"Investing" in Education?

We've heard a great deal lately from Team Obama about the moral imperative of "investing" more in education. Setting aside the irony of this crowd telling anyone about what's "moral", we need to think very carefully about allowing our dollars to be "invested" by them, especially when it comes to education.

Writing in the Denver Post, Robert Hardaway summed up the situation nicely (http://www.denverpost.com/opinion/ci_5982482):

• Spending on public schools in the U.S. exceeds that of any other country on earth


• Public schools in this country currently spend more than twice as much money per student as private schools


• If money were the solution, America's schools would be the best in the world. In fact, American public school students ranked 19th out of 20 countries in international achievement tests (nudging out Jordan), although American students did excel in "self-esteem" and the number of hours watching TV.

Further illustrating that there's no demonstrable link between increasing federal spending and improvements in education results, Mr. Hardaway reported:

• a study has shown that Iowa, which ranked No. 1 in the nation in SAT scores, ranked 27th in per-capita student expenditures.


• Utah, which ranked dead last among the states in per capita expenditures, finished 4th in test scores.


• In Japan, where public schools students consistently finish first or second in international tests, per-student expenditure is about a third of that in the U.S., despite a higher cost of living.

Between 2001 and 2008, federal spending on education increased from $42.6 billion to $67.5 billion, an increase of 58% or 6.8% annually. In fact, since the 1970s, federal per-student expenditures have tripled (adjusting for inflation), but test scores on the National Assessment of Educational Progress have not improved. This does not sound like a very profitable "investment".

American taxpayers are spending, on average, more than $9,000 per student per year for all children in public schools. The average in Obama's hometown of Chicago is slightly higher than that, but a recent report published by the America's Promise Alliance found that the city's high school graduation rate was only 51.5 percent. Again, not a very successful "investment".

The problem with American education isn't lack of "investment" - it's lack of discipline and lack of competition. Entrenched interests (unions, bureaucrats, etc.) prevent our public schools from delivering an education which equals that currently delivered in private and charter schools for far less cost. Public school bureaucrats do not grant authority to teachers to discipline students or protect innocent students from disruptive ones. And just today the Obama administration rescinded charter school scholarships for poor African-American children in Washington D.C.

As the Heritage Foundation has reported, "Many Members of Congress value the opportunity to choose a safe and effective school for their own children, yet many of these same Members consis­tently oppose school choice legislation that would give the same opportunity to other families. For example, Senators Edward Kennedy (D–MA) and Hil­lary Clinton (D–NY) have been outspoken opponents of school choice initiatives even though both have sent their children to private schools."

Over 40% of Senators and Representatives send their children to private school, which is more than 4 times the national rate of private school attendance. They clearly recognize the failure of our public schools, and the failure of simply throwing more money at that problem. Yet rather than addressing the core problem, they simply dodge it by sending their kids elsewhere and continuing to compel the rest of us to make a phenomenally unsuccessful "investment". Once again, our employees in Congress want to have it both ways - to their advantage and our great disadvantage.