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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
December 1, 2006
Contact: David Strom
Ph: (651) 294-3590
PSMinnesota’s BS
Surprise! Education Establishment Wants More Money!
St Paul—What a shock!
An organization made up of representatives of the education establishment inMinnesota has released a report that shows that the education establishment doesn’t have enough money to do its job.
The new organization, PS Minnesota (www.psminnesota.org), begins its pitch with what must seem to most Minnesotans a pretty startling admission: until recently, the education establishment didn’t actually have to take its mission to educate all children equally seriously:
"The state and federal governments have dramatically changed requirements for our students and schools. Today our schools are charged with ensuring that EVERY student, regardless of language barriers or disability, meets higher state-determined learning standards. The last decade has seen historic changes to the demands placed on public schools, yet we have not modernized our approach to school funding to meet new requirements." (http://www.psminnesota.org/), emphasis in original)
Actually educate EVERY student?! To high standards! How shocking!
Apparently, such an idea never occurred to PS Minnesota’s members, which includeMinnesota’s School Boards, the PTA, school principals, and other similar organizations.
And obviously, if these organizations are actually going to be held accountable for finally doing their job, they claim, they will certainly need a boatload of new money.
$1 billion to $1.8 billion in new money, actually. That is, if a study released by PS Minnesota is to be believed.
“PS Minnesota’s study is a load of BS,” said David Strom, President of the Taxpayers League of MN.
“Per pupil funding has skyrocketed over the last 20 years, with no corresponding increase in student performance. Since 1970, real spending per pupil has risen 93% (after inflation), and still we hear complaints that it isn’t enough,” Strom added.
Strom derided PS Minnesota’s basic argument that the new standards require new money.
“The whole point of putting the new standards and testing regimen in place was to ensure that students were actually getting what they were promised: a high quality education that prepared them for work and/or higher education. For education bureaucrats to cry ‘foul’ now that they are going to be held accountable for doing what they were supposed to do all along is ludicrous! If I were them, I would be embarrassed to admit that they haven’t been trying to educate all students to high standards until now.
“It just shows how unabashed the education bureaucrats have become. To actually say that the requirement to give a high quality education to every student is a new thing for them shows just how out of touch from reality the education establishment is. There is nothing new at all about the expectation that the schools give a high quality education to all comers. The only thing new is that we now have a way to measure whether they actually accomplish that goal,” Strom said. “Obviously, accountability is a new concept to the education bureaucrats.”
The new study released by PS Minnesota has a glaring omission, according to the Taxpayers League: nowhere does it suggest that there be consequences attached for failing to accomplish the goals set out.
“I assume that if the new $1 to $1.8 billion didn’t buy a better education for our kids, PS Minnesota would use that as proof that there still wasn’t enough money to do the job. By this logic, every failure to perform would be proof that the system needs more money. That’s a pretty good deal for the system, but what about the students and taxpayers?” Strom concluded.
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