Should there be more funding for the public education system?
Although DeVos has not released her budget plans, here is what the budget has gone towards in the past. The majority, about sixty percent, of the budget goes towards instruction. This is assumed to include tools and curriculum. The next thirty percent goes to benefits (for staff) along with generalized support and the last ten percent goes to transportation and debt. All of these things are compacted into a relatively small budget of approximately one to five hundred billion dollars, depending on the fiscal year.
While this seems like a large amount of money, with over 14,000 school districts, it can become an issue. The issue is not with the amount of money necessarily, but where it is being put and which schools or districts are being better financially supported. In this way, Ms. DeVos is right, throwing pockets of money will not solve any problems if districts are not given tools to work with.
With that said, funding for the public education system is still a very important aspect of how well education runs, so better funding is still necessary. Unfortunately, if the School Choice program is adopted, funding will lessen and the public education system will suffer greatly. Randi Weingarten, President of the American Federation of Teachers, stated that President Trumps choice of Education Secretary "makes it loud and clear that his education policy will focus on privatizing, defunding and destroying public education in America."
Over 50 million students attended public school in 2016, while only a little over 5 million attended private schools. If funding were to be redistributed in a way that even less is provided for public education, that is over 50 million children that are not getting the education they deserve.
While "throwing money" at the system will not solve any issues, providing a big, well thought out and sound budget for the public education system to work with will help our children grow up in a positive environment where they can learn and be participating citizens. After all, the children are indeed the future, and how we choose to educate them will impact the future of our country.
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In Kelli Roger’s blog, “The Financial Factor in the Public Education System,” she discusses concerns about Betsy DeVos School Choice program possibly being adopted. The School choice plan includes taking funds from an already tight budget for public education and use the funds to assist private and charter schools. Kelli has a strong argument as to why she believes that the School Choice Program could be problematic under DeVos, and her numbers regarding attendance was confirmed on the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) website. It stated that about 50.4 million students started public elementary and only 5.2 were expected to start private school in the fall of 2016. So, after Trump cut the education budget from 68 billion to 59 billion, the School Choice program could take funding away from continued education for the teachers, the teachers’ salaries, and assistance for special ed, students with disabilities, and low-income students.
I share Kelli’s concerns with Betsy DeVos as our Secretary of Education, and I think Randi Weingarten is right when he said that Trump’s choice of Secretary of education, “makes it loud and clear that his education policy will focus on privatizing, defunding, and destroying public education in America.” I can see why Kelli quoted him in her blog, and I think our children’s education is very important, and needs serious budget increases, not decreases.
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