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Matthew Lynch published in Equity, Policy & Reform

How to Help Low-Income Students Succeed

By Matthew Lynch

Students from low-income homes hit the K-12 scene at a disadvantage. Materially, they often do not have the means for the resources they need for basic classroom functions. In non-tangible ways, they often do not have the same academic support as middle- or high-income peers and know less when they arrive in Kindergarten.When parents are unable to provide for their children, that responsibility then falls on the schools and the community. Ensuring that students from low income households succeed in K-12 classrooms is multi-faceted and must include:

Physiological considerations. According to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, students need to have physiological needs met before they are able to learn. If a child is hungry, he or she will focus on that fact and not on the schoolwork. Federal law allows schools to provide breakfast and lunch for students whose families meet federal poverty guidelines. The law was created in an effort to meet the biological needs of each student if the parent was unable or unwilling to provide the necessary provision. If children have all of their physical needs met, they will be more likely to succeed in school.

Safety considerations. Another need that must be met is the safety of the child. Students need to feel comfortable and safe enough to learn. Students will not be able to focus unless they feel safe in both the home and the school. When teachers become certified to teach, they become mandated reporters of child abuse. This means that a teacher who suspects abuse in the home of a student is compelled by law to report this information, using protocols established by the school and/or the district.

The main job of schools is to deliver effective instruction for student learning. If the school needs to provide some or all of the necessary physical/biological needs, it should do so. Schools should be concerned about the welfare and the safety of the children they serve. The school’s purpose in the community is to ensure that students have the support and resources they need to be successful.

It is important to realize that the schools are not required to provide said support. Schools not operating as full-service organizations should advocate for their students whenever necessary. Ruby K. Payne discusses support systems in her book A Framework for Understanding Poverty. Payne posits that students from poverty need support systems to succeed. She believes that students with the right resources and support systems can succeed even if they are living in poverty.

Why should the burden fall on schools?

Local schools are the only community-service organizations that come in contact with virtually all school-aged children in a given area. Educators and administrators are in a unique position to understand the needs of children and the communities in which they live. Teachers are among the few people who understand children’s hopes, aspirations, and impediments; however, only a small percentage of teachers take advantage of this fact.

With all the problems and the issues that our children face, we can ill afford to miss opportunities to connect with them. A strong student-teacher relationship will in turn help the teachers better educate their students. One of the keys to the teacher-student relationship is the creation of mutual trust and respect. Once students understand that their teacher trusts and respects them, they will do everything in their power to live up to the teacher’s expectations.

How to help low-income students succeed

James P. Comer, a child psychiatrist who studied students from low income neighborhoods In New Haven, Connecticut, developed the Comer Process which focuses on child development in urban schools. The Comer process is based on six interconnected pathways which lead to healthy child development and academic achievement. The pathways are physical, cognitive, psychological, language, social, and ethical.

Comer believed that the pathways should be considered a road map to a child’s successful development into adulthood. If a child’s needs are not met in one of the pathways, there will be likely difficulties in the child’s ability to achieve. Comer explained that a child could be smart, but unable to be socially successful. He wanted teachers to be aware that they should not teach for the sake of teaching, but rather to help the child learn how to negotiate life both inside and outside of the classroom.

According to Comer, if a child is intelligent but cannot socially interact, then the school system did not do its job of preparing the child for the world. The theory pushes teachers to make sure that children are developing emotionally, physically, and socially before the child can learn the school-related topics. Comer believed that children will not be functioning members of society if he or she is only successful in academic skills such as math and reading.

Comer proposed that children need a primary social network—one that includes parents, and people from the child’s school and community.  Comer emphasizes that the people in this network are concerns all needs that are part of the developmental pathways. Children who have this level of support will likely be more successful in school. This is the main premise behind Comer’s idea of letters home to the parent or caregiver. He wants to make sure that the parents and caregivers are aware of what is happening in their child’s school life so they are able to share in creating a positive experience at school.

Comer’s notion of developmental pathways is now practiced in many schools across America. In fact, there is such interest in his theory that a field guide is now available for creating school-wide interventions to help students achieve academic success. Comer’s theory is concerned with the ways in which the world is changing. He foresees children needing to have more skills and more “book smarts” than previous generations. The future adults of this society will need to be socially accepted while also being “book smart tech savvy” and multi-taskers.

Educators today should understand that when they become teachers, their duty is to advocate for not only the children in their class, but also the students in the entire school. Teachers are often the creators of grassroots advocacy organizations and coalitions. Advocacy is an essential part of a teacher’s profession. When teachers advocate for a student, their action conveys to children a message that the teacher cares about their well being and creates a positive bond between teacher and student.

photo credit: katerha via photopin cc

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Matthew Lynch published in Policy & Reform

What will it take to reform K-12 education in Mississippi?

By Matthew Lynch

Year after year, it breaks my heart to see the public education system in my home state of Mississippi repeatedly scoring so low in education rankings, particularly when it comes to students in a viscous cycle of underachievement. As an educator, it makes me disheartened to know that as a whole, public schools are not winning the battle against low-incomes and poverty and their negative impact on learning.

I do not doubt that there are exceptional schools in Mississippi. In fact, I have worked for several of them. However, this is the exception to the rule, rather than the norm. We all know what happens to students who leave high school without basic skills. More often than not, they fall prey to a cycle of generational poverty, underachievement and possibly incarceration.

My critiques are not meant to bash my home state and its K-12 educational system; my aim is to issue it a no holds barred wake up call. Collectively, our educational system cannot get any worse, so why deny charter schools the right to come in and mix things up a bit? Or to put dollars beyond aggressive social work programs that extend beyond academic constraints? I do not endorse making rash decisions, but I also do not condone sitting idly by and expecting for our system to magically get better.

So what can be done about this? There is obviously a problem that exists but observation alone will not get us very far. Then the question shifts to whether anyone even cares. Realistically, the parents of most Mississippi public school students cannot be relied upon to change this near-failing trend. Many of these parents were students in the same seats in their own K-12 generation so they do not know anything different. The children certainly cannot change the course of their educations. Even if they understood that the learning process around them needed to improve, they have no power to change it.

The responsibility then lies on the shoulders of educators – from the public school classroom teacher to the state superintendent of education, Dr. Carey Wright.

Increased equity

One way to improve the achievement of Mississippi public schools is to consolidate high and low-poverty districts to increase equity in school funding and reduce racial or socioeconomic segregation. I’d say that is a start – but simple consolidation will not solve the underlying problems. With low incomes and poverty come students with more baggage than their mid- to high-income peers and if those accompanying issues are not accounted for and addressed, the learning process will always be fruitless.

Life skills

Along with learning teaching methods, educators in Mississippi need to have social work training, of sorts, to accomplish their goals of reaching children academically and emotionally. Without public school programs that reach beyond the constraints of academics alone, Mississippi will continue to suffer low scores on annual education rankings. The bigger problem, of course, is that these numbers reflect public school student underachievement and that is an issue that impacts every citizen in my home state.

Urgency needed

The risks have never been greater: the future of Mississippi and its children is at stake. Mississippians cannot continue to allow the educational system to operate in its current condition. While there is no magic formula or configuration to solve the problems our schools face, we must engender change, and we must do it now!

On the surface, the concept of creating and sustaining school reform is an oxymoron, simply because change is inevitable. In many ways, what is needed is sustainable change. In other words, schools must change to meet the current needs of children and youth in order to support their development into contributing and productive adults.

As the needs of our society shift, our education system must adapt to ensure that it prepares an educated populous to meet society’s needs. Education reform is possible, but it depends on what the state is willing to do to achieve its educational goals. Will Mississippi develop and pass effective educational legislation aimed at creating viable solutions to the problems at hand?

Lasting and beneficial change in our schools will require hard work from a committed group of stakeholders — teachers, administrators, parents, policymakers, and community members alike. Ultimately, it is the children who matter most. At the end of the day, they are the reasons why we must champion the cause of education reform in Mississippi and throughout our great nation.

I hope to be writing a very different column in the near future about Mississippi’s public school ratings but that can only happen when better management of the poverty-classroom relationship takes place.

 

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Matthew Lynch published in Policy & Reform

Schools gravitating toward healthy fundraising

Fun runs are popular these days and bake sales are taking the back seat, partly  thanks to the changes from a “smart snacks” provision in the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010. In addition, regulations that ban the sale of junk food during school hours went into effect last summer as part of a nationwide push by Michelle Obama.

The result of this push means that schools are gravitating toward healthy fundraising too.

Many parents appreciate this, especially in a society where sugary snacks and sodas seem to plague child-centered social events.

However, some states aren’t taking the news without a fight. South Carolina’s state superintendent of education Molly Spearman points out that fundraisers provide vital income and wants waivers from the smart-snack requirements for fundraisers.

Similarly, Ted Poe of Texas is working to push a bill to keep the “federal food police” from schools. His bill would prevent nutrition standards under the 2010 law from being applied to fundraisers.

I like that the First Lady recognizes the importance of good nutrition in schools and surrounding school events. Teaching and supporting healthy eating from a young age sets children up for healthy eating for the rest of their lives. I think that fundraisers that sell unhealthy, sugary-and calorie-laden snacks do not help students really, even if they do raise money. Selling these treats really doesn’t help anyone.

The last few years have been a period of change in public school meal programs with Michelle Obama in the driver’s seat. She has been instrumental in making changes for the better and I hope we see acceptance of the requirements around the country.

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Matthew Lynch published in Parental Involvement, Teachers

How can parental involvement in schools improve?

**The Edvocate is pleased to publish guest posts as way to fuel important conversations surrounding P-20 education in America. The opinions contained within guest posts are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official opinion of The Edvocate or Dr. Matthew Lynch.**

A guest post by Michael J. Ryan

During this season of public school awards and recognition ceremonies, I am reminded of a middle school principal who at one awards ceremony finger-wagged at families. She first thanked everyone for attending. Then, with obvious disappointment, she highlighted that she had not seen most of the adults at all during the school year.

The conversation involving charter schools often includes debatable issues regarding the quality and/or treatment of the teachers, the dedication to sustainable continuity of teaching staff and whether or not charter schools live by the same rules as traditional public schools. However, one aspect that is never debated is many charter schools, which are public schools, demand parents sign a “contract” to volunteer.

Some doubt that these contracts or covenants are fully enforced and others point to imaginative methods to allow “volunteer” hours for parents who live some distance away. However, the act of signing a contract obviously means something.

As a former PTA president, I understand the significant challenges in getting families to successfully cross the threshold of a school. We know, however, once families volunteer or engage, they quickly learn that family engagement in the school environment generates positive benefits for their own children and for the school environment at large.

You don’t have to be an accomplished educator or a Nobel-prize winning economist to understand the benefits of familial engagement in education. Imagine the dollars saved if more families volunteered for projects involving our schools, the benefits of having more people to read, tutor and mentor and the positive long-term economic boost from smarter, more successful students which, in turn, would strengthen public education.

However, sadly, familial engagement in our public schools is not always what it should or could be. When did it become acceptable for parents and guardians to never engage in their child’s school?

Fully-funded, free and equal public education is a constitutional right that must be protected and can never be denied. Schools recognize some households are struggling, working multiple jobs with challenging hours or raising children alone. Others may have difficulty volunteering often or feel they have little to offer. Language differences can work to undermine confidence in the benefits of engaging in a school.

We know, as a result, we cannot generate a mandatory volunteer policy in public education that is fully enforceable against those who refuse to engage. At the same time, we can’t rely on more community meetings to solve this familial engagement crisis.

For municipalities who do not control education, the lack of familial engagement is not something to ignore. We know that strong schools support vibrant neighborhoods, which translates into safer and more economically stable communities. While implementing municipal-based solutions when schools are governed by a separately elected board of education is challenging, the impact of failing to try directly and negatively impacts municipal governments.

So what to do?

We must begin by altering the expectations for a parent or guardian and families in a quality public education system. Public education is a collective commitment intended to build future success for our children and our society involving the entire community, including, not excluding, families.

Schools need to develop a true, sustained and supported customer service model, like we see in businesses who must compete, to overcome fears and preconceived notions, as well as blunt negative past experiences. Schools must embrace the notion that some families may be intimidated or may have had experiences in the past where the school was not as welcoming as it could have been. Directly communicating a customer-friendly atmosphere can be a challenge since not every “customer” comes to the school, but it is not impossible. It starts, perhaps, in the car loop and the front desk, and progresses outward to those who do not come to the school.

Next, schools must understand that not all families will have someone who will be able volunteer inside the school or as part of the curriculum. So, developing a menu of opportunities to engage must include at home projects and potential in-kind efforts.

Additionally, if engagement is the goal, let’s re-think what engagement in education means. Since we recognize that not all families can volunteer or will have the confidence that they have something to offer, changing the definition of engagement offers opportunities to achieve compliance with overall educational goals. Maybe re-define engagement to include meeting with the teacher or administrator to learn about how the student is doing in school, reading to the student at night, going over the homework assignments or attending a school wide event or meeting.

Start with that level of engagement, track it, praise it and encourage different types of engagement. Set a baseline expectation of 1 hour per week, which is roughly 40 hours per school year. Then, watch the hours grow through a visible tracking system communicated to the community.

While we recognize benefits to the students should be enough incentive, developing other incentives for parents or rewards to students for engagement can help as well. Of course, we must be mindful the system of incentives does not operate to punish students who cannot find a family member to engage.

Municipalities which do not control education have an important role to play in addressing the crisis of familial engagement. Prioritizing engagement in schools as a theme in meetings with community, inter-faith, and business leaders sets the tone. Establishing the benefits to the community at large helps to generate a gravitational pull towards the school if for no other reason than self-interest in an economically stable community.

In the end, it is time to have all families sign a covenant, or contract, to engage in their respective schools. The act of signing a “contract” or covenant means something. Even the lack of enforcement options generates only marginal incremental increases in engagement, in whatever form defined, we can no longer ignore the current familial engagement crisis. We owe it to ourselves and our young minds to try something.

_____________________

Michael J. Ryan is a partner with the Fort Lauderdale law firm Krupnick Campbell Malone Buser Slama Hancock & Liberman, a former president of the Parent-Teacher Association at Sawgrass Elementary School and former chair of the City of Sunrise Education Advisory Board. Mr. Ryan also currently serves as Mayor of the City of Sunrise, Fla.

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Matthew Lynch published in Matthew Lynch, Policy & Reform, Teachers

4 Tips Cash-Strapped Districts Can Use to Pay Teachers What They Deserve

It’s no secret that teachers in the United States receive little recognition and a salary below their abilities, and that their training after hire consists of professional development that rarely leads to much growth. There is also little incentive for teachers to strive to earn more because pay isn’t based on excellence, but on time on the job. This can lead to quality teachers feeling burned out, with no recourse for better pay for their efforts.

But with a little creativity, this truth can be reversed—even for districts on a tight budget.

Without further ado, here are some things to consider so that teachers can get paid what they’re worth, whether funds are abundant or limited:

1. Rethink the “teachers on an assembly line” mentality. There is a tendency for American teachers to be treated like factory workers. The No Child Left Behind program holds teachers entirely responsible for their students’ performance on state achievement tests, regardless of the many variables that influence students’ performance on these tests. For example, it is extremely difficult, if not impossible, to prepare a sixth grade student reading at a second grade level to perform well on a state achievement test. It is no wonder that standardized testing has caused schools and teachers to panic.

2. Put it into perspective: remember that school principals and other administrators receive comfortable salaries. In addition to concerns about job security, low compensation, and student performance on high stakes test, teachers must also worry about subpar principals who are overcompensated for the successes of teachers. Although administrators deserve to be fairly compensated for their work, their pay does not seem equitable compared to that of teachers. If administrators are to be compensated fairly for the job performed, then teachers, too, should be fairly compensated.

3. Prioritize paying teachers more, and question the assumption that this has to be expensive. When considering these issues, a major mistake made by reform groups is to table efforts at improving teacher salaries because the expenditure does not fit into the school budget. If children are America’s most precious commodity and the focal point of the nation’s educational system, then the lack of funding is no excuse to forgo efforts. Many school reform efforts are cost-effective and can be implemented by resourceful educators. When there is a lack of money, change is contingent upon the faith and commitment level of the faculty and staff. Money should not be wasted on model programs and unsubstantiated trends.

4. Think about the indirectly related factors that will help teachers. Considering factors such as teachers’ professional development, while at first may seem unrelated, can be a key factor for successfully improving teaching salaries as well. When analyzing budgets, it is important to set aside money to hire teachers with the ability to create and teach in-service professional development programs. The ability to train the staff and educators internally will save the school money, and will give the teacher/expert a feeling of usefulness. For instance, a teacher with 30 years of experience and a demonstrated ability to obtain amazing results from her specific teaching strategies might create a professional development seminar to share her expertise. This saves the school an enormous amount of money, and saves the administrator the trouble and cost of hiring a consultant. These savings can then be passed on to the teachers, perhaps in the form of bonuses, etc.

In the end, schools operating with limited funds to support reform efforts will need to be both resourceful and creative in order to affect positive change and strive toward equitable pay for superior teachers. Forward thinking leaders, committed and imaginative teachers, and a supportive community can contribute to change that improves the working environment of our teachers – and their salaries too.

I am sure that you also have some interesting insights on how to pay teachers what they deserve, even on shoestring budgets. So share your thoughts below in the comments.

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Matthew Lynch published in Education News, Equity, HBCU's, Higher Education, Secondary Education

Three Ways Louisiana Is Getting Students Career-Ready

By requiring industry-based credentials for CTE students and encouraging all students to interact with industry professionals, Louisiana’s Jump Start program is revolutionizing career education

In Louisiana, only 19 percent of high school students go on to receive a four-year college degree. There are plenty of high-paying jobs available for the other 81 percent, but matching students with these opportunities and making sure they have the right credentials—like a two-year degree or industry certification—has always been a challenge.

For years, Louisiana students have been able to earn a Career Diploma as an alternative to a traditional academic diploma. But the program was seldom used, and students working toward a Career Diploma weren’t being adequately prepared for jobs in high-demand fields.

In short, there was little or no connection between Louisiana’s career education strategy and its workforce needs. State leaders knew they needed a better approach.

Read the rest of this article on the Huffington Post.

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Matthew Lynch published in Education Leadership, Matthew Lynch

Instructional Leadership and Student Performance

According to research, schools that make a positive difference in the learning levels are led by principals who make a positive contribution to staff effectiveness and students under their charge. In the 1980s, instructional leadership was often depicted as “hands-on” leadership in classroom matters. The majority of recent studies report that the involvement of principals in classroom instruction are indirect, and carried out through building a school culture and leading by example.

However, most scholars now find that a principal’s impact on student learning is small, but has an important place in statistical data. Even marginal impact is vital to acheiving desired outcomes, because policy makers still use these findings to justify their emphasis on the selection and training of school leaders as a strategy for school improvement. The role of the principal in shaping the school’s vision and mission is described as the most influential “avenue of effects.”

School context has been found to have a significant effect on the success of a principal’s instructional leadership. Instructional leadership effectiveness should be viewed as an independent effort, but also as dependent on the learning environment.

Successful instructional leaders work with other stakeholders to shape the school to fit its mission. Instructional leaders directly influence the quality of school outcomes by aligning the school’s academic standards, timetables, and curriculum, with the school’s mission. Leaders are more effective when they are clear about missions, and manage activities that fall in line with practices needed for effectiveness.

The lack of clarity of the role of the principal in instructional leadership has been a problem. Instructional leadership has rarely defined practices and behaviors that the principal should model, making it hard to determine what needs to be considered for effective instructional leadership. Assigning clear duties to principals will help to ensure instructional leadership is carried out properly. Once principals and school leaders understand their roles, they can begin the task of leading their schools toward higher success.

 

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Matthew Lynch published in Education Leadership, Policy & Reform

Accountability versus Gaming the P-12 System

I’ve recently delved into The Death and Life of the Great American School by Diane Ravitch. It has been on my reading list for some time now and I finally decided it was time to really give it the attention it deserves. I consider myself an education reformer, and an advocate for reforming the current public school system, so Ravitch’s works speak to me, even if I’m not always completely in the same school of thought.

In educational discourse, Ravitch is an interesting figure. She served as the assistant secretary of Education under George H.W. Bush, though she has never been a Republican and is an Independent today. She was once a supporter of the No Child Left Behind Act and even the formation of charter schools, but in recent years has spoken out against these initiatives, saying that she is now disillusioned with them. In her eyes, and those of her supporters, the idea of standardized testing as a measure of a school’s worth and competition as a way to improve public education are not valid avenues to reform, and will indeed lead to an education system more flawed than the current one.

Ravitch discusses the many ways that school districts that include public, private and charter schools within their realms game the system to reach standardized testing and other accountability benchmarks. She talks in depth about the transformation of New York City public school district 2, an area that has undergone reform with support from deep pockets, like those belonging to billionaire Michael Bloomberg. In this particular instance, New York City schools are under mayoral control for all intents and purposes – and as such, have accountability standards that read more like a white paper on business efficiency than suggestions for actually teaching human beings.

The problem with these standards, of course, is that with stringent, subjective targets for learning, schools are able to game the system to make it work in their favor. In other words, these schools are looking for ways to meet a specific, narrow goal – think of it like a salesperson closing a deal – and then they are rewarded for that piece of shallow success. The flip side of this is that the schools that do not manage to meet these standards are then punished, in true NCLB style, even if the details of their teaching methods actually have some merit. Teachers and administrators at schools that are deemed “failures” or even just mediocre by the established system then must bow to the pressure in order to stay relevant and away from the target range when it comes to adding “competitive” school choices.

Places like New York City are not the first to bring in sweeping reform ideas intended to aid student success – they are simply re-debuting ideas that have already existed in other parts of the country. It is fair to note that by many accounts, areas with public charter and magnet school choice do not fare any better (and are sometimes worse) than the traditional neighborhood schools in the area. Yet, sometimes these schools DO work – at least on paper. I’ve mused before about how my home state of Mississippi would look if there were to be more choice in the state when it comes to P-12 education. As it stands now, student achievement gets a failing grade consistently in Mississippi and the public schools are not improving under the current system. Based on the success of choice programs in other areas, is it worth a try? Or will those schools be developed in ways that “game the system” and take away the true measure of learning: well-rounded, educated students?

On Friday, I’ll take a look at the idea of superstar teachers tackled in the book and if they really are the cure for all educational reform ailments – or if they even exist.
Have you read The Death and Life of the Great American School? What are your thoughts?

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Matthew Lynch published in EdTech & Innovation, Education Leadership, Matthew Lynch

Relating Resource Allocation to a Performance-Focused Agenda

As the focus on the improvement of learning becomes more central, what educational leaders are expected to do and accomplish through the allocation of resources has changed. Historically, supporters of education were more concerned with the dollar amount allocated per pupil, and they spent much of their political capital advocating for increases from one year to the next.

Educational leaders were responsible for creating balanced budgets with the dollars they had available and accounting for expenditures in a responsible manner– a complex task in large school districts. Little attention was paid to how resources were related to performance or what type of performance was expected. The standards-based reform movement of the past several decades changed the situation fundamentally, by prompting new questions about what the learning standards should be and how educators should be held accountable for improved performance.

In response, educators have become more focused on results, while taking the stance that higher performance cannot be accomplished without adequate resources. Thus, a sea change has occurred, prompting educational leaders to consider how resource allocation is related to building high-performing systems that work for all students. As they take seriously the charge to become more learning-focused, leaders critically examine the equity, efficiency, and effectiveness of existing resource allocation policies and practices and make decisions regarding ways in which resources might be reallocated in more productive ways.

This resource reallocation challenge is as important in the present era of standards-driven reform and accountability for results. Given the considerable variation in the needs, capacities, and contexts of schools, it is striking– though not surprising– that for the most part, resource allocation patterns in K–12 education are relatively uniform.

The uniformity of leaders’ responses to these varying needs may simply signal a safe course: the most easily defended set of decisions in a context of competition for scarce resources. Beneath the surface of this course of action, however, conflicting expectations, tensions, and barriers may be impeding leaders’ ability to think more creatively about how to organize and allocate limited resources and act strategically. These barriers exist at all levels of the educational policy system.

In such a situation, leaders might wish for definitive understanding about the impact of particular investments on student learning, yet the state of knowledge here is incomplete. The highly contextual nature of schools, the variations with which any particular improvement strategy is implemented, the motivational conditions that are present, and the need to adapt strategies to fit specific circumstances all interact with the resources brought to bear on learning improvement goals.

For districts wishing to commence anew with student-weighted allocation systems (whereby funds are allocated on the basis of student types), offering clear-cut guidance on what increments should be assigned to each student type is a crucial first step. However, a definitive response plainly cannot exist in the current state of fiscal allocation policy. The difficulty here is that currently there is no efficient resource allocation system whereby an answer can be reliably extrapolated.

Policymakers are consequently forced into determining fiscal policy without information relating to expenditure on student types. They are forced to do so with no understanding of the workings of allocation policies at different levels (federal, state, and local) either together or in conflict. Policymakers have little clarity on expenditure for different student types at the school level, nor awareness of the types of policies that would be more effective in guaranteeing that dollars reach students in the proposed ways.

School finance today works in opposition to the focused and effective utilization of resources that promote improved education of students. Just as an archaic computer can no longer function properly in a technological environment inundated with the latest software, this nation’s school finance system frozen by a combination of unrelated expenditure policies and administrative plans can no longer serve the needs of an educational system calling for reform.  A new model is required, to do one thing– ensure that every child receives instruction for his or her needs in order to become an involved citizen having total participation in this modern economy.

Current school finance systems fund programs, uphold institutions, and offer resources and staff employment so the school and district administrators can fully execute the multitude of laws and regulations that have become part of public education. However, the methods employed by today’s school finance systems– deploying expenditure levels based on habit and not need, covering up funds’ actual allocations, supporting institutions whether they are viable or not, hypocritically addressing equity, spending resources flippantly, attempting to make adults accountable by compliance and not by results– confuses the links between resources and academic aims that make finance relevant to student performance.

The school finance system evolved in a era in which programs were funded, and students passed or failed without much regard paid to the role of funding in student performance. This pattern was sustainable then, as jobs were available for people with low skills, and the vast majority of workers were not required to be well educated in order to maintain a healthy economy. Unfortunately, that legacy has proven unworkable in today’s highly technological, information-based economy, where low-skilled workers cannot rise above the poverty level and overseas workers are able to compete effectively in the market for skilled jobs, once available solely to Americans.

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