On both the national and state level, we have recently heard promises to add programs and initiatives to education along with proposed budget cuts and tax refunds. What is going on here?
In last week's State-of-the-Union address, President Bush proposed shrinking federal spending on education by more $3 billion, but he also wants to launch new initiatives to strengthen math and science achievement and reform America's high schools (sounds like another unfunded mandate!) As Wendy Puriefoy, president of Public Education Network, says, "This budget clearly leaves children behind."
On the state level, candidate for governor, Kerry Healey, had this to say about education:
"I believe that Massachusetts should offer top-quality education from Kindergarten through college. In order to compete in this new global economy, our schools need not to be just the best in the nation, but as good as any in the world. To fulfill our promise to today’s children, we need to focus on education in new ways, creating enhanced opportunities for early childhood education, intensive early interventions for children with learning difficulties, and more time in the classroom for everyone. I also believe we need to make public higher education more affordable for everyone." A little later on in the same speech, Healey calls for a reduction in the State income tax to 5%!
(From Adam Reilly's online column:
http://www.thephoenix.com/TalkingPolitics/ )
To put both of these statements in context, let's look at the record. The federal budget has no increased funding for Title I, the program to help disadvantaged children and the source of over half of the funding for No Child Left Behind. Most of the $3 plus billion in cuts to education will come from "scrapping 42 education programs, including programs for the arts, state grants for vocational education, Perkins loans for low-income college students and the Even Start literacy program for poor families. " From the PEN website, to read full article go to:
http://www.stateline.org/live/On the state level, consider this: "Massachusetts cut the largest percentage of state aid to education in the nation in 2002 - and we have never recovered. We now rank 34th out of 50 states in education spending as a percentage of personal income. "(From the Massachusetts Budget and Policy Center,
www.massbudget.org).
Meanwhile, on the local level, we have the towns in revolt over Chapter 70 funding, and in Lowell, the schools are still dealing with the aftermath of massive budget cuts in 2003, while struggling to maintain some progress in the face of diminished funding and increased accountability.
