The Other Side of Saving Our Schools

By George Scaggs Texas Insider Report: AUSTIN Texas   This past weekend a crowd of approximately 10000 activists teachers parents & students converged on the Texas Capitol for the Save Our Schools Rally. While impressive in size and just the sort of political theatre that traditional press sources relish in highlighting the event might have more aptly been titled the Raise Our Taxes Rally for it contained no solutions to funding shortfalls only demands that education funding not be cut. Inherently such events seem to reflect an insistence to continue a grand charade. Texas budget dilemma did not suddenly appear out of nowhere. Similarly the entire nation has been rushing headlong towards this sort of problem for decades yet liberals are waiting for someone anyone to wave that magic wand just one more time and make everything right with the world.  For too long weve kicked the can down the road choosing to either ignore or simply excuse away demographic economic and cultural shifts that are at the root of ever growing funding crises. When our economy was healthy it was easy to pretend. Now that we have hit an extended economic downturn while Washington continues to drown us in debt we may have reached the end of that proverbial road. Governments approach to public education has been the same for decades. As student performance has declined decision makers have spent spent and spent some more clinging to the notion that spending more money equals results with no empirical evidence whatsoever to prove it. Like everyone else Texas has followed much the same path. According to the State Comptrollers Office while student enrollment has grown 20 over the last decade primary education spending has grown 93. The numbers suggest that there is plenty to cut somewhere in the system. While popular sound-bites are bandied about throughout the political spectrum it seems unlikely that any single idea will completely cure our ills. There is no silver bullet. Similarly though teachers the education bureaucracy and the legislature all play a significant role in controlling costs and influencing the quality of the product laying blame at the feet of any one group is short-sighted. Effective solutions will prove to be multi-faceted and necessary sacrifices shared. Though decisions will eventually rest with individual school boards under the circumstances protecting bloated bureaucracies appears to no longer be an option and merely nibbling around the edges of all that spending will likely fall short of the mark. So what to do? Texans would be well served by bold reforms and honest assessments of what lies at the root of our funding challenges. For one thing we appear to have a structural funding problem but there is much more to it than that. While politicians and teachers are readily chastised an important factor that is often left out of the equation is parents and what is taught or not taught at home. At some point we must acknowledge that the Lefts declarations of if it feels good do it" are coming back to haunt not just them but our entire society. Societal changes in behavior have come with an enormous price tag. When parents abdicate responsibility and fail to instill basic values at home it results in burdens on public services. School systems are over-whelmed with everything from providing meals and pregnancy services to the need for more remedial courses and counseling. It is time for our nation to consider that our laissez-faire attitudes about morality personal responsibility and the integrity of the family unit have delivered us to the brink of an economic calamity that cannot be escaped. In the simplest of terms we have more government than we can afford or at least certainly more than were willing to pay for. This uncomfortable reality can be seen playing out again and again; Washington is struggling with the dilemma as public debt is driven to new and previously unimagined heights. In Wisconsin it has recently resulted in wild protest scenes. So too in Texas we find it at the heart of our state budget woes as well as subsequent reactions like the Save Our Schools effort. In todays world where government can no longer afford to provide services that citizens feel they have a right to it is becoming increasingly difficult to justify providing services for those that are here illegally. The time has long since passed current budget woes clearly reflect that a rude awakening is in order. Social justice advocates have reached the end of both their moral and their intellectual rope. If we want justice it would be best served by sending the tab for social services for illegal aliens to the federal government for it is their failure that has resulted in the states financial burden. Leftists cant have it both ways something has to give. If you believe that open borders are a humanitarian cause and demand that the public pay for services for the subsequent deluge of undocumented immigrants then you should be the first in line willing to accept less services all the way around. It is also time to fully embrace the charter schools concept. Though traditional public education systems carry some legitimate burdens that many charter schools do not our current fiscal crisis demands that any option which provides more bang for less buck are fully explored. Outside the rigid demands of efforts like Save Our Schools solutions await. The question is whether or not Texans have the political will to step outside the box and necessarily deal with some harsh realities.