Money Holes

DD, you've forced me to show my true colors.

Putting in more money - particularly in DC public schools - is absolutely NOT a solution. Though the city is the murder capital, it is also one of the highest in spending per pupil (see Table 5 of this NEA report). Yet, Washington remains near the bottom in test scores.

Another telling example is the Kansas City school system. Because of a judicial desegregation order, the board kicked up property taxes to throw $2 billion into the public schools there. An Olympic-swimming-pool-top-notch-labs-and-curriculum later, the schools still score low on state achievement tests and have high drop out rates.

These failures have led to the growing interest in vouchers and the public school choice provision of the No Child Left Behind Act. Money is not irrelevant. But after a certain point, when you still have no results you have to start wondering about the skills of the managers.

(Disclaimer: I actually worked on school vouchers this past summer with Alliance for School Choice and will be writing a law journal article on this subject.)