Posted on 03/25/2006 11:20:28 AM PST by Reagan Man
The District of Columbia spends far more money per student in its public elementary and secondary schools each year than the tuition costs at many private elementary schools, or even college-preparatory secondary schools. Yet, District 8th-graders ranked dead last in 2005 in national reading and math tests.
D.C.'s public elementary and secondary schools spent a total of $16,334 per student in the 2002-2003 school year, according to a Department of Education study. That compares to the $10,520 tuition at St. John's College High School, a District Catholic school that sends almost all its graduates to four-year colleges.
Last year, however, only 12% of 8th-graders in the District's public schools scored at grade-level proficiency or better in reading in the federal National Assessment of Educational Progress tests that were administered in the District and all 50 states. Only 7% of the District's public-school 8th-graders scored grade-level proficiency or better in math.
Not one U.S. state can boast that a majority of the 8th-graders in its public schools last year had achieved grade-level proficiency or better in either reading or math.
How much money did your state spend per pupil while failing to adequately educate in reading and math the majority of students in its public schools? The answers are in the chart below.
They eloquently make the case for school choice.
The state spending figures below are the total median expenditure per student as reported in "Revenues and Expenditures by Public School Districts: School Year 2002-03," published by the Department of Education in November 2005. The NAEP 8th-grade reading and math scores were published by the Department of Education in October 2005.
State | Per Pupil Spending |
Percentage of 8th-Graders at Proficiency or Better |
Percentage of 8th-Graders at Proficiency or Better |
Alaska | $16,665 |
27% |
29% |
District of Columbia |
$16,344 |
12% |
7% |
New York |
$13,989 |
33% |
31% |
New Jersey |
$12,419 |
37% |
36% |
Wyoming |
$12,116 |
35% | 29% |
Delaware |
$10,874 |
31% |
30% |
Connecticut |
$10,765 |
34% |
35% |
New Mexico | $10,602 |
19% |
14% |
Rhode Island |
$10,189 |
29% |
23% |
Massachusetts |
$9,952 |
44% |
43% |
Wisconsin | $9,805 | 34% |
36% |
Maine |
$9,787 |
38% |
30% |
New Hampshire |
$9,731 |
38% |
35% |
Vermont |
$9,614 |
37% |
38% |
Maryland |
$9,298 |
30% | 30% |
Pennsylvania |
$9,298 |
36% |
31% |
Minnesota |
$9,133 |
37% |
43% |
Colorado |
$8,948 |
31% |
32% |
Montana |
$8,927 |
37% |
36% |
West Virginia |
$8,845 |
22% |
17% |
Texas |
$8,826 |
26% |
31% |
Nebraska | $8,714 |
35% |
35% |
Indiana |
$8,673 |
28% |
30% |
Michigan |
$8,651 |
28% |
30% |
Hawaii |
$8,632 |
18% |
18% |
Kansas |
$8,620 |
34% |
34% |
Oregon |
$8,577 |
33% |
33% |
North Dakota |
$8,552 |
37% |
35% |
Illinois |
$8,465 |
31% |
28% |
Nevada |
$8,458 | 22% |
21% |
Washington |
$8,454 |
34% |
36% |
Georgia |
$8,393 |
24% |
23% |
California |
$8,262 |
21% |
22% |
South Carolina |
$8,226 |
25% |
30% |
Ohio |
$8,208 |
24% |
34% |
Virginia |
$8,087 |
35% |
33% |
South Dakota |
$8,001 |
35% |
36% |
Iowa |
$7,789 |
34% |
34% |
Florida |
$7,571 |
25% |
26% |
Idaho |
$7,554 |
32% |
30% |
North Carolina |
$7,469 |
27% |
32% |
Missouri |
$7,462 |
31% |
26% |
Louisiana |
$7,443 |
20% |
16% |
Alabama |
$6,942 |
22% |
15% |
Kentucky |
$6,934 |
31% | 22% |
Arizona |
$6,933 |
23% |
26% |
Utah |
$6,859 |
29% |
30% |
Oklahoma |
$6,817 |
25% |
20% |
Arkansas |
$6,774 |
26% |
22% |
Tennessee |
$6,460 |
26% |
21% |
Mississippi |
$6,387 |
19% |
13% |
Retirement bennies will have to go down eventually if they are to keep a decent amount at all. THey have to comply with Gas-b (government accounting something or other). The ones around here went substantially down which is okay. They've tried to keep health care costs down here too and it hasn't been as badly impacted as most areas.
Believe me I know that for sure. Things sure don't turn out for me hardly ever the way I want them to. I'd be rich if I had a penny for all the times things haven't gone my way. Heck, that could be a new way of paying off the debt. :)
That already happens here to a good degree. But again, there are subjective things that can be considered too.
If someone has it out for the teacher--parent, principal, or whomever, even a good teacher could get fired. A VERY good teacher here who'd won awards for her teaching and training student teachers got a principal who for some reason just didn't like her and failed her on her observations. She was given "one last chance" by the principal and "passed" with flying colors with the principal saying "Oh look you much I improved you." She subsequently assigned the teacher to teach sixth grade when she had done WONDERFUL work teachng third grade. If we do allow complete jeopardy involving the good teachers, we lessen the quality of the teaching in the community and school. I don't have the complete answer now (except for some things like frequent monitoring and parental input), but am just bringing up some points to consider. You're right, sometimes it isn't fair. Sometimes I think that there could be a different way to go about things sometimes.
My own wife got layed off due to outsourcing (of computer programming), and the greed and incompetence of the managers in her company. It is now a shell of what it once was. The president wondered why no one would talk to him like they used to.
This problem is generations deep and nationwide.
The educated class in DC send their kids to private schools, or, if they send their kids to public school, they live in the wealthy suburban counties of VA or MD. That leaves behind only the children of the underclass who are themselves undereducated and often illiterate.
This is no different than any other major city, but in DC it is ONLY the city kids who are counted, whereas, say, Detroit gets mixed in with Grosse Point for a state total. If you took DC and its surrounding suburbs you would have a far higher 'average' but still same kids with the same scores and the same problems.
.... and the cycles continue.
I know there are good teachers, I just don't think a teachers union is needed.
If tax money is to be used for public schools there should be a voucher system, and the schools should be run by education managers with the power to hire/fire as they see fit to manage the schools.
The taxpayers should be much like stockholders, who in turn can fire the manager if he/she doesn't do their job.
Privatize the schools and run them like a business.
I think private sector vouchers might be okay, but I'm not in favor of another welfare program,nor of the "purse strings," and I favor keeping private entities private .
Actually, I'm in favor of getting politics out of education altogether--on all sides--from those who place a lot of blame, promote the negative, bash teachers, encourage disrespect, and such AND from those who may use it to promote certain dogmas which have no place in the school. At least here, a little change in attitude would help and a little bit more time spent would be a giant first step. Other areas require more drastic measures.
At least here (not elsewhere) we could decentralize schools and allow them greater local control while keeping the high degree of choice that we have here already.
Yes, I can see the argument about inner city kids, though at least here that is an argument used.
Most of my concerns are personal. I believe that if the person has the "choice" to raise a child, they already have one of the best choices one could ever have and the greatest privlege one could ever have. I have been wanting that "choice" for many years and may never get that. I just would like the "choice" to raise just one child. BUT I will never expect someone else to pay for that choice. It will be on my own dime. To complain about a "lack of choice" when one has the choice to raise kids already and then on top of that expect me to subsidize that personal choice does not sit too well with me. I am taking my own "lack" of choice and using it as a vehicle whereby I can serve others while working towards that goal of being able to raise my own child. Like I've said very often, that child I have will not be the most spoiled child, but may be the most loved. If one has several children, I look on that as all the more blessings that one has received (responsibly anyways). And I think a person should thank the guy upstairs for that. I know I would.
Again, I didn't mean to get in a discussion about this. It's my own community and neighborhood that I am most concerned with.
Here in Birminham, the school system is a baby sitting and free food service for all. We feed the future brood mares and the future drug pimps well, so that their parent (singular) can have a lot of extra dollars left of their welfare monies. The brood mares keep the cycle going and the drug pimps land in prison. They are fed very well in prison also, most likely better than school. We had a federal judge here that his son was on free lunch the whole time he was in school, go figure.
"What does Massachusetts know that nobody else has figured out yet? Their spending is among the highest (42nd), and their scores are #1."
As a former teacher who is proud to say that my granchildren are ALL home schooled, I'd say that MA schools "teach to the test". In fact they may even pre-teach with the test!
Padding scores is not unheard of and I wouldn't trust that State to do anything straight up.
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