Better use of education money, not more of it, will improve student learning
September 2006
We are regularly told by education officials and teachers’ union spokesmen that the schools need more money. But by any reasonable measure, Washington public schools have ample funding. Operating expenditures for K-12 public schools have increased almost 92 percent, adjusted for inflation, since 1982, even though the number of students has increased only 36 percent. Today, Washington taxpayers spend about $9,500 per public school student.
In contrast, private schools typically spend around $6,000 per student. Even taking the differences in their missions into account, public schools still spend over 50 percent more per student than private schools, and generally achieve poorer academic results.
Yet, public schools are certainly not short on staff. In 2005, there were 53,117 certificated teachers, 3,925 administrators, 36,502 classified staff (food services, transportation, building maintenance) and 6,906 support services personnel on the education payroll. With a workforce of a little over 100,000, there is about one education employee for every ten students.
Also, the trend toward smaller families means that the state’s total population has grown much faster than the number of students, creating a larger tax base to pay for educating a proportionately smaller number of children.
New government education programs are regularly announced with great fanfare, with rosy promises about how they will improve student learning. Once in place and funded, however, these programs are seldom mentioned, since they usually achieve only limited success. Since 1992, the state has spent, in nominal dollars, almost $1.7 billion on 27 targeted programs. Much of this is in addition to the roughly $6 billion in basic funding the state spends annually for education, on top of local school levies.
A partial list of these once-touted programs include: 21st Century Schools (1993), Readiness to Learn (1993), Math Initiative (1993), School to Work (1994), Reading Program (1997), Reading Grants (1998), Reading Corps (1999), Second Grade Reading (2000), Math Helping Corps (2000), Summer Accountability Institute (2000), Web Instructional Network (2002), Student Achievement Fund (2002), Mentor Teacher Fund (2002), and Focused Assistance (2002).
Despite all the extra funding, public school officials are failing to educate children to the standard set by the state. Only slightly more than half of sophomores passed the math, reading and writing portions of the latest state-required WASL test.
Washington’s adoption of the WASL has been successful at moving the culture of the education system away from measuring inputs (number of dollars spent) to measuring real-world results (how well students are learning). Despite years of targeted programs and higher funding, Washington students are still not learning at levels needed to succeed beyond school. The research argues not for lowering test standards, which would only result in more poorly educated students being graduated into society, but for maintaining standards and improving student learning.
The quality of public education is not necessarily related to the level of spending. This can be seen in private schools and in national and international test scores, which show that high academic achievement is often not dependent on high levels of education spending. Similarly, objective measures like spending per student, class size, and average teacher pay are not reliable predictors of high academic performance. For example, private school class sizes are commonly larger than those of their public school counterparts, yet private school teachers often produce better academic results (and usually for less compensation).
Simply making us all pay more for education budgets is not the answer. There are smarter ways to spend our current education dollars. Policymakers should decentralize the management of education by giving local principals more control over their own hiring and spending. Principals should then be held accountable for how well their school is accomplishing its educational mission.
Similarly, policymakers should allow principals to adopt merit or performance-based pay for teachers. Paying good teachers more shows respect for students, parents and taxpayers, who have a right to expect that public schools will consistently and effectively educate children.
Increasing education budgets will not improve the quality of student learning in Washington. Blindly boosting spending not only misuses the public’s money, it contributes to public distrust when people are told schools are improving when in fact that is not happening. Only dramatic, proven reforms, not increased spending, will significantly improve the academic achievement of Washington students.
Click here to read more about the author Paul Guppy.
This commentary is based on independent research by Washington Policy Center Adjunct Scholar Liv Finne. See her full report, “An Overview of Public School Funding in Washington,” at www.washingtonpolicy.org.