Over at Rocky Top Ed Talk, Charles Corra talks about the importance of investment in schools, using the fairly extreme example of Detroit Public Schools as a cautionary tale.
Corra concludes:
DPS’s situation is certainly an extreme one, but clearly not unrealistic. The legislature in Tennessee needs to look at DPS’s crisis as a warning – school funding is critically important and should not be overlooked. Yes, an entire state being underfunded by $500 million is certainly a big difference from a city school district being in debt $350 million, but the point still stands – funding matters, and its not a game.
While he notes that the DPS example is extreme, it is worth noting that the legislature is in the middle of some serious school funding games, with some lawmakers attempting to abdicate the state’s responsibility to fund schools.
Yes, school funding matters. And being $500 million behind as a state is problematic, especially during a growth period when we have a surplus of $1 billion.
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