“Is Education Spending Constitutionally Protected?”

Liv Finne Washington Policy Center #5 “Is Education Spending Constitutionally Protected?” Liv: Given these stressful times, I hope you are well. You certainly seem back to your old self. Some comments on the content of this posting: Documentation You were very thorough in documenting the comment SPI Reykdal. However, I notice there are no further citations in the posting. So none of the assertions that followed are documented. I realize that you are writing for a very narrow audience, the faithful who follow WPC with little critical analysis. The absence of citations means nothing to them, but as I am also a follower of WPC, they mean a great deal to me. Without those citations, one is left to wonder about the accuracy of those assertions. For example, you state that, “The McCleary school funding case decided by the state supreme court in 2012 held that it is the legislature’s constitutional duty to define and fund the program of education.” The McCleary case was finally decided with the filing of Supreme Court No. 84362-7 on June 7, 2018. Now that may seem like a small issue, but an error of six years is no laughing matter. https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/4498026/McCleary-Order-6-7-18.pdf Low graduation rates. Although we can all agree we’d like to see graduation rates higher, what you have avoided stating here is that current graduation rates are at or near their all time highs. Achievement Gap The only way to ensure that the achievement gap narrows is to prevent white students from improving their own assessment results in response to the efforts to bring about general improvement. The best way to narrow that gap is to enhance the resources available to the students who are behind. Priority Schools “Washington state has identified 118 failing schools, politely called “Priority” schools by state education officials.” While you may designate schools that don’t meet improvement goals as “failing schools” if you wish, it’s worth noting that the term “Priority Schools” appears to come from federal terminology associated with ESEA. Children of Color “These schools have a disproportionate impact on children of color.” One might just as easily state that “Children of color have a disproportionate impact on these schools.” You are implying that the schools make the students fail, as opposed to poor student performance is what earns these schools their “Priority” designation. Cold Hearted Administrators “The 44,000 students that administrators send to “Priority” schools are most at risk of dropping out of school.” You are implying that heartless school administrators deliberately send these students to failing schools, when you know very well that schools serve specified “service areas” which are determined by population demographics. That’s where the often used term “zip code” comes into play. 60% in Classrooms “... heavily bureaucratic system of schools which during the 2019-20 school year spent $17 billion, but delivered only 60 cents of every dollar to school classrooms. ” The reason money spent in the classroom is such a popular metric these days is that it allows the author to ignore the services of any certificated educators who do not have a classroom. That includes librarians, counselors, psychologists, nurses, or an educator who works in a “pull out program”. It’s a simplistic way to manipulate the data and impress people who don’t know any better. It also happens to be the national average for that metric. Privatization I confess that I’m surprised that you waited until the next to the last paragraph to unveil this argument. It is one of two reforms which is nearest and dearest to the hearts of libertarians and followers of James M. Buchanan. Destroy any resemblance of free, universal, public education and education becomes a commodity available only to those who can pay for it.