SocraticGadfly: The poor get poorer in Texas public schools

September 27, 2014

The poor get poorer in Texas public schools

The Waco Trib has a good article about how school districts, faced with diminished federal and state funds (are you listening, Greg Abbott? of course not), more and more school districts are searching high and low for grant money to supplement the lost funds elsewhere.

Only one problem.

As the article notes, many poorer and/or smaller school districts can't afford a full-time grantwriter.

Many districts created educational foundations several years ago, but those were done in part to adjust for flat or declining state dollars back then. To expect an education foundation to ramp up even more, or one starting from scratch to meet not just a couple of years worth, but a decade's worth, of revenue issues, is too much.

And yet, voters in "red" communities and school districts who aren't as rich as Dallas-area's Highland Park, or even as the Waco area Midway, will still pull the "R" lever unthinkingly on Nov. 4.

Well, folks, if you're voting to perpetuate your own problems, you deserve the problems you're perpetuating.

At the same time, school districts are whoring themselves out too much for technology, like the iPads mentioned near the bottom. That money you raise?

Spend it on better teachers. Spend it on better, and greener, playgrounds. Spend it on a school community garden. All of that will help your kids more than iPads.

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