Starving America’s Public Schools

Posted by on October 31, 2011

‘Far more real and much more dangerous’

A new report from the Campaign for America’s Future looks at American pre-K-12 public schools from the perspective of local newspapers and media broadcasts, a bottom-up view to further inform discussions about America’s public schools. The authors report they found a growing crisis “far more real and much more dangerous to our nation’s children than the prevailing narrative suggests.” Austerity budgets passed by state legislatures are hugely impacting direct services to children, youth, and families. Education funding cuts have gutted early childhood education programs (pre-K and kindergarten); led to huge class sizes in many subjects; ended art, music, and physical education; and reduced specialized programs and/or introduced hefty fees for them. As schools grapple with severe cuts, they also face enormous pressure to transfer tax dollars outside traditional public education to charter, private, and religious schools, and contractors and companies tasked with setting up new systems for testing and accountability. The report focuses on five states — Arizona, Florida, North Carolina, Ohio, and Pennsylvania — that the authors feel epitomize the current crisis in K-12 education systems.

See the report: http://www.ourfuture.org/report/2011104111/starving-america-s-public-schools