More on a Child-Centered Education Finance System for Ohio
Ohio's two major party candidates for Governor squared off yesterday in a debate over education. The first question went straight to the heart of Ohio's current focus for improving our schools -- funding. On this issue the candidates showed a clear difference in their beliefs and in their perspectives. The responses were indicative of how each candidate perceives the problem, and the solution.
The question of school funding was phrased as one asking how the candidates would address the "school funding problem."
Congressman Strickland stayed to the tried and true notion that we simply lack resources, properly distributed, in our K-12 system. Reducing the property tax burden, combined with an increase in the amount of total resources going into the system, with an emphasis on equitable distribution will be sufficient to 'solve' this 'problem.' Since Mr. Strickland was not forthcoming with a plan for cutting spending elsewhere, increasing total taxes for still more spending on school bureaucracies appears to be in the cards if he were elected.
Secretary of State Blackwell showed a grasp of the true 'school funding problem' with his response to this question. Mr. Blackwell offered a simple and yet profound solution: a child-centered funding system.
A child-centered funding system for Ohio was first proposed by the Buckeye Institute in its white paper, Children First: A Discussion Paper on Public School Finance and Education Reform in Ohio. This paper can be found at http://www.buckeyeinstitute.org/docs/white.pdf.
Currently, state spending on education is indeed "school finance" or more accurately, "school district finance" as the end recipients of tax dollars are those cornerstones of the educational status quo, local public school districts. Our child-centered finance plan would rework state spending into a true education funding system as state dollars would be spent by parents and children and not district bureaucracies.
By cutting out the middlemen in our current school district finance system and putting parents in control of their children's education, Ohio would create an education funding system that is thorough, efficient and far more capable of preparing our children to succeed in the global economy.
The Buckeye Institute has documented how Ohio has been spending ever increasing amounts of money on its public school system over the last 20 years, and yet the state has seen no increase in student achievement as a result. In fact, Ohio's urban schools are among the highest spending districts due to past efforts to increase equity. Even with these resources, none of the Big 8 school districts managed to pass more than seven of twenty-five criteria on the state's 2005-06 report card.
Our research over the years has consistently found that inadequate spending is no longer the 'school funding problem,' if indeed it ever was.
The problem more properly put is that the vast resources going into the school finance system are not producing sufficient returns for Ohio. Mr. Blackwell's recognition of the true nature of the 'school funding problem' in Ohio, and his proposal to put children and their parents front and center in a new funding system, is refreshing and much needed.
