I haven't ranted in a LONG time. Something has gotten under my skin though.
On Sunday, September 9, 2007, the Springfield News-Leader ran an editorial under their "Our Voice" header supporting the ruling by a state judge in the lawsuit filed by almost half of the state school districts against the State of Missouri. The suit was filed due to the inequitable process the state uses to dole out monies to the 520+ districts in the state and the way that some districts are penalized by the state by simple being where they are... or where they are not more specifically.
The editorial board states that they see the lawsuit as simply a money grab and that it has nothing to do with equality among the districts in the state. That's where I call BS on the article. They say:
Of course it was about money... because in today's educational environment, money is, unfortunately, fairness. Money provides the means to hire and keep seasoned teachers. Money provides the means to install technology that keep students engaged and parents informed. Money purchases new textbooks and facilities that are falling apart. Money does not solve all the issues a school district may have in trying to educate a child, but it sure does help.
So, why then, is the lawsuit so darn important? Try coming up with a good answer to this question instead... What makes a child attending school in Kansas City or St. Louis any more deserving of more money from the state than a child that attends school in Sheldon or Crane or Blue Eye? Why should a district that has a low property value be any less deserving of the benefits of the decisions of the state to allow a company to build a new Baseball Stadium, Nuclear Power plant, or dam up a river and create miles of coastline?
Money is fairness when it comes to meeting state mandated guidelines for teaching kids how to pass the MAP test... which leads of schools being accredited and thus not failing No-Child-Left-Behind (NCLB). Money is fairness when the state passes two to three times the funds to schools in Urban areas as it does ones in rural areas. And I'm not talking about taxes because that's a whole other issue. This lawsuit was about the funding formula and whether or not one child is worth less to the state than another child.
Period.
Money = Fairness.
And slamming the Republic School Districts Super for stating, "Imagine what we could do with an extra $2000 - $3000," was just one example of not understanding what it takes to educate in today's world. The point of the statement is that if we can do the same here for half of what it supposedly take in KC or St. Louis, imagine what could be accomplished if we had their money at our disposal.
Obviously these people have never taught in a school district that has to perform to a mandated level as all other districts in the state (and nation now that the No-Child-Left-Behind act is out there) and do it with less resources than those more "deserving" districts.
That just shows that schools in this area have to work smarter and harder to achieve the same results, but that does not mean that the state's funding formula is FAIR.
Nor does it mean that a judge should decide that one child is more deserving than another just like our elected officials should not have passed a law that allocates money differently to individual districts.
Don't get me wrong. There are plenty of places where local school district patrons and elected officials are doing wrong by their local schools. Citizens not voting for tax increases when clearly there is a need such as classroom floors falling in or ceilings falling out is one such problem. Officials voting for a system of funding for schools that ties a schools intake of funds to property taxes is ridiculous since that places the burden of the money on the property holders while giving those that do not own much, if anything, a truly "free" education for their children.
Regardless, I hope this issue is not going to go away anytime soon.
11 years of teaching in districts where I read of the countless amounts of money thrown at St. Louis and KC by the state only to have them not even close to accreditation by the most lenient of state standards while we begged and pleaded for even a little extra money to update our books taught me two things.. 1) Money is not the only solution, and 2) It sure does help though.
You can read the News-Leader's point of view here.
On Sunday, September 9, 2007, the Springfield News-Leader ran an editorial under their "Our Voice" header supporting the ruling by a state judge in the lawsuit filed by almost half of the state school districts against the State of Missouri. The suit was filed due to the inequitable process the state uses to dole out monies to the 520+ districts in the state and the way that some districts are penalized by the state by simple being where they are... or where they are not more specifically.
The editorial board states that they see the lawsuit as simply a money grab and that it has nothing to do with equality among the districts in the state. That's where I call BS on the article. They say:
"From Day One, that's been the problem with the lawsuit more than 200
school districts, including many in the Ozarks, filed alleging that the
state's funding formula for schools was unfair. The question was never
a matter of fairness, it was about more money..."
Of course it was about money... because in today's educational environment, money is, unfortunately, fairness. Money provides the means to hire and keep seasoned teachers. Money provides the means to install technology that keep students engaged and parents informed. Money purchases new textbooks and facilities that are falling apart. Money does not solve all the issues a school district may have in trying to educate a child, but it sure does help.
So, why then, is the lawsuit so darn important? Try coming up with a good answer to this question instead... What makes a child attending school in Kansas City or St. Louis any more deserving of more money from the state than a child that attends school in Sheldon or Crane or Blue Eye? Why should a district that has a low property value be any less deserving of the benefits of the decisions of the state to allow a company to build a new Baseball Stadium, Nuclear Power plant, or dam up a river and create miles of coastline?
Money is fairness when it comes to meeting state mandated guidelines for teaching kids how to pass the MAP test... which leads of schools being accredited and thus not failing No-Child-Left-Behind (NCLB). Money is fairness when the state passes two to three times the funds to schools in Urban areas as it does ones in rural areas. And I'm not talking about taxes because that's a whole other issue. This lawsuit was about the funding formula and whether or not one child is worth less to the state than another child.
Period.
Money = Fairness.
And slamming the Republic School Districts Super for stating, "Imagine what we could do with an extra $2000 - $3000," was just one example of not understanding what it takes to educate in today's world. The point of the statement is that if we can do the same here for half of what it supposedly take in KC or St. Louis, imagine what could be accomplished if we had their money at our disposal.
Obviously these people have never taught in a school district that has to perform to a mandated level as all other districts in the state (and nation now that the No-Child-Left-Behind act is out there) and do it with less resources than those more "deserving" districts.
That just shows that schools in this area have to work smarter and harder to achieve the same results, but that does not mean that the state's funding formula is FAIR.
Nor does it mean that a judge should decide that one child is more deserving than another just like our elected officials should not have passed a law that allocates money differently to individual districts.
Don't get me wrong. There are plenty of places where local school district patrons and elected officials are doing wrong by their local schools. Citizens not voting for tax increases when clearly there is a need such as classroom floors falling in or ceilings falling out is one such problem. Officials voting for a system of funding for schools that ties a schools intake of funds to property taxes is ridiculous since that places the burden of the money on the property holders while giving those that do not own much, if anything, a truly "free" education for their children.
Regardless, I hope this issue is not going to go away anytime soon.
11 years of teaching in districts where I read of the countless amounts of money thrown at St. Louis and KC by the state only to have them not even close to accreditation by the most lenient of state standards while we begged and pleaded for even a little extra money to update our books taught me two things.. 1) Money is not the only solution, and 2) It sure does help though.
You can read the News-Leader's point of view here.
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Comments
I've lived in communities where this kind of thing has happened. I've heard business owners say that the purpose of schools is to get people ready to come work in their factories and nothing more. I've heard men who are lining their pockets at the expense of the poor in their communities say that schools can cut overhead by dumping gifted programs "because those kids are already smart."
Some people are more interested in making sure they have bingo and lottery ticket money than making sure the children of their communities have good educations.
I disagree with you on the lawsuit, however. The judge was right in that the state is fulfilling it's obligation to fund schools. The state constitution doesn't say how they are to fund it...just to fund it.
Now, we crack the whip on our reps to get the formula as fair as possible. That is, if people can be pulled away from their watching American Idol to contact their reps about the issue.