Is Education in the Crosshairs?
Justin Bathon on Thursday, February 5, 2009 at 3:44PM Talkingpointsmemo.com has education in the crosshairs of Senators working on the Stimulus Package:
The biggest hit is on education spending.
A few examples of the recommended cuts ...
$24.786 Billion on "State Stabilization Money"
$15 Billion for "State Incentive Grants"
$6.75 Billion for "IDEA", proposed cut 50%
$6.5 Billion for "Title I Funding", proposed cut 50%
I don't really get how education is not stimulating? Not only is it jobs RIGHT NOW because teachers and education staff are going to be RIFed without some help from the Fed. ... but it is also stimulative in the future because the kids of today are the employees and entrepreneurs of tomorrow. In fact, pulling money away from education as these Senators seem to be doing will stifle our economy down the road ... not stimulate it. Round and round we go ... where education winds up no one knows.
Update: More detail on the proposed cuts.
Reader Comments (5)
It seems as though the Obama administration is more concerned with the present or at least the next 4-8 years. The recovery package (I guess Obama refuses to call it the stimulus package) focuses on health care, the creation of saving of jobs, and providing tax credits.
I agree with you Justin that education is important and that more federal funding should be available to the schools to educate our future business and political leaders. However, the economy is in such dire straits that the Obama administration is forced to look more towards the present with the hope that the present will improve the future.
A better economy now will lead to a better economy in the future if the promises made by President Obama come to fruitition. Perhaps that will lead to improved education for our children and more funding for this education.
Lets see what happens
Education is the base of society. If it isn't properly funded society will collapse.
I agree with Michael. Unfortuneately because the economy is in shambles and so many people are losing their jobs, those in Washington justifiably must focus on the present rather than worry about the future.
Right, but when is the last time Washington didn't think there was a crisis? Since 2001 we have been in a crisis because of terrorism. Prior to that we were in a crisis because the tech. bubble collapsed. Prior to that, prior to that, prior to that .... The list is endless. There is never a time in American History when everything was just perfect in Washington's eyes and they had the opportunity in invest in future oriented things like education.
At some point you have to ask why we keep getting into crises? Why something is always going wrong? Everytime something happens we look back and say, "why weren't we smarter?" "Why didn't we see that coming?" In this latest crisis, we are asking "why didn't people know how to manage their finances better?"
Well, education usually takes the blame for all those questions. We didn't manage our finances better and not get into unreasonable mortgages because we didn't educate our kids well enough ... right, that's what typically happens. So, if education has the capability to screw up so often, doesn't it also have the capability to succeed often? When things go right in this country, we never give education the credit ... yet there must be some connection between the fact that this nation was the first to publicly educate its whole population round about the late 19th and early 20th Century starting and we became the most powerful nation on earth round about the time that all those kids we put through school grew into adulthood. That's not coincidence. Yet, we talk about how to lead America into the future and keep America on top and then slash education spending like this. Well, then don't be surprised that the counties that don't slash education spending, like the Scandinavian countries, Japan and others, pass us by when today's kids become adults.
You have to be able to see the forest from the trees. A new bridge, that's a tree. A new education program, that's the forest.
Justin you are so right. Our economy is effecting our schools already without cutting the funds. In the area where I live they are closing five schools to begin to make up for the shortfalls of the budget . The teachers from those schools are already being told that they will have to reapply to the district. The schools lines will be reestablished and teh children will be crowded into the schools left open. Class sizes will increase and discipline will enevitably decrease. Discipline decreases higher dropouts (actually pushouts) rates will occur. Higher dropout rates envitably means higher crime rates, higher incarceration rates, more taxes for prisons and rehabiliatation programs, etc.
I agree that education should be first. It is the basis for everything that is or past, today and future.