Thomson: Is more money best for schools?

Is more money best for schools?

Rod Thomson

Executive Editor

Sarasota County voters face an enormous question in March: Should they continue to tax themselves so the county school district can have $250 million over the next four years to run our schools?

Schools Superintendent Gary Norris says this money is needed to pay for his NeXt Generation plan, which aims to close achievement gaps and increase graduation rates while hiking teacher pay.

An increasing number of critics - including a surprising number of teachers - question Norris' plan and the organization he has hired to guide the district, an organization that has worked primarily with inner-city schools with far different issues than Sarasota's.

The debate can get emotional and political. But if we stipulate that we all want public schools to improve, then the real question becomes: What is the best way to accomplish that? More money? More choice? New techniques? Reform?

Answering those can get murky, but perhaps the view clears if we simply walk through the issues, dispelling some myths. Here are some questions every voter should ask himself before deciding whether to extend the one-mill tax for four more years.

• Dollars or families? Most people in education tend to feel that if there was just enough more money, they could solve education problems. That, in fact, is the contention underlying Norris' plan.

But is it true? It would be much easier if it were. Unfortunately, it's just not that clear.

Proponents of more money usually point out that in suburban districts that spend more, students do better.

The muddy part is that often school districts that can afford to spend the most on schools are also those communities that have the highest percentage of intact, stable homes sending students to school. It's pretty well accepted fact that family breakdown begets poverty, emotionally damaged children and less successful students.

The anecdotal opposite of the successful suburban district is Washington, D.C., which is one of the biggest spenders per student with one of the worst school systems. Are there other factors involved? Exactly.

According to the National Center for Education Statistics, per-student spending nationally nearly doubled in the past 30 years in real dollars, but test scores have remained largely flat. On that scale and on the micro D.C. scale, we see no persuasive linkage between student-spending and educational outcome.

• Do we spend enough?

Nationally, the U.S. spends more than half a trillion dollars on K-12 education - more than any other country in the world. We are in the top three in per-pupil spending. But again, there is not a strong correlation between money and results.

The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development found that the United States consistently scores poorly in math, reading and other skills compared to other nations - most of whom spend less per student.

Perhaps there are other factors involved? Exactly.

This year, Sarasota County is spending about $642 million on 41,639 students, which comes to about $15,400 per student. By any measurement, that is an astounding amount of money. Under the increase voters are being asked to approve, that would grow to nearly $20,000 per student four years from now.

• What are the results so far?

So far, Sarasota County schools have spent nearly $100 million in the first three years of the tax. During the past three years, teacher pay has increased by more than 24 percent, making the district about the fifth highest in the state at $44,860.

But the standardized FCAT test scores have not budged as the result of this $100 million infusion. In fact, they have declined slightly - while statewide scores decline slightly or held steady with no similar infusion of cash.

If the huge injection of money these past years has not resulted in substantial change, perhaps that is because demographics of stable families have not changed much and that is a stronger determining factor.

Naturally, one must then ask whether $250 million forced out of taxpayers will do anything more than pay teachers a higher salary.

• The right spending priorities? If voters give the go-ahead, is this the right way to spend another quarter-billion dollars?

The majority of the money in Norris' NeXt plan goes for teacher pay raises - nearly $160 million - raising teacher pay from $45,000 annually to $51,000 by 2010.

While better pay theoretically would allow the district to attract better teachers, almost all of the teachers getting those pay hikes are already in the system. Will those increases make them better teachers?

Further, those hikes are not tied to teacher quality. The good ones, the mediocre ones and the bad ones all get pay raises. It's difficult to see how that will substantially improve the school district - particularly when the current round of pay raises has not.

• Money or reform?

If money is not the answer, yet most everyone acknowledges a serious problem, perhaps reform is closer to the answer - reform that puts more power in the hands of the folks who already are such a determining factor: parents.

Dramatically unshackled choice and vouchers are proven effective and are slowly becoming more accepted by elements of the education establishment.

U.S. Secretary of Education Rod Paige once said, "Once you empower people with choice, the system as a whole improves. Not just the students who take advantage of choice are helped, but the students who stay behind also are helped because the system responds by getting better. Choice in and of itself is a valuable commodity."

According to a Cato Institute study published in October, choice programs actually can save school districts - and hence taxpayers - money.

It already works to a limited degree in Sarasota County. Good charter schools have waiting lists. And the public schools that people most want to get into through public school choice are overwhelmed, creating more waiting lists. There is simply more demand for good schools than supply, within the same district.

Researchers at the Hoover Institute came to similar conclusions as Cato researchers: True choice utilizing age-old free-market concepts improves education and makes it more cost-effective.

Sometimes educators get so deep in the newest ideas, techniques and theories that they are unable to take a big step back for perspective. Reform is simply not on the radar for county education leaders.

Voters can put it there.

Rod Thomson can be reached at [email protected].