Did America set public schools up to fail? onesarahjones reports
America’s public schools are experiencing an austerity crisis. Photo: Michael Loccisano/Getty Images Andrew Worthington’s public school was in trouble even before the coronavirus struck. “We have lead in the pipes,” the Manhattan-based English teacher said. “We have all sorts of rodents. There’s soot in the ventilation system. The bathrooms are constantly out of service.” When school is in session, Worthington said, most classes have over 30 students.
With school back in session, administrators and teachers alike must stretch already scarce resources to meet new demands. If school buildings reopen at all, social-distancing demands smaller class sizes and more teachers. If schools keep classes virtual, poor students need tools that their districts might not be able to afford. Because the pandemic helped spawn a recession, schools also face crippling cuts as state and local tax revenue contracts.
As the president of the nation’s largest teachers’ union, Eskelsen Garcia’s position makes sense. It’s her job to secure the best deal possible for her 3 million-member base. But the facts are also in her corner. Consider Andrew Worthington’s school in Manhattan: The state of New York owes it some money. Almost $600,000, to be exact. That’s a healthy chunk of its annual budget, which is just over $5.2 million for the upcoming fiscal year.
Once again, New York is hardly the nation’s worst offender. According to Leachman’s co-authored research for the CBPP, the state of Arizona cut funding for public education by over a third from 2009 to 2015. A statewide teacher walkout in 2018 nudged funding levels up by a significant degree, but overall, the state education budget still lags far behind the 2008 standard. Florida, in second place, cut funding by 22 percent.
A decade after the recession, teachers raised the red flag again. They walked out of schools in droves and launched protests that continued well into 2019. The demands of the Red for Ed movement varied slightly from state to state, but the core complaint was always the same. The stagnant wages, the crumbling buildings, and the lack of school nurses and counselors all stemmed from one problem: Traditional public schools didn’t have enough money, and lawmakers deserved the blame.
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