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Public Schools = One Big Jobs Program
Who said public schooling is all about the adults in the system and not the kids? Everyone knows it’s even more basic than that: Public schooling is a jobs program, pure and simple. At least, that’s what one can’t help but conclude as our little “stimulus” turns one-year old today.
“State fiscal relief really has kept hundreds of thousands of teachers and firefighters and first responders on the job,” declared White House Council of Economic Advisers head Christina Romer today.
Throwing almost $100 billion at education sure as heck ought to have kept teachers in their jobs, and the unemployment numbers suggest teachers have had a pretty good deal relative to the folks paying their salaries. While unemployment in “educational services” – which consists predominantly of teachers, but also includes other education-related occupations – hasn’t returned to its recent, April 2008 low of 2.2 percent, in January 2010 it was well below the national 9.7 percent rate, sitting at 5.9 percent.
Of course, retaining all of these teachers might be of value to taxpayers if having so many of them had a positive impact on educational outcomes. But looking at decades of achievement data one can’t help but conclude that keeping teacher jobs at all costs truly isn’t about the kids, but the adults either employed in education, or trying to get the votes of those employed in education. As the following chart makes clear, we have added teachers in droves for decades without improving ultimate achievement at all:
(Sources: Digest of Education Statistics, Table 64, and National Assessment of Educational Progress, Long-Term Trend results)
Since the early 1970s, achievement scores for 17-year-olds — our schools’ “final products” — haven’t improved one bit, while the number of teachers per 100 students is almost 50 percent greater. If anything, then, we have far too many teachers, and would do taxpayers, and the economy, a great service by letting some of them go. Citizens could then keep more of their money and invest in private, truly economy-growing ventures. But no, we’re supposed to celebrate the endless continuation of debilitating economic – and educational — waste.
You’ll have to pardon me for not considering this an accomplishment I should cheer about.
Same Old SAFRA Tune
Congressman George Miller (D-CA) is at it again, publishing a letter in the New York Times Saturday implying that the Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act — which is, thankfully, languishing in the Senate right now — would save taxpayers $87 billion over ten years.
Quite the opposite: The bill would almost certainly cost taxpayers additional tens-of-billions, not save money. But that doesn’t seem to deter Miller. Unfortunately, neither does the galactic national debt, nor that people appear to have had it with seemingly incessant expansion of federal power.
Dr. Frankenstein on His Creation: It’s All The Monster’s Fault
As I have explained on numerous occasions, supporters of the Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act (SAFRA) – which would end federal guaranteed student loans, turn everything into lending direct from Uncle Sam, and spend the resulting savings and way much more — have often shamelessly promoted the bill as a boon to taxpayers when it will almost certainly cost them tens-of-billions. Where they have generally been right is in rebutting criticisms that SAFRA would be a federal takeover of a private industry. With lender profits all but assured under federal guaranteed lending, the vast majority of student loans haven’t been truly private for decades.
Unfortunately, SAFRA advocates are just as clueless — or, more likely, rhetorically unbridled — about what constitutes a private entity as are status-quo supporters. Case in point, an article in today’s Huffington Post that, along with U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, attempts to portray the suddenly rocky road ahead for SAFRA as a result of evil lender lobbyists dropping boulders in the selfless legislation’s way:
Taking aim at Sallie Mae, the largest student lender in the country and a driving force behind the lobbying effort, Education Secretary Arne Duncan on Tuesday accused the company of using taxpayer funds to lobby and advertise, and cast its executives as white-collar millionaires uninterested in serious education reform.
“Sallie Mae executives have paid themselves hundreds of millions of dollars in the last decade while teachers, nurses, and scientists — the backbone of the new economy — face crushing debt because of runaway college tuition costs,” Duncan said.
Here Sallie Mae is painted in the same ugly hues as Lehman Brothers, AIG, and all the other supposedly rapacious, unscrupulous companies whose unchecked greed, we’re told, brought the American economy to its knees. (We also get the baseless but obligatory pronouncement about “crushing debt” for teachers and other toilers for the “public good.”)
But wait! Doesn’t ”Sallie Mae” sound a lot like”Fannie Mae” and “Freddie Mac”? Of course! That’s because just like Fannie and Freddie, Sallie was created by the federal government, only with Sallie’s job being to furnish lots of cheap college loans. And guess what? Just like Fannie and Freddie, Sallie became by far the biggest kid on her block because her huge federal creator fed her and protected her for decades, not setting her off on her own until 1996. But that part of her story doesn’t fit anywhere into the evil corporation narrative, so it’s just not mentioned. All we need to know is Sallie is private, her owners and employees make a lot of money, and that is why she is evil and dangerous.
And so the politics of demonization and denial, a staple of the recession blame game, continues. Private institutions are portrayed as malevolent predators and government as a warm, pure, protective father-figure. But there is much more accurate imagery possible when it comes to Sallie Mae: Egomaniacal Dr. Frankenstein furiously blaming the monster he created for doing exactly what he built it to do.
And some wonder why there’s such widespread outrage — the real reason SAFRA is in trouble – about ever-expanding federal power?
Obama Ringing the Pell
As part of his ill-considered credentialing-to-compete initiative, President Obama wants to greatly increase both the size and availablity of Pell Grants. Under his proposed FY 2011 budget, the total pot of Pell aid would rise from $28.2 billion in 2009 to $34.8 billion in 2011; the maximum award would go from $5,350 to $5,710; and the number of students served would rise by around 1 million.
A critical question, of course, is whether increasing Pell will ultimately make college more affordable or self-defeatingly fuel further tuition inflation. The New York Times took that up in yesterday’s Room for Debate blog.
Economist Richard Vedder has long educated people about the inflationary effect of student aid, and does so again with great clarity. It’s higher-ed analyst Art Hauptman, however, whom I think best captures what likely occurs when Pell is combined with all the cheap loans and other aid furnished by Washington, states, and schools themselves:
Read the rest of this post »
Politicians Are SO Predictable!
The big vote-buy is on!
Today, the Obama administration will release its FY 2011 budget proposal, and while the administration would supposedly freeze discretionary spending in all areas except defense, homeland security, and veteran’s affairs, education is slated to get a huge boost in “investment.” (Politicians love the term “investment” when discussing education spending, by the way, because it suggests a big payoff to come. That we’ve never actually realized said payoff doesn’t seem to bother them.) The proposal is expected to include a $3 billion increase for No Child Left Behind-authorized programs; $1 billion for some sort of incentive to overhaul NCLB (it’s not clear how the president can offer Congress extra money to act, but I’m sure there are details to come); a $1.35 billion extension of the stimulus-funded Race to the Top fund; and a $17 billion increase in Pell Grant funding. In other words, education appears slated — as I feared it would — to be the administration’s post-Massachusetts, big vote bribe.
At the same time the budget proposal is coming out, the administration is also starting to release information about it’s plans for NCLB reauthorization. According to the New York Times, the basic idea will be to “change federal financing formulas so that a portion of the money is awarded based on academic progress, rather than by formulas that apportion money to districts according to their numbers of students, especially poor students.”
On the surface, it makes sense to reward high performance rather than just send money to states based on set formulas. But a little deeper digging reveals the pit below.
Bipartisan Badness?
As I wrote last week, I had a bad feeling that President Obama would turn to education bribe — er — “reform” after last Tuesday’s bombshell election, and it seems I was right to be afraid — very afraid. It’s an area where Republicans have been all too happy over the last decade or so to let big government in despite its undeniable record of failure, and it will give the President a terrific chance to look like a new, “bipartisan” man. Fortunately, many progressive Democrats dislike extremely intrusive federal education laws like No Child Left Behind, so while the battle lines over what the president is likely to propose for K-12 education will probably be different than we’ve seen over the last year, hopefully the opposition will be just as strong. And when it comes to some efforts Mr. Obama is likely to highlight in higher education — even more federal spending and a complete takeover of student lending — Republicans will likely offer much more unified resistance. In other words, fighting the awful proposals we’re likely to hear about in tonight’s State of the Union won’t be easy, but it won’t be impossible, either.
Is “Race to the Top” Handwriting on the Wall?
As freedom-minded folks have been celebrating major setbacks for Obama Care, campaign-speech control, and lots of other attacks on liberty, some have been sounding the alarm over the insidious “Race to the Top” contest. A couple of siren blasts I just caught are well worth taking in yourself, one by the Heartland Institute’s Robert Holland and the other by Colorado Board of Education member Peggy Littleton. In particular, the writers think they see the handwriting on the wall in the de facto requirement that states promise to adopt as-yet-unwritten “common” (read: national) standards to compete for RTTT funds. As Littleton writes:
We already know that the federal government, or at the least consortiums of states, wants to develop assessments to assess the Common Core. The scary progression continues… National Common Core, common assessment, will inevitably lead to a national curriculum.
Is nationalizing — and thereby federalizing — the curriculum the Obama administration’s goal? RTTT sure as heck makes it seem that way, but we should have an even better idea soon: the administration wants Congress to reauthorize the No Child Left Behind Act this year.
And so it may be coming to pass: Perhaps, ironically, because of this week’s revolt against Washington, we might be heading for another power grab by Washington. And this time, we shouldn’t expect anything close to unanimous Republican help fending it off.
Are We Mad about SAFRA?
This morning I mused about whether yesterday’s Massachusetts miracle would curb the drive to have the feds take over K-12 education. In particular, I wondered if the president’s new proposal to extend the “Race to the Top” – and as part of that directly connect local districts to the feds –will meet an almost immediate demise as legislators dive frantically to avoid the backlash against ever-expanding federal power.
My hope is that it will, but I’m not especially sanguine. The prospects for stemming the centralization tide are probably better today than they were yesterday, but federal education initiatives tend to have a fair amount of bipartisan support, especially if they throw money at public schools — which liberals like — as well as things like charter schools, merit pay, and “standards” that conservatives support. Indeed, I wouldn’t be surprised if President Obama, facing hopeless prospects on health care, cap and trade, and other anger-igniters, were to propose reauthorizing the No Child Left Behind Act as one big Race to the Top. Incorporating both big bucks and things conservatives endorse, it would stand a pretty good chance of garnering some Republican support. And that would allow Obama to say he has learned his lesson about working with both parties while letting legislators head back home declaring that they’d done something “for the children.”
Can Scott Brown’s Election Stop the Federal Takeover…of Education?
Yesterday, I wrote about President Obama’s proposal to extend the Race to the Top program, this time letting school districts completely bypass state governments and apply directly to the feds for funding. I pointed out that the proposal was one among several troubling signs that Obama intends to put Washington fully — and, of course, unconstitutionally — in charge of American education. At the time, I didn’t realize how right I was.
When I was writing yesterday I was basing my comments on documents from the White House’s website and hadn’t yet read the details of what went on at the President’s photo-op announcing the proposed extension. I sure wish I had: At the dog-and-pony show, the President just came right out and said that he wants to push aside states — mentioned by name was famous holdout Texas — that dared to invoke the Constitution and not participate in a program that was, Constitution or no Constitution, supposed to be voluntary.
“Innovative districts like the one in Texas whose reform efforts are being stymied by state decision-makers will soon have the chance to earn funding to help them pursue those reforms,” intoned the President.
Fortunately, Texas Governor Rick Perry wasn’t about to be cowed: “I will say this very slow so they will understand it in Washington, D.C.: Texas will fight any attempt by the federal government to take over our school system.”
So it’s pretty certain now, more so even than just 24 hours ago: President Obama wants to federalize American education.
Thankfully, a lot can clearly happen in 24 hours. Yesterday’s election of Scott Brown in Massachusetts could very well send shockwaves of fear through the ranks of Democratic (and maybe even Republican) legislators in DC, who might finally get the message that Americans just don’t like federal takovers. Heck, perhaps even the President will get the message. If so, then maybe even something as relatively small as a $1.35-billion scalpel designed to cut through states and get right at districts could be seen as too dangerous to handle.
That’s speculation, of course, but we should know a lot more in just, oh, the next 24 hours.
Race to Domination
Today’s the day that states must submit their applications to the U.S. Department of Education to compete for round-one “Race to the Top” grants. But no worries if your state’s a little behind: Not only will there be another application round for the $4.35-billion dash-for-cash, but as President Obama announced today, he wants a $1.35-billion sequel to what was supposed to be a one-time, stimulus-funded contest.
The important question, of course, is whether sponsoring this race is worthwhile for federal taxpayers. The clear answer is no.
Sure, in response to RttT states have been raising charter-school caps, allowing teachers to be evaluated using student performance, and instituting other changes, but they’ve done little of real substance. Just raising caps won’t make it much easier to get good, competitive charter schools since most of the charter-supply problem revolves around over-regulation and painful authorization processes. And while states have eliminated prohibitions on using student test results to evaluate teachers, they haven’t done much to actually base teacher evaluations on student performance or other meaningful metrics.
What has RttT done that is of substance? Unfortunately, push yet more power into federal hands, forcing states and districts to jump through all manner of hoops for a chance to get back some of their citizens’ money. Indeed, it is becoming painfully clear that President Obama intends to put Washington firmly above the states in the hierarchy of education power.
For his $1.35 billion RttT expansion, President Obama plans to allow districts to directly compete for federal funding, bypassing states completely. And then there’s his crusade for national curricular standards. His administration has been talking up “common” standards since almost day one, and in the ”fact sheet“ accompanying the RttT expansion announcement the first bullet states that RttT emphasizes “designing and implementing rigorous standards and high-quality assessments, by encouraging states to work jointly toward a system of common academic standards.”
Don’t be fooled, by the way, by the “states” working “jointly” thing, or utterly unbelievable administration denials. If the feds are paying states to adopt common standards then those standards will be de facto federal. Either that, or the feds will let states adopt any old joint standards and still get paid. Six of one bad thing, half dozen of the other…
Thankfully, there is resistance to Obama’s bribe-to-the-top scheme. Texas, most notably, has refused to participate in RttT, with Gov. Rick Perry declaring that ”we would be foolish and irresponsible to place our children’s future in the hands of unelected bureaucrats and special interest groups thousands of miles away in Washington.” And Texas is not alone: According to a New York Times article appearing yesterday, states and districts around the country are refusing to put on their track shoes and run for the federal funds.
Still, federal money — taxpayer money — can be a tough thing for any elected offical to turn down. Sooner or later, if we let him, Obama will almost certainly find an amount that no state or district can resist.
Neither Standards Nor Shame Can Do the Job
Washington Post education columnist Jay Mathews has done it again: lifted my hopes up just to drop them right back down.
In November, you might recall, Mathews called for the elimination of the office of U.S. Secretary of Education. There just isn’t evidence that the Ed Sec has done much good, he wrote.
My reaction to that, of course: “Right on!”
Only sentences later, however, Mathews went on to declare that we should keep the U.S. Department of Education.
Huh?
Today, Mathews is calling for the eradication of something else that has done little demonstrable good — and has likely been a big loss – for American education: the No Child Left Behind Act. Mathews thinks that the law has run its course, and laments that under NCLB state tests — which are crucial to standards-and-accountability-based reforms — “started soft and have gotten softer.”
The reason for this ever-squishier trend, of course, is that under NCLB states and schools are judged by test results, leading state politicians and educrats to do all they can to make good results as easy to get as possible. And no, that has not meant educating kids better — it’s meant making the tests easier to pass.
Unfortunately, despite again seeing its major failures, Mathews still can’t let go of federal education involvement. After calling for NCLB’s end, he declares that we instead need a national, federal test to judge how all states and schools are doing.
To his credit, Mathews does not propose that the feds write in-depth standards in multiple subjects, and he explicitly states that Washington should not be in the business of punishing or rewarding schools for test performance.
“Let’s let the states decide what do to with struggling schools,” he writes.
What’s especially important about this is that when there’s no money attached to test performance there’s little reason for teachers unions, administrators associations, and myriad other education interests to expend political capital gaming the tests, a major problem under NCLB.
A Nice Little Reminder
There hasn’t been much in the news about education over the last several weeks, so there haven’t been many education entries here on Cato@Liberty. That should be changing soon, though, with the first round of state “Race-to-the-Top” applications due to the feds on January 19, and the Common Core State Standards Initiative expected to release draft grade-by-grade mathematics and language-arts standards sometime this month.
To tide you over until those two monumental happenings occur, the New York Times today offers a little piece about supposedly tough state “exit examinations” that illustrates why you shouldn’t expect either R to the T or national standards to produce any meaningful improvement in academic outcomes. Quite simply, no matter how good or tough “standards” and “accountability” sound, in government schooling they will almost always end up evaded. After all, what incentive does anyone have to set and meet high standards when they’re going to get paid no matter what?
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