Improving Education Amounts to Pennies a Day
It takes a two-thirds vote to increase any kind of local funding for our schools, a requirement that makes little sense, whether you’re in or outside the classroom. That the future of our schools can be held hostage by a minority of voters seems almost to flout the whole idea of democracy. But even given this reality, why would one-third of the voters still vote against their schools? I’ve been asking this question ever since a parcel tax was defeated in my husband’s school district and a bond issue lost in mine.
Predictably, a frequent reason people gave for voting no was that they didn’t want their taxes raised. Fair enough, but let’s look at just how high that increase would have been.
In my husband’s district, the tax hike came to 26 cents a day (that’s what $95 looks like spread out over a year). In my district, a $250,000 home (the median price in the area the district serves) would have to shell out 18 cents a day (based on a $27-a-year tax hike per $100,000 of assessed value). Considering the kind of repairs and programs these funds would have paid for, this was an unbelievable bargain.
A few people with no children or grown children told me they should not have to support schools. That’s like saying that since I have no intention of going to Yosemite, developers can go ahead and pave it. Or since I no longer drive, the roads can go to pot. Such myopic thinking ignores what it means to be part of a community, or even a nation.
The students coming through our education system will one day be our nurse practitioner, our electrician, our auto repairman and, yes, our tax accountant. More important, these students grow up and move next door. The quality of their education will affect every aspect of our lives.
And if such noble appeals fail, let’s put it in terms of money: When schools deteriorate, so does home value. The money saved in taxes cannot offset the loss to home value caused by weak schools.
Then there’s the chronic rumor that schools don’t really need more funding. Believe me, I try to keep that in mind as I dodge the buckets placed in my school’s hallways every time it rains and as I enter our broken-down bathroom with cracked tiles, no soap and no hot water.
In an area as wealthy as Orange County, the condition of the high schools in my district is shameful. And the list of programs and positions that are now being considered for elimination in my husband’s district is enough to break your heart: the elementary school science specialists, art programs and music programs; high school counselors and all school librarians. And, of course, the belt-tightening means dumping more kids in every teacher’s already overcrowded classroom.
The accusations can already be heard that the district is trying to “punish” the voters. And if the district doesn’t cut anything, these same critics will say, “See, they really didn’t need the money.” You can’t win.
Some maintain that the money has already been raised. One parent we know insisted he had bought wrapping paper already this year and would thus vote “no” on a tax increase. The very fact that the schools have to sell wrapping paper to support programs should send this guy a different message.
California ranks near the bottom or dead last in number of teachers per student, number of administrators per student and the amount of money spent per student. There’s clearly an aching need for increased funding.
Another excuse I’ve heard is that the schools mismanage the money they do have. Clearly this is sometimes true, as it is in any organization. But let us also remember that schools more often do a pretty amazing job of balancing funds, despite ever-changing directives from Sacramento and shifting demographics. In any case, if the citizens are fed up with their school districts, how about electing a new school board? Perhaps in no other area can elected officials be so immediately controlled.
Closely related to accusations of mismanagement are worries about exactly how school taxes will be spent. I can see this concern when it comes to paying federal taxes: One’s money goes out into the void and there is little say about how it’s spent. But this simply isn’t the case at the local level. The benefits of a tax increase are immediately obvious: The roof gets repaired, there are finally enough computers for everyone in the class, and there’s a school nurse on duty if your kid gets hurt. The results of a defeated tax are equally obvious: There is no longer a frosh/soph baseball team, there are significantly more kids in your child’s class and the art teacher is history.
But somehow I sense the strongest motive behind these recent defeats was anger at governing agencies in general, be they the state government or the local school board. Citizens, disgruntled with everything from the IRS to their HMO, might see a “no” vote as a chance to strike back at a faceless bureaucracy. If the school board made a mistake, then a “no” vote will teach them a lesson.
But who gets punished?
The teachers and students. The bright new teacher next door to me is now out of a job. Your neighbor’s child can no longer play his clarinet in the school orchestra. But are they really responsible for a school district’s actual or imagined problems? Again, it makes more sense to get active in the next school board election.
During a previous, unsuccessful bond election, a woman whose child was in my class vehemently opposed a tax increase. I asked her if she was unhappy with me as her child’s teacher. She assured me that was not the case, that “our school” was fine, but that the district had wasted money and she wasn’t about to give them any more.
I have no idea if any of her accusations against the district were true since she was mighty short on specifics, but unfortunately, I was the target of the lesson. My class sizes increased the next year, we lost all our school counselors and the job of teaching her kid became much more difficult.
I hope she feels the few cents a day she saved was worth it.
Christine Baron is a high school English teacher in Orange County. You can reach her at educ@latimes.com or (714) 966-4550.
