Posted on: Wed, 12 Jun 2013 01:59:39 +0000
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