Politics: Why My Kid's Schools Will Suck
Bob Herbert in today's New York Times tells a compelling story about the school district in Hillsboro, Oregon. Because Oregon was so heavily leveraged in the tech world, and because of the manic phobia of actually taxing Americans for the services they enjoy, Oregon's schools are sinking into the murk.
The school year will be cut 17 days short this year, because the district cannot afford to keep the doors open. They have cut deeply into school programs this year, and expect to cut even more next year.
And Oregon is just an example of what's happening. In school districts across the country, the fiscal crisis that has thirty-some states staring down multi-billion dollar debts has taken its toll. The programs often cut are low visibility ones on behalf of people American society would rather not see thrive, like people with disabilities, and people seeking help with substance abuse problems. (Or all schools: The Kansas state legislature will balance the budget by delaying aid to schools, which ought to do wonders for student education.)
But this is all part of a sadder, larger passion play.
Rich people's kids will be able to get a good education. Their parents will send them to private schools. They will vote with their pocketbooks, and stop investing in their communities, because they see the crappy public schools as an affront to them. This will perpetuate the decline in public education that is occurring now at the state level.
Like in some major cities in America, only people whose parents can't afford private school will go to public schools. The public schools in cities will be war zones with shootings and open-air drug transactions, and we will click our tongues and thank heaven we don't have to send our children there.
In the suburbs and the rural areas, the decline won't be so picture-imperfect. Things will look the same as they did before, except that there won't be art classes, or music classes, or a chorus, or a school play, or programming for students with disabilities, or accelerated classes for gifted students. There will be less teachers, and fifty kids stacked up like stars on a flag in a room that's too small. The kid in the back, who's a little shy, won't learn the subject the first time through, and there won't be time to explain it to him because the school year's been shortened, and this teacher is barely getting paid anyhow.
But once the crisis is over, things will be better, right?
Will state legislators across the country take a look at what their cost-cutting has wrought, and restore funding to boom-time levels? No. (Two more questions you can use to reach that same answer: Do schoolkids make campaign contributions? No. Does Lockheed Martin do any education consulting? No.) Legislators, string-pulled by right-wing groups who think that supporting schoolchildren and providing services is akin to treason, will be shamed into allowing nothing more than slight increases that are dwarfed by the increase in the cost of living, as long as no tax hikes are needed.
The biggest irony of all this is that it has occurred in only about two and a half years. The Bush administration has been disastrous for American schools, starting with a tax cut that precipitated a recession. The recession deepened with 9/11, but the second tax cut, and the $80 billion war on an enemy not threatening our shores did a lot to deepen it as well. All this from a liar who got elected spewing crank about "leaving no child behind." Take a look at the unfunded mandates born out of Bush's 'all hat and no cattle' No Child Left Behind act.
The Bush administration has proven it likes war. Maybe some Americans like war, too, and many support the war on terror. But nobody bargained for Bush's secret wars: the war on schools, the war on jobs, the war on the economy, the war on prosperity, the war on democracy, the war on civil liberties, the war on reproductive choice, and the war on dissent. All of these wars are ones Americans can't afford to see through.
Bob Herbert in today's New York Times tells a compelling story about the school district in Hillsboro, Oregon. Because Oregon was so heavily leveraged in the tech world, and because of the manic phobia of actually taxing Americans for the services they enjoy, Oregon's schools are sinking into the murk.
The school year will be cut 17 days short this year, because the district cannot afford to keep the doors open. They have cut deeply into school programs this year, and expect to cut even more next year.
And Oregon is just an example of what's happening. In school districts across the country, the fiscal crisis that has thirty-some states staring down multi-billion dollar debts has taken its toll. The programs often cut are low visibility ones on behalf of people American society would rather not see thrive, like people with disabilities, and people seeking help with substance abuse problems. (Or all schools: The Kansas state legislature will balance the budget by delaying aid to schools, which ought to do wonders for student education.)
But this is all part of a sadder, larger passion play.
Rich people's kids will be able to get a good education. Their parents will send them to private schools. They will vote with their pocketbooks, and stop investing in their communities, because they see the crappy public schools as an affront to them. This will perpetuate the decline in public education that is occurring now at the state level.
Like in some major cities in America, only people whose parents can't afford private school will go to public schools. The public schools in cities will be war zones with shootings and open-air drug transactions, and we will click our tongues and thank heaven we don't have to send our children there.
In the suburbs and the rural areas, the decline won't be so picture-imperfect. Things will look the same as they did before, except that there won't be art classes, or music classes, or a chorus, or a school play, or programming for students with disabilities, or accelerated classes for gifted students. There will be less teachers, and fifty kids stacked up like stars on a flag in a room that's too small. The kid in the back, who's a little shy, won't learn the subject the first time through, and there won't be time to explain it to him because the school year's been shortened, and this teacher is barely getting paid anyhow.
But once the crisis is over, things will be better, right?
Will state legislators across the country take a look at what their cost-cutting has wrought, and restore funding to boom-time levels? No. (Two more questions you can use to reach that same answer: Do schoolkids make campaign contributions? No. Does Lockheed Martin do any education consulting? No.) Legislators, string-pulled by right-wing groups who think that supporting schoolchildren and providing services is akin to treason, will be shamed into allowing nothing more than slight increases that are dwarfed by the increase in the cost of living, as long as no tax hikes are needed.
The biggest irony of all this is that it has occurred in only about two and a half years. The Bush administration has been disastrous for American schools, starting with a tax cut that precipitated a recession. The recession deepened with 9/11, but the second tax cut, and the $80 billion war on an enemy not threatening our shores did a lot to deepen it as well. All this from a liar who got elected spewing crank about "leaving no child behind." Take a look at the unfunded mandates born out of Bush's 'all hat and no cattle' No Child Left Behind act.
The Bush administration has proven it likes war. Maybe some Americans like war, too, and many support the war on terror. But nobody bargained for Bush's secret wars: the war on schools, the war on jobs, the war on the economy, the war on prosperity, the war on democracy, the war on civil liberties, the war on reproductive choice, and the war on dissent. All of these wars are ones Americans can't afford to see through.
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home