This is a powerful editorial written by the editorial board of the York Dispatch.
The Republican-controlled legislature has imposed a funding system that is literally forcing the school district to starve in order to survive.
It is an outrage.
This should be a cover story in every national magazine. It isn’t, because it’s all too common.
When we starve our schools, we destroy the education of the children who attend them.
The editorial says:
York City School District is trapped in a death spiral.
It’s stuck under years-long state management that limits how money can be spent. Charter schools are annually sucking more than $25 million from its budget. Miserly state lawmakers foist the responsibility for funding public education on local officials, thereby fostering a system that rewards students in rich communities and punishes those in poor ones. And York City taxpayers are fed up with paying taxes that are up to double what’s paid in richer districts with more valuable property.
It’s no wonder that, under these conditions, York City Superintendent Andrea Berry presented a slash-and-burn budget for the 2020-21 school year containing $6.2 million in cuts. And, sadly, it’s no surprise the district’s school board went even further, last week approving a budget that axed 44 positions, including 32 teachers.
And, even so, York City’s 2020-21 budget still boosted taxes. That’s how bad things really are.
Really, what choice did district officials have?
York City school officials are trapped in a budgetary spiral that’s plagued poor, largely minority communities throughout the U.S. for decades. Under-represented at the statehouse, their calls for funding reform fall flat.
Like anything stuck in a trap, eventually the grisly choice of gnawing off one’s leg is the last, best available option.
Easily available metrics, such as test scores, drive the moneyed classes from the city, exacerbating blight and crashing property values.
The poverty increases the demand for not-for-profits, which, in turn, remove more property from the tax rolls.
And, all the while, Republicans in the state Legislature tout the myth of “school choice,” a particularly insidious bit of libertarian conservative dogma — concocted in response to the integration of Southern schools — that conspires to privatize the American school system and funnel taxpayer dollars to religious institutions.
The results will be devastating for York City’s students and society at large.
Interested in the performing arts? Too bad.
Hoping to grow from an introduction in the humanities? Those options are even more limited now.
Programs such as these are, in a very real sense, the foundation of a well-rounded education, one that prepares students to take their place as active citizens in a representative republic. But, more often than not, society has decided that the liberal arts aren’t for poor kids.
Make no mistake, York City’s plight is one destroying urban districts throughout the country. Just ask Connecticut Superior Court Judge Thomas Moukawsher, who, in 2016, wrote a blistering ruling that attacked the very foundation of the system under which public schools are funded in this country.
His 90-page ruling was an indictment of the disparity between rich districts and poor ones that the U.S. funding model breeds.
“So change must come. The state has to accept that the schools are its blessing and its burden, and if it cannot be wise, it must at least be sensible,” Moukawsher wrote.
And yet, with the inherent systemic flaws well-established, school districts such as York City remain trapped and must eat itself just to survive.
Officials there had little choice this past week.
But the fact that they were left without any other options is neither moral nor just.
Thanks to Peter Greene for sharing this blistering but accurate editorial.
7-9-2020, Pennsylvania Catholic Conference site- “applauds” SCOTUS decisions in the Little Sisters of the Poor, Our Lady of Guadalupe and St. James Catholic schools cases.
6-7-2019- Pennsylvania Catholic Conference site- House Education Committee Chair, “Rep, Curt Sonney (photo accompanying) Remains a Champion of School Choice…School choice is a national trend but in Penn., we’ve been kind of ahead of the curve….a bunch of Republican sponsors and even a few Democrats…Tony DeLucca and Mark Rozzi.”
Thank you, Diane and Peter, for posting this.
The sad history of the York City School Districts suggests that the best path forward is for Democrats is to win big in November. Pennsylvania has a Democratic governor that values public education, but the state legislature contains many charter lobby friends and charter school investors. Governor Wolf cannot do the job alone, and the same can be said about a president. Republicans are skilled obstructionists. We need a landslide in November if we want significant change. In the middle of a pandemic it remains to be seen if this is possible.
and the more essential path forward: Democrats win big in November AND aggressively separate the party from its deep relationship with the charter school game. It is very hard to imagine this….
A powerful and all-too-common example of yet another billionaire riff – the soaking of public school wealth by privatizers. The pillaging of public ed funding is one of many such fronts in the attack on the quickly-evaporating middle class. This large-scale transferral of wealth to the oligarchy is perpetrated via scam Republican “tax cuts” (the last one transferring $3 trillion to the elite….), dismantling public healthcare and using public monies to inflate stock prices for example. Seeing criminally dunder-headed scamway grifter Betsy DeVos on TV today makes me think we’re a long way off from repairing the deep damage these tawdry kleptocrats have already wrought.
No mention of the $1.4- $3.5 bil. money the Catholic Church got this year from taxpayers. No mention of the tax funded employees of the state Catholic Conferences who promote legislation for school choice in almost every state?
Wait… mentioning that and Putin’s playbook to enact the Manhattan Declaration in Russia (Daily Beast 7-12-2020) would be labeled anti-Catholic bias.
The billionaires first claimed opposition to charter schools was anti-black. Then, the Koch network and Catholic researchers praised the better values found among students in Catholic schools. And now, opposition to Catholic bishop politicking, is anti- Catholicism.
What an effective propaganda machine convincing so many.
Thank you, Diane, and York Dispatch for highlighting the disparities and dysfunction that has prevailed for sadly way too long. A disturbing unequal playing field on all accounts. Superintendent Dr. Berry & Governor Wolf can’t do this alone! Improving our urban education system is a very possible endeavor! York City residents should have access to free pre-school for all 4-yr-olds to level the kindergarten playing field, prioritize intensive reading education via 10 students per class, remove underperforming staff within 90 days & focus on teacher quality rather than teacher seniority, music, art & job skills training & education must be brought back, have students spend more time in school by changing the standard 180 days to 205 & full 8 hr days, pay teachers more deserving salaries, & most importantly, implement creative get-togethers design to foster parental, teacher & community involvement on a daily basis! Yes these are solutions that need backed with appropriate funding & committed oversight, but still feasible to spearhead if all districts, communities & residents stop viewing this as “a city problem” as this devastating spiral affects everyone so help your neighbor RISE!!!