In view of the national debate about taxes, with questions about who should pay more, how our tax dollars are spent and the role of the federal government, it might be instructive to examine recent events surrounding the education scandal in Georgia.
According to a recent study by The Cato Institute, "American taxpayers spend around $600 billion a year on K-12 public education. A sobering 27 cents of every tax dollar collected at the state or local is consumed by the government-run K-12 education system, compared to only 8 cents for Medicaid."
The unfortunate reality of how some of this money is spent brings us to Atlanta, Georgia and what is perhaps the most despicable teachers' scandal in the history of this country. Over a period of five years or more, hundreds of teachers, meeting at so-called "cheating parties," changed thousands of students' answers on federally mandated achievement tests. At least 178 teachers and principals in Atlanta Public Schools cheated to raise student scores on high stakes standardized tests, according to a Georgia Bureau of Investigation report. Part of the tragedy of this story is that it occurred over such a long period of time and with so many teachers participating.
What have Georgia school students learned from this lesson? Is it that if you work hard and do your best you are likely to move ahead and be successful? Or, as is more likely, have they learned that the teachers and the school system really don't care how individual students are doing. What they really care about is what looks good for the system and for the teachers' bonuses? Beverly Hall, head of the Atlanta school system and the person who ran this entire scheme, reportedly received $580,000 in bonuses for her leadership.
The most important lesson the U.S. public should learn from experiences like these is that funding for public school systems must be audited and accounted for in a much more rigorous fashion than has been the case. The U.S. spends more on public education than any country in the world, and achievement tests presently are the primary tool used to evaluate the relative effectiveness of that funding.
Randi Weingarten, head of the American Federation of Teachers, recently declared that, "Tragically, the Atlanta cheating scandal harmed our children and it crystallizes the unintended consequences of our test-crazed policies."
Blame it on the tests if you will, but real accountability is needed at all levels of the system.
David Taylor
Westminster
