USE RACE TO TOP MONEY FOR SCHOOL

FUNDING "CATASTROPHE"

Editorial by Molly A. Hunter

s reported widely this spring, pink slips are going to hundreds of thousands of

A school employees, including teachers, and causing deep concerns about

growing class sizes and the end of essential K-12 education programs for kids,
beginning with this year's planned summer school. Related programs and
services that are proven to raise achievement, such as successful after school programs and
even cost-saving preschool programs, are being shuttered in many states and districts.
The current 'Great Recession' has raised unemployment and reduced the funds that ordinarily
flow into state treasuries. The schools are one of the basic services that these state revenues
usually fund. While the federal Recovery Act of 2009 softened the impact on education in this
school year, that money is running out for next year and beyond.
Expected to be missing from classrooms next year are 15,000 teachers in New York alone,
17,000 in Illinois, 22,000 and possibly more in California, and so on across the country. Also,
rural schools, trying to cut transportation costs, seek to reduce school to a four-day week or
shorten the school year.
Recently, federal Secretary of Education, Arne Duncan called the crisis a potential "education
catastrophe," and Senator Tom Harkin introduced an emergency bill calling for $23 billion to
save education jobs. But, insiders are doubtful the bill can pass. If it fails, a new, similar bill
should be pursued aggressively next year, with proper safeguards to prevent states from
shifting education funding to other uses, as some have done with Recovery Act's fiscal
stabilization funds.
Meanwhile, the federal Education Department (ED) is forging ahead with the "Race to the Top
(RTT), designed as a "competition" to award $4.35 billion in federal funds to select "winner"
states. Many experts question the educational value of the changes in state education law and
policy promoted by the RTT competition. Putting that aside, however, maybe it's time for ED to
rethink the RTT strategy in light of the extraordinary fiscal stress in state education budgets. As
EPI has suggested "the substitution of competition for uniform funding has no place in this time
of state fiscal crisis."
State school finance systems are in a shambles as states rush to cut -- and cut -- deeper into
their education budgets. Secretary Duncan should reach out to states and ask whether it

Education Justice at Education Law Center, 60 Park Place, Suite 300, Newark, NJ 07102
www.EducationJustice.org ~ 973-624-1815 ~ Fax: 973-624-7339 1
makes more sense to use the next round of RTT funds to help address this "catastrophe." If
the states agree, then ED should allocate the RTT funding to help states and school districts
stop, or at least slow, the downward spiral.
If RTT goes forward as a competition, millions of children will lose because federal funds will
go to a relatively small number of states. If California loses, its six million students lose. If New
York, Texas and Florida lose, their more than 10 million students lose.
Are the millions of students in Pennsylvania and Massachusetts any less worthy of support
than those in Delaware and Tennessee? ED needs to move quickly to ensure all children have
access to high quality educational opportunities in these trying economic times.
Molly A. Hunter is Director, Education Justice, the national program of the Education Law
Center.

Prepared: April 25, 2010

Education Justice at Education Law Center, 60 Park Place, Suite 300, Newark, NJ 07102
www.EducationJustice.org ~ 973-624-1815 ~ Fax: 973-624-7339 2