The New Normal By David Brooks Summary

To point out another way to fix school funding in Alabama would be to use a weighted school system. A weighted system puts a specific dollar amount for each student based on their poverty levels, special education and many other factors. The weighted system is a penny-pinching way to save extra money. Each school has a per-pupil budget, this is the amount of money they spend on each student. The dollar amount spent on each child is determined by the skills and characteristics that impact their learning the most. If this weighted system was used statewide, it would free up millions of

Financial budget cuts that have occurred in schools are mentioned in support for Moore’s argument that the American value of education has declined. Moore shows his case and point by stating that, “The person who cares for our child every day receives an average of $41,351 annually; A Congressman…$145,100” (136). Moore later brings up budgetary evidence and says that, “Oh, it’s on the funding list-somewhere down between OSHA and meat inspectors” (136). He works to pull politics into the picture when he cites the irony that at the time former librarian and First Lady Laura Bush “kicked off” a national campaign for American libraries, and just a week later President George W. Bush proposed to cut almost 19 percent of federal spending for libraries. Moving on he talks about how 10 percent of U.S public schools are over their maximum capacity for the buildings that house the students by 25 percent. Continuing his attack he

The National Conference of State Legislatures said, “School budget crunches have been a trend over the past couple years and span the entire nation” (qtd. in Van

This article in the Times newspaper, points out problems and flaws with the 2002 U.S. No Child Left Behind educational legislation, which was designed to improve education in the U.S. Topics that are discussed include, teachers complaints that No Child Left Behind policy sets impossible standards and forces teachers to teach based on the test material, and how the bill originally came to life by the proposal of former U.S. president George W. Bush. The other topic

Oklahoma as of today is ranked 49th nationally in per-pupil expenditures and ranked 48th in teacher pay (Klein 2). Putting Oklahoma as one of the worst states to be educated in the United States. “Oklahoma is consistently ranked near the bottom for education funding and teacher pay” (“Investing In Education Is Key For Growth And Job Creation” 3). When there are state cuts that need to be made, the departments of education are one of the first that usually tend to suffer. Since the 2008 economic crisis, Oklahoma has continued to cut the budget for education; even though the economy has since then gotten better (Perry). Budget cuts in education affect all parts of the education process for the students. “Some school districts have ordered teacher layoffs and shorter sessions” (“Oklahoma Makes the Poor Poorer” par 4).Schools are now struggling to keep their heads above water. Each year from the budget cutting, schools have had to lay off teachers, cut entire programs, and have limited resources used to educate the students. Even the teachers’ retirement system is suffering, being one of the top poorly funded pension programs nationally (Ash par 3). Seeing as that the schools have to cut down classes and programs, administration has had no other choice than to increase class size, overwhelming teachers tremendously. “Oklahoma has 1,500 fewer classroom teachers and 40,000 more students since 2008-2009” (“Investing In Education Is Key For Growth

One of the important drawbacks of the budget was the cuts and delays in education funding. As published in the article “California lawmakers pass long-overdue budget” (2010), by Fox News “Under the deal, nearly $2 billion in payments to K-12 schools and California's community colleges would be delayed until the next fiscal year”. This was one of the consequences of the late deficit budget, which lawmakers agreed upon. Stopping payments to educational institutions was not seen as a positive feature of the budget. The delay in funding kept the educational programs on hold, which affected many educational

During President Bush’s term, government became aware that American schooling needed major improvement. There was a need of a law which would improve the system while using scores to evaluate students as well as their teachers. "The fundamental principle of this bill is that every child can learn, we expect every child to learn, and you must show us whether or not every child is learning," (Secretary, 2002) President George W. Bush said on Jan. 8, 2002, signing ceremony of No Child Left Behind Act. However, this one size fits all approach revealed not be resourceful. "The goals of No Child Left Behind, the predecessor of this law, were the right ones: High standards. Accountability. Closing the achievement gap, but in practice, it often fell short. It didn 't always consider the specific needs of each community. It led to too much testing during classroom time. It often forced schools and school districts into

Public school funding is unfair and unequal in most states. However, more concerning is out of the 49 million children in public schools, students living in poverty are affected the most. There are wide disparities in the amount spent on public education across the country, from a high of $18,507 per pupil in New York, to a low of $6,369 in Idaho (Baker, Sciarra, & Farrie, 2015). The question that all stakeholders should be asking is school funding fair?

I expected to see excel spread sheets comparing line by line year to year expenditures; to hear analysis of the value of program expenditures with real data showing results and information. That was not the case. Our school board considered hand-outs and charts filled with hypothetical information and numbers. I heard questions responded to with an anecdotal story. No substantiation was required. I was appalled. I have turned this disgust and disappointment into a desire to lead change in our school district in terms of the budget. You as a citizen pay for everything – it’s your money – you deserve to know where it goes, how it is spent and the educational results you are achieving for your money. For example: You deserve to know how much it costs to implement the Middle Years Program that we are all paying for and what the educational outcome that is expected for this expenditure. It’s your

In addition, insufficient funding of schools along with quality teachers that are retiring are some of the problems we encounter in the education system. In some parts of the United States, there is a lack of adequate access to materials for reading and writing due to budget constraints. In Allen D. Kanner’s article, “Today’s Class Brought to You By…” he mentioned that with the baby boomers retiring, and a high turnover among new teachers, who are asked to teach subjects they are not properly trained for, are causing difficult classroom situations (280). Similarly, Governor Jerry Brown’s statement last January 11 pointed out that K-12 education has ‘borne the brunt’ of the state’s budget cuts with more than $18 billion in cuts over the last three years. This resulted in larger class sizes, programs are cut, and over 30,000 educators laid off. These teachers are very valuable in our society because they provide our youth with the knowledge and social experiences that they will use to better their future and the future of the entire world. As a student, I have suffered the consequences of triple digit fee increases and the lack of available classes offered. The high cost of education has put the burden not only on the students, and many of their parents, but educators, as

On average it costs about $10,616 to send a student to a public school for 1 year. For an average of 12 school years it costs a total of $127,392 , in tax payer money, to have 1 student graduate. To think all that money went to waste is outrageous to me. If a student drops out before they graduate they should pay back the money used to educate them. Drop outs should pay it back because the money could have been spent on another child who wanted an education. If they do pay it back they can help educate someone who needs it. For example, I didn’t know how much money was spent on us until now. I have always been lazy and never did my work, but after finding out I have started to try and not take this chance for granted. Some children around

Budget cuts in schools cause turmoil and stress among the students and faculty. Drastic changes in the budgets have caused schools to negatively impact the people around them. With the lack of funding, schools are facing difficult decisions on what to do to stay within their budget. Supervision is facing much scrutiny on how to handle the lack of funding in their school districts. A solution needs to be made to improve the distribution of funding to our schools in order to keep them operating and thriving for our children to obtain their education. Budget cuts in schools have shown negative effects on employee positions, supplies, extracurricular activities.

Today, however, it seems as if the public has lost track of the importance of a great educational system. The main issue today’s public schools faces are funding problems. There is not enough money allocated to support the growing needs of school across the nation.

In today’s economic environment even the wealthiest states and districts are having to cut funding for education, while districts which were already teetering on the edge are now in an even worse position. In some schools children have to face not having enough books, paper for copies, severe overcrowding,

My dad, brother, and I spent a lot of time camping, mostly we went to the Belfair Campsites. It was convenient, and close as well as something to do when we had nothing planned for the weekend. The normal campground we would be at was full of winding trees with branches as long as cars.The three of us owned dirt bikes at the time and we would take them with us and ride along this little trail on the side of the gravel road, we would ride around the campsite sometimes though. When we rode on something nice and open we normally wouldn’t have any concerns, we would be riding carelessly.