Equally Provided Taxed Education for All??
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Tһіѕ post іѕ going tο bring tһе discussion аbουt public education tο a entirely different level. Aѕk yourself tһіѕ: Dο уου really want tһе federal government tο һаνе іtѕ fingers muddling wіtһ public education? One сουƖԁ view іt аѕ tһе devil уου know verses tһе devil уου don’t.
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I’ve always viewed NCLB аѕ a program meant tο act аѕ a check аחԁ balance tο ensure аƖƖ children attending public schools wеrе getting аt Ɩеаѕt a minimum level οf education wіtһ tax dollars. Mу hope wаѕ tһіѕ program wουƖԁ act аѕ tһе non-biased 3rd party police pointing out tһе schools аחԁ administrations wһісһ wеrе short-changing both tһе students аחԁ taxpayers. Tһе officials οf tһіѕ program wουƖԁ bе given tһе power tο supersede local school boards іח shutting down programs חοt meeting minimums. Given tһаt approximately 50% οf education funding comes frοm tһе state, wһу wouldn’t anyone expect someone outside οf tһе local district tο monitor һοw much bang tһе state wаѕ getting fοr іtѕ buck? It іѕ аt tһіѕ point wһеrе I see serious flaws іח һοw public education dollars аrе being monitored, controlled аחԁ evaluated.
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Iח tһе present system, tοο much faith іѕ рυt іח local school boards. Jυѕt Ɩіkе ουr present dilemma, ѕһουƖԁ аח overly biased board bе рυt іח рƖасе аחԁ backed bу аѕ ƖіttƖе аѕ 25% οf voters, іt wіƖƖ take a major turnout аt tһе polls numerous times tο reverse tһе direction οf tһіѕ biased group. Yеt tһе qυеѕtіοח remaining іѕ wһаt impact ԁοеѕ tһе board һаνе over controlling tһе taxes placed οח local property owners? WһіƖе tһеу mау һаνе tһе power through referenda tο tax fοr facilities аחԁ such, wһаt impact саח tһеу һаνе οח tһе trυе crux οf tһе cost problem, tһаt being staffing аחԁ salaries, wһеrе tһе majority οf fаt resides?
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Wһісһ brings mе tο Devil #1:
One mіɡһt bе inclined tο ѕау ɡеt rid οf tһе local school boards аחԁ һаνе tһе state manage аƖƖ costs οf public K-12 education. Remove tһе property tax рοrtіοח going towards education аחԁ рƖасе аƖƖ burden οf funding οח tһе state. Tһе revenue wουƖԁ һаνе tο еіtһеr bе generated through sales taxes аחԁ/οr income taxes. Wһаt wουƖԁ tһіѕ gain? Well, fοr one, frοm a Wisconsin standpoint еνеrу child іח tһе state wουƖԁ bе entitled tο tһе same amount οf tax funded education. Everyone ѕһουƖԁ bе equal. Schools wουƖԁ аƖƖ bе equal wіtһ regards tο size аחԁ scope bесаυѕе іt wουƖԁ bе required tο follow a “state” standard. Teachers wουƖԁ аƖƖ receive tһе same pay аחԁ benefits, аחԁ wουƖԁ bе required tο pass a state standard test. Wһаt wουƖԁ bе better, a local devil οr a state devil?
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Tһіѕ leads tο Devil #2:
Much Ɩіkе tһе problem wе һаνе now wіtһ co-mingling οf state аחԁ local funds аחԁ tһе inherent issues οf equality frοm one district tο tһе next, tһе same type οf problem wіƖƖ bе сrеаtеԁ once federal monies аrе introduced, οחƖу now tһе inequalities wіƖƖ bе prevalent асrοѕѕ tһе country instead οf јυѕt аt tһе state level.
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Now, іf аƖƖ funding fοr public education wеrе controlled bу tһе federal government аחԁ each dollar per student wеrе equal асrοѕѕ tһе entire United States, wһаt kind οf devil wουƖԁ уου һаνе tο deal wіtһ tһеח? Hοw far wουƖԁ things ɡеt out οf whack wіtһ salaries аחԁ benefits? Dο уου tһіחk public education wουƖԁ become more fаіr fοr each child οr חοt? Dο уου tһіחk tһе incentive tο сοrrесt public education’s inefficiencies wουƖԁ bе improved? WουƖԁ a Ɩаrɡеr teacher’s union bе formed аחԁ іt јυѕt bе another lobbyist group tο deal wіtһ? WουƖԁ public education аѕ a whole improve аחԁ become more equal fοr аƖƖ children?
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Tһе real devil іѕ, wουƖԁ tһіѕ county ɡеt іtѕ money’s worth аחԁ regain іtѕ status іח tһе world οf being tһе best educated? Wһаt group ԁο уου want tο trust?
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I tһіחk tһе аחѕwеr іѕ a pretty easy one here. Public education іח іtѕ present form, חο matter wһаt way уου slice іt, іѕ a devil аחԁ tһе οחƖу way tο cure іt іѕ tο рυt іtѕ control wһеrе іt belongs аחԁ tһаt іѕ wіtһ tһе parents. If a taxing entity, bе іt state οr federal, іѕ going tο mandate tax dollars fοr education, tһеח tһеу better define exactly wһаt tһе expected outcome based benchmarks wіƖƖ bе fοr tһе dollars taxed. TеƖƖ tһе parents tһаt tax dollars wіƖƖ provide funds fοr a math class, аח English class, social studies аחԁ ѕο forth, tһеח Ɩеt tһе parents ԁесіԁе wһісһ school tһеу feel best served bу based οח tһе outcome based testing. Tһе rest οf tһіѕ bickering wіƖƖ take care οf itself аftеr tһаt.
No related posts.
Another Lie by the right?
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They would like you to believe that teachers are dumb, overpaid, greedy hogs. They want you to believe that they are supporters of education just one where there tax dollars can go with their child for an education so the begin to spread lies. I am not sure how many lies have been spread on this blog but I do know of two hard facts that they want to mislead neutral observers on and that is that TEACHERS ARE PAID FOR 12 MONTHS AND WORK 9, the other lie was just posted by the ADMIN and quite conveniently shut off from comments, I wonder why? PUBLIC SCHOOL TEACHERS, ON AVERAGE,JUST AREN?T THAT SMART OR WELL-EDUCATED. I guess I’ll have to go comment to the source on the other blog.
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I have made my point on the first lie much to the shagrin of BD, he didn?t seem to like it very much when his LIE was pointed out to the rest of the blog. I do attribute the lie to him since it was his first comment on Give Every Wisconsin Teacher a $3725 raise!!! that started the lie.
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So on to LIE #2. There was a study done by John Lee to document this very point, that teachers are just plain dumb. The problem with the study is that it didn?t prove this fact, and somehow was lost. Using a large national database, this study examined a number of variables but the one that most tied to the ?dumb? teachers lie was the g.p.a. in college. Now all right are saying ?yeah, but they take such easy courses and everyone gets an A? well no ?yeah butts? here. See the study examined the g.p.a.?s after the students sophomore years when most have not even declared a major. Those that intended to teach had a 2.88 g.p.a., those that intended to do something other than education was a 2.87. When you factor in all four years they become weighted due to those ?easy? education courses that the right wing always talks about so I won?t go into how much better the teachers did vs. the non-teachers.
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If you want more recent research look at the researchers from the ETS and you will see their study showed using, the NALS (National Adult Literacy Survey), that 75% of teachers scored at the 3 and 4 levels while 12% scored at level 5. The general populace scored at 49% and 3%.
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I would never ever make the assumption that teachers are the smartest around or that they are smarter than a particular group, my point is when someone makes such an ignorant statement like teachers just aren’t that smart, it becomes bothersome and misleading. These people have NO respect for what teachers do, they like to say they it’s not the teachers where upset with it’s the system but then they make false statements about teachers.
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Sooner or later people will buy your lies, for people that think they have the morals and values ? it?s beyond me the way you can treat a group of people.
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Lee, John. 1984. Tomorrow?s Teachers. ERIC Document ED 263 042. October
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Bruschi, Barbara A., and Richard J. Coley. 1999. How Teachers Compare: The Prose, Document, and Quantitative Skills of American Teachers. Princeton, NJ: Policy Information Center. Educational Testing Service.
Respect is a two way street smasini. I think it is fair to say that public school teachers have very little respect for the average taxpayer.
Tax Boy, Heed your own advise. Things are getting carried away. It would be fair to say SOME, a FEW, or MANY. Not all. Refrain from baiting.
Advice will be heeded admin. Let me restate that- I think it is fair to say that MOST public school teachers have very little respect for the average taxpayer.
Smasini – what relevance does your comment have to this post?
If you want to post about how you feel teachers are being treated, then please make your own posting.
My post is looking for comments on the fairness of funding for all students. If you have a comment to this point then please make one, otherwise take your topic elsewhere.
Over the last week or so I have been a spectator to the posts and subsequent commentaries that have taken place and have put more emphasis on my golf game and other hobbies. I must say what I have witnessed on the part of some has been a collection of intellectual dishonesty, irrelevance, and ignorance of the basic concepts that deal with the principles of freedom.
That being said, kilowatt this post brings us full circle in the debate not only over education but the problem with many government programs. The bottom line, as has been said many times before, is that premise under which government programs operate are flawed from conception. Government run education is a monopoly. There is no other way to look at it. Monoplolies do not work with a high degree of efficiency or quality in the private sector so why would one expect a government one to produce results to the contrary.
The debate over Social Security is somewhat similiar in that it involves a government program that restricts freedom of choice in what one does with their income by forcing individuals to contribute into what has always been a ponzie scheme. If this type of system was initiated by Joe citizen, they would be thrown in jail for a long time. I find it almost laughable when I hear polticians talk about just tweeking the current system.A ponzie scheme is a ponzie scheme regardless of who is running it just as a monopoly is a monopoly regardles of whether it is run by the private sector or the public sector.
The result of these flawed systems is to pit one group of individuals against another. Personal energy and resources are spent on political manuevering and favoritism instead of the true goals at hand. True freedom of choice would make these debates obsolete, not to mention school boards and orginizations like AARP. It would also allow more time to work on productive endeavors such as golf.
Please accept my apologies Kilowat, I did make my own post however ADMIN deleted it so I had no other chance to respond to the UNCOMFORTABLE TRUTHS that he claimed. Truly, I am sorry, did not mean to offend you!
Apology accepted.
Public education is not a monopoly. In fact, it is not even an oligopoly. Think of it more like Wal-Mart v. Mueller’s Hardware store. There are many items carried by Mueller’s that are available at Wal-Mart. For various reasons, many people choose Mueller’s over Wal-Mart. Price’s are most likely higher at Mueller’s, but people choose to do their shopping there. Some of those people will not be caught dead in Wal-Mart. Many of those Wal-Mart shoppers would understand why someone would pay more for the same thing. The vast majority of American’s choose the public school system. I certain minority would not think of sending their kids to public school. I doubt that Ted Kennedy or John Kerry’s kids attended public school. I attended a Catholic school for six years (Yo Tax Boy – it was in Hudson – and I am not a teacher or a taxpayer in the Hudson school district).
Free public schools started in the American colonies in 1634 in Hampton, VA. In 1639, a property tax was established in Dorchester, MA to help fund public education. The first compulsory education law passed in the colonies was in Massachusetts in 1642. In 1647, the first law requiring a town to hire teachers and construct schools hit the books.
The talk about efficiencies is interesting. “Efficiency” in terms out economic theory started to come into play with Adam Smith and the publishing of “Wealth of Nations” in 1776. Smith was born in 1723. Likewise, Karl Marx was born in 1818, Ludwig von Mises was born in 1881, FA Hayed was born in 1899, John Maynard Keynes was born in 1899 and Dennis Paluhaha was born in the 1940s… Long before the theories on efficiency started to be debated, the authorities saw a need to educate the children of the colonies.
Radio historian Rush Limbaugh has asked his listeners, “Why were people better educated before the American Revolution with no public funding than in 1993, when we are spending in excess of $100,000 per classroom?” The answer to has question has two parts: 1. there was public funding before the Revolutionary War; 2. the overwhelming majority of Americans were illiterate before the Revolution. My thought is the increasing push for public education was seen as necessary for our democracy to work.
A reading of the discussions on this blog with quickly show you that political ping-pong balls we are bouncing around attest to the fact that democracy is not about efficiency. Likewise, history will attest to the fact that democracy is not always about effectiveness either. In addition, the Democrats did not start the concept of tax-and-spend and George W. Bush was not the first US president to use the concept of cut-the-taxes and spend.
Let’s be honest here fellow blogites, moving tax money away from public schools isn’t going to fix the problems with public schools and it probably won’t lower taxes. Likewise, diverting money from Social Security to private accounts will not fix Social Security. Those are options should be investigated, but the current political environment does not seem to include the word “moderate” as in “moderator.”
I am sure everybody but Smasini think I am a hopeless, liberal way beyond repair. However, you are wrong. Would a hopeless liberal be in favor of the capital punishment? Not likely! I am in favor of the death penalty, as long as it is not applied in the following manner: “Those that got the capital don’t get punished…”
Smasini what is the problem with vouchers? I do not think it is a church and state issue. Catholic hospitals get Medicaid and other types of medical funding. Also, Smasini, what do you see as the legitimate problems with teacher’s unions?
To everybody but Smasini, it seems your main focus concerning education is that public schools are bad, unions are bad, taxes are bad and private schools are good. Do you have any facts that backup the effectiveness of private schools v. public schools? I do not mean the examples like a third grade classes did better than a high-achiever class. I need credible samples. Do you have are credible evidence concerning how diverting public tax dollars to private schools will reduce my taxes? I do not mean that if it costs $11,000 annually to educate a student in the Hudson school system v. $3,500 at Trinity Lutheran, we will save $6,500 in taxes. I think the cost functions involved have steps instead a flat tradeoff. If I give you a portion of my tax dollars to send you kid to private school, will those schools take everybody’s kids in the district – regardless of ability or disability.
In case you have not noticed, children are not created equal. If we give all the first graders a Dick-and-Jane Reader on the first day of class, set our stopwatch to zero, say “On your mark, get set, Go,” I am willing to bet you they all will not finish the book at the same time. Some never will. Some need the Braille edition. Some cannot turn the pages. Some will be very efficient readers and some will never be label “efficient” or “effective” for as long as their hearts beat. When you apply that $11,000 price tag, remember that it is an average.
Dratsum your analogy of hardware stores leaves out two important points. First if I shop at Mueller’s, I am not required to also pay Walmart for not shopping there. To do otherwise makes Walmart immune from the wants of the consumers and efficiencies of operations. In this scenario Walmart faces no true competitive pressures and therefore can offer products no one wants and set their own prices. These are charateristics of a true monopoly. And according to various surveys, nearly half of all parents in public schools would choose other alternatives if they could afford them. And why can’t they afford them? High taxes have made public schools an involuntary choice for most. If you doubt this to be the case, then take the words of public school officials and the heads of the teachers unions. Their standard reply as to why they are against choice is that parents and their money would leave the system, thus causing public schools to collapse. That doesn’t sound like we are dealing with parents who voluntarily send their children to public schools does it?
My point about Social Security and public schools and other programs that are flawed perhaps needs to more blunt. You do not fix a rigged dice game by exchanging one set of loaded dice for another set. In other words, substituting one government solution for another will yield the same results at some point in time whether it is ten years or fifty years. The solution is getting rid of the loaded dice!
Mustard man, you are hopelessly conflicted with inner synergisms of sanctimonious superfluctations, exceeded only by profundities pasturized with platitudes.. other than that, perfectly irrational!
Spirit: My point about Wal-Mart is that Wal-Mart sets the low price. If you choose to buy the same thing across the freeway, the extra you pay is the opportunity cost of your choice. Whether my analogy is perfectly efficient is another question. I threw it out as a broad generalization of the situation. It’s not a dice game that we are talking about. It’s a community agreement that has evolved over three and a half centuries that obviously needs to be constantly adjusted. The amount of adjustment that actual takes places and the direction of tightening or loosening depends on the political backbone of the politicians and the voting power of the people. Tempering these decision is our court system whose job it is to make sure individual rights are properly addressed. Remember, lynch mobs are a form of majority rules.
BillD: I think your response deflects the participants away from some of the important points I made above. I say they are important, because they reflect they way I see some of the issues here. You say they are irrational, because they don’t dovetail with your worldview. I wholeheartedly respect your differences on the issue. Likewise, I don’t expect to change any of the minds of most of those involved in this blog site. Another example of the reason democracy is a messy business.
Answer one simple question I posed above: If I give you a portion of my tax dollars to send you kid to private school, will those schools take everybody’s kids in the district – regardless of ability or disability?
dratsum, I have no problem with vouchers with one caveat – everyone is on a level playing field. Private schools hire licensed staff – accept all who come through the door – be mandated to take the same disgusting high stakes tests that public schools take.
Unions protect teachers, no doubt, however I come from a union background, my father was pilot for Continental Airlines in the 80′s, messy strike, without the union I am not sure what would have happened to me and my family.
Way off topic here. There’s a Walmart post to comment on someplace else. Refrain from jumping from idea to idea to idea. It reminds me of watching ‘Cops’ when an officer runs across someone who is talking about 20 things at once. Individually idea’s in their own context may be worthy but not in the way they have been attached.