Lawmakers acknowledge inequity in school funding

In South Carolina, good ideas are rare to emerge from our State House -- no sense denying the truth -- but every good idea is chained at the waist to two or three bad ones.

Here's an example, as reported by WTLX:

A bi-partisan group of South Carolina legislators wants to create a uniform education funding system that boosts funding for most students while cutting property taxes for businesses and rental owners.

Catch that? One step forward, two steps back.

Arithmetic is simple. One plus one equals two. Five plus five equals ten. Ten is more than two.

Today, some schools are getting level-two funding. Some are getting level-ten funding. That's unequal.

Funding comes from tax revenue.

It's a great idea to create a single pot of tax revenue out of which all schools can be funded equitably.

It's a foolish idea to cut the tax revenue that will go into that pot, because cutting the tax revenue means that there's fewer dollars in the pot to improve school funding.

Republican Rep. Jenny Horne of Summerville led a news conference Tuesday calling for a revamping of South Carolina's fragmented, decades-old education funding formulas.

The five Republicans and one Democrat say a bill will be filed Wednesday to jumpstart the conversation.

The concept involves creating a statewide system of property tax billing for school operations and spending the same on students statewide. The amount per child would be weighted with additional spending, for example, for poor students and gifted and talented students.

Here's where this proposal will fail: By cutting tax revenues, these lawmakers are telling communities whose schools are currently funded at level-ten that they're going to have to settle for level-six funding, in order to raise level-twos up to level-six too.

They're not going to go for that, which means this has been an exercise in futility. You don't feed more children equitably by making the pie smaller; you feed more children equitably by making the pie bigger.

Most businesses would get a tax break.

Well, of course they would. This is South Carolina; night follows day, and the sun rises in the East.

Here's coverage of the same topic by the South Carolina Radio Network:

A group of state legislators unveiled a new proposal Tuesday that would make major changes to how public schools are funded in South Carolina.

Rep. Jenny Horne (R-Summerville) called the idea a "win-win" for public education and business.

A bipartisan group of lawmakers want to set a single property tax millage rate across the entire state and put that money into a single pot. That money would then be divided up on a per-pupil basis and sent back to districts, with weighted amounts for students with disabilities, low income or other factors.

The idea is to replace the state’s four-decade-old funding formula that has become a patchwork of different tax rates and funding levels.

“We’ve got 85 school districts in this state. We’ve got 85 different funding formulas,” said Sen. Paul Campbell (R-Goose Creek), who plans to introduce the proposal in the Senate Wednesday. “What we need is a comon funding formula in this state.”

A group of five Republicans and one Democratic legislator held a press conference in the Statehouse lobby Tuesday to unveil the proposal.

“We’ve heard for years that the money needs to follow the child,” Rep. Doug Brannon (R-Landrum) said, “Under the current education funding process, that’s just not possible.”

Brannon said education funding reform is needed before lawmakers can start tax reform, since property taxes mostly go towards schools and education makes up more than half of the state’s General Fund spending. While unlikely to pass this late in the session, Rep. Jenny Horne (R-Summerville) said it is meant to start a conversation for next year’s session.

Education groups agreed. Debbie Elmore of the South Carolina Association of School Boards said she was glad lawmakers recognized the need to change how school districts are funded. “It’s like a blast of cool water on a hot day. It’s refreshing.”

Molly Spearman, executive director of the South Carolina Association of School Administrators, said the original formula was created in the 1970s and has not been updated since– meaning many counties treated as “rural” under the formula have since seen a significant growth. Others are still treated as if they have a textile mill tax base, when that has not been the case for decades.

Horne called the new proposal a “win-win”: most residents and businesses would see a property tax decrease, while school districts would get a more efficient funding formula.

“This is where the campaign rhetoric ends and true, meaningful tax reform begins,” said Rep. Mia Butler-Garrick (D-Columbia), who joined Republicans in introducing the bill.

The bill will propose a uniform rate of 100 mills rate (a mill equals $1 of property taxed per $1,000 of its assessed value), which would be a decrease in 43 of the state’s 46 counties. Horne said lawmakers would work to find ways to keep the remaining counties (Beaufort, Charleston, and Georgetown) below that rate so that they will not be the only ones to suffer a tax increase.

National educators group offers lobbying tips

The American Association of School Administrators, the national association with which the South Carolina Association of School Administrators is affiliated, has published a helpful note on its website on the topic of gaining greater funding for public education.

It is helpful because it reminds educators in South Carolina of two facts: One, public education and its funding is under attack nationwide; and two, it is always valuable for South Carolina's educators to join with, to consider and to consult the experience and expertise of educators in other states. We are, after all, members of a profession, just like physicians, attorneys, architects, accountants and others.

AASA's Noelle Ellerson writes, "Squeezed by four consecutive years of budget cuts as the nation’s greatest recession wears on, our country’s public schools have found themselves operating under increasingly tighter fiscal constraints while facing ever-changing demands and enrollments."

Reductions in financial support to schools at the federal level have compounded cutbacks at the state and local levels, meaning school leaders must stretch every dollar to go further and school districts are doing as much or more with less.

In such a fiscal climate, advocacy for government appropriations — especially knowing how to make a compelling case for continued and increased education funding — has never been a more crucial skill for school system leaders. In any list of advocacy tips, an understanding of the education appropriations process is a proper starting point.

Certainly so. It's not likely that other states have as obtuse a system of school appropriations as South Carolina -- obtuse because although our Education Finance Act clearly dictates the annual base student cost, the legislature chooses annually whether or not it will fulfill its obligation to appropriate that sum -- but it's likely that strategies that have worked elsewhere may be useful here.

On behalf of K-12 schooling, AASA’s advocacy efforts at the federal level are guided by a member-driven legislative agenda, updated annually, that outlines our organization’s federal priorities. The agenda covers a range of topics, including the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, education technology, the Rural Education Achievement Program and education funding. These policy areas reflect federal legislation, which is grouped into two categories, authorizing language and appropriations language.

Authorizing language is best described as legislation that creates agencies, programs or other government functions. Authorizing language serves the purpose of establishing parameters for government programs and agencies but does not actually fund them.

Appropriations language, on the other hand, is legislative language that actually provides the funding to run the agency or its program. ESEA authorizes federal education programs — Title I, REAP, Ed Tech (officially known as Enhancing Education Through Technology) — that are funded through the federal appropriations process.

Appropriations is an annual process, meaning education leaders and community members have an opportunity each year to make the case for financial support. While federal education dollars represent a small portion of overall education spending in the United States (roughly 8 percent), the funds play a significant role in many school districts, without which the districts would be hard-pressed to maintain programs, services and personnel.

Although, it is worth noting, Congress occasionally appropriates special funding for special purposes, such as last year's funding to protect public education by protecting educators' jobs, and our 49 sister states benefited in that case by our state leaders' stubborn foolishness in refusing to accept those funds -- about $144 million, if memory serves.

The heavy lifting of effective advocacy centers on your ability to build and maintain a viable working relationship with your congressional delegation and their education staffers. Over the years, AASA has developed a few strategies that we see as the foundation to advocacy that works.

Weigh in early, weigh in often. Policy decisions are made whether or not you share your informed voice on a proposal. As public school administrators, you are community and education leaders with direct contact to the community and an important understanding of how federal policy is or is not functioning on a day-to-day basis.

Let's apply that to ourselves. How often have you, as an educator or a parent who supports public education, called and emailed your state representative and state senator to impress upon them the need to support public education funding, and why? Elected lawmakers are fearful of only one thing: Electoral defeat. Telephone calls and emails from large groups of their constituents get their attention; personal visits by groups of their constituents strike fear in their hearts. Don't let them forget that you vote, that they don't permanently own your vote, and that you have opinions and concerns that demand their respect.

Maintain a regular dialogue. While it is good to weigh in when something is urgent or pressing, a more meaningful approach is to maintain an ongoing conversation. It doesn’t have to be daily or weekly. A monthly call or e-mail to your congressional delegation can go a long way.

For maximum impact, I suggest scheduling a weekly five-minute calendar reminder. In the first week, e-mail one of your U.S. senators or their education staffer. In the second week, do the same to your House of Representatives member. During the third week, contact your second senator, and take a break on the fourth week. It is a quick way to point out something that worked well or went wrong relating to a federal initiative. The point is to maintain regular contact with your elected officials in Washington.

Or in Columbia. Even better: Most state legislators have routines -- maybe it's Saturday morning coffee with a gaggle of friends, maybe it's attending church on Sunday. To be most effective, find out their routines, and find out how to become part of them.

Make it real. By building regular conversation with your delegation where you share the ins and outs of how federal policy is functioning at ground level, you and your school district become an anecdote, or the “face” of the policy for your congressional representative. When a policy is proposed or under consideration, the congressional office is inclined to think of the local districts with which they regularly communicate. Why shouldn’t it be your district?

Further, during congressional recesses, invite your representatives and their staff to visit your schools and see firsthand how your district operates.

Here at the state level, our legislators are only in Columbia from January to June, so we've got a full six months to see them in their home districts, and they should have plenty of time to visit schools and classrooms. Isn't it reasonable to ask, since they devise and vote on the budget that funds public schools, that they visit every public school in their district at least once per year? How difficult is that?

And during the legislative session, they all go home on the weekends -- usually they're at home from Friday through Monday -- so we've got plenty to time to find them nearby on the weekends.

Share both the good and the bad. Think about the strongest working relationships you have in your district. Odds are, they are driven largely by open, honest conversation. Certainly, some people share only the most positive, and others speak up whenever they think the sky is falling.

However, the most helpful working relationships balance the developments, and the same can be said of managing your relationships with your congressional delegation. As you reach out to them, don’t hesitate to mix in an example of federal policy with favorable effects (say, emergency dollars that enabled your district to save three teachers’ positions) with something that is not serving your students well (perhaps budgetary pressure from the chronic underfunding of IDEA).

In our case, you might thank lawmakers for not completely zeroing-out the line item for the Education Finance Act. Remember: Think positive!

There's a bit more to the AASA's column, and I encourage readers to check out the rest for themselves, as well as other resources available at the organization's website.

Kershaw public school parent demands, "Show me the money"

Public school educators have been raising the issue since 1977, when the Education Finance Act was first adopted. It was a compromise, which means it didn't meet the complete need even then. Still, it established the base student cost, a formula-driven dollar amount that South Carolina lawmakers would appropriate each year to fund public schools statewide.

That commitment didn't last a hot minute.

And in the 34 years since 1977, lawmakers have felt moved to fully fund that base student cost fewer than 10 times.

More often than not, they funded other budget priorities first, then shoe-horned the state's remaining revenue into the education budget and called it the base student cost.

This year is a great example. The EFA dictates that the base student cost should be nearly $3,000 per child. South Carolina's lawmakers appropriated only $1,880 per child -- the same funding level they appropriated in 1989.

That's what passes for commitment to quality public education in our state.

O, yes, we passed an additional penny on the sales tax in 1984, called that the Education Improvement Act and kept truckin'. Sadly, a lot of lawmakers consider the revenue from that penny to be the only revenue that they are obligated to use in funding public schools. That's called "supplanting" funds.

And -- so sorry, but -- when revenues from that penny are thin, thanks to a bad economy or a recession, the answer from lawmakers is always the same: That's all we have to give, we can't afford any more.

O, they say it like they hate it. They wring their hands and shake their heads from side to side. They look at the floor around your shoes as if there might be some more money laying there. They look so disappointed when they don't see any.

But we can always afford another corporate tax break, though, can't we?

So, from the perspective of an educator, it's always heartening to see parents get on board and ask the same questions, as Kershaw County's Robert Price is doing now.

An electrician by day, Robert Price spends most of his free time on somewhat of a crusade. He wants to change the way education is funded in South Carolina.

"Other than sit around and talk in the bars and complain or talk at church and complain, or talk at work and complain; what can I do to really be effective to help open the eyes of the political people who fund the education system?”

Price, who has a daughter in the Kershaw school system, is launching a petition drive to change the formula state lawmakers use to fund education.

He says the law requires the state spend $2,790 on each student every year; but they're only spending $1,880. Price wants to know where that money is going.

"Not one dime has the governor planning to give to public education, out of 900 million dollars. There’s something wrong with that picture, I don't care if Picasso paints it."

Speak, Mr. Price, speak.

But be careful, Mr. Price, and be not misled. "Funding reform" does not always mean more funding will make it into the public schools. If you take a dollar from your right pocket and put it in your left pocket, you still have a dollar. You can fold that dollar and slide it into your shirt pocket, roll it up and perch it on your ear if you want, but you still have your same dollar.

At the State House in Columbia, lawmakers are very skillful at spooning a million dollars out of one line item and saying they'll put that million dollars on another line item in the name of "funding reform." Problem is, a lot of dollars fall out of the spoon between here and there. They may say that, in the name of "funding reform," we've made some policy changes that result in greater efficiency.

Lawmakers love greater efficiency, Mr. Price, because it's a great distraction from the fact that fewer dollars wind up in the final accounting. Remember: It's all about the dollars. And in the end, lawmakers will congratulate YOU for helping them to achieve "funding reform."

I checked the website that features your petition drive. On its front page, it reads,

School funding is unpredictable and unstable, reform is needed to provide the quality of education we want for our students in South Carolina.

We are in the process of getting 25,000 signatures on a petition for education funding reform. This petition will be submitted to lawmakers in Columbia. It is our expectation that this will have a positive impact and they will respond by carrying out reform that will improve the education received by the children in South Carolina.

Uh-oh. I see a lot of "reform" but I don't see anything demanding lawmakers to fully fund public education, to fully fund even the base student cost. And if I don't see it, you can bet your last money that lawmakers won't see that either.

So I clicked through to the "Mission Statement" page, and it read,

The Citizens for Education Finance Reform in South Carolina organization is a non-profit, non-political, organization with the sole purpose of convincing the South Carolina House of Representatives and the South Carolina Senate to overhaul the funding structure for K-12 education in the state of South Carolina in order to provide a predictable funding stream and equitable funding for the educational needs of all students, regardless of where they live.

Ooh, I get nervous when I hear that we're asking lawmakers to "overhaul" a funding system.

I know what that means to me: I want lawmakers to guarantee that they'll fund what it costs to provide high quality education to every child, including yours.

But I also know what "overhaul" means to lawmakers who already believe that we spent too much money on public schools. It means to spend the least money we can to achieve the best results from the most children. That means what "funding reform" always means: Children of important folks in important places will get what they ask for, while the rest of us... well, Mr. Price, the rest of us won't keep getting what we've always gotten; we'll get even less, in the name of "funding reform."

And when getting even less yields even worse results, our elected leaders will say they gave us the reform we asked for, so if it isn't working, the teachers must not be performing.

The teachers.

The same teachers who've been saying since 1977 that a compromised base student cost was insufficient to provide a high-quality public education to every child.

And we're back where we started, except that our children will get another year older, and our school boards will be strapped for cash one more year, and life goes on, and on, and on.

You have to be specific with our elected leaders, Mr. Price. Many of them are slick as greased pigs on May Day. You ask them for "funding reform" and an "overhaul" and that's exactly what they'll give you -- and that lonely dollar you've been moving from pocket to pocket will be just as lonely tomorrow.

To get what you want, you have to be specific: Call the Devil by his name. If it costs $3,000 to educate your child this year, demand $3,000. If it's $4,000, demand $4,000.

Meanwhile, Mr. Price, thank you. The more we are, the stronger we are.

Haley's budget ranks among five most harmful to education

Columnist Sarah Jaffe at Alternet.org casts Governor Nikki Haley's budget proposal for 2012-13 dead-center among the five most harmful to public education, in a column posted here this weekend.

Budget plans offered by Pennsylvania Governor Tom Corbett and Ohio Governor John Kasich ranked first and second in her list, and Alabama Governor Robert Bentley and Kentucky Governor Steve Beshear finishes fourth and fifth.

But Haley manages to shine from her third-place ranking anyway.

Kasich's elimination of the estate tax is certainly one example of policies that favor the 1 percent and leave students out in the cold, but South Carolina governor Nikki Haley has gone Kasich one better and proposes to entirely eliminate the corporate income tax in her state. That would cost nearly $140 million in the first year alone—-so Haley's taking a chunk of that cash out of public schools.

Her budget, according to Columbia, SC news channel WLTX, cuts “a key funding stream” for public schools, one that primarily goes to teachers' salaries. And another local station, WJBF, reports that while Haley cut public school teachers' incomes, she includes an extra $10 million for charter schools. So that's less money for public employees, more money for private companies using state education funds.

John Ruoff, policy analyst and founder of South Carolina Fair Share, pointed out that eliminating the state corporate tax is likely to have little impact on job creation—-but a big impact on much-needed public programs like the schools. "Governor Haley ought to be a lot more concerned about how we develop a state that businesses want to come to," Ruoff told Tax Analysts. That means having decent infrastructure and a well-educated workforce, not just a zero tax rate.

That Nikki Haley. Ain't she somethin'?

I just feel sorry for whoever follows her in the governor's office. What a mess they'll have to clean up.

Heroic Mick Zais benefits from "politically weak" educators

When Superintendent Mick Zais appeared before a legislative committee to press his agenda to starve public education, he seemed out-of-place and fumbled for words to answer lawmakers' questions. But in a puff piece published by a right-wing organization online, Zais is absolutely eloquent, even accusatory of "weak-willed Republicans" who support public education and educators.

What distinguishes the Palmetto State’s K-12 reform debate from all the others is that it’s being led by an outspoken, retired Army brigadier general and former college president who is eager to take on the “liberal education establishment.”

State Superintendent of Education Mick Zais, a Republican, won election in 2010 by a huge margin of 108,000 votes. He has been in office for just over a year, but he has rankled lawmakers of both political parties by refusing to accept federal education dollars from President Obama’s Race to the Top initiative that gives states money in exchange for approved school reforms.

While other states are eager for the federal assistance, Zais argues that the one-time handouts come with strings attached and quickly turn into unfunded mandates, ultimately driving up education costs and stripping local communities of control over their schools.

“We don’t have a shortage of dollars in South Carolina’s schools, we have a shortage of accountability, competition and incentives,” Zais told EAG.

It's unclear when Zais took time to talk with EAG, a right-wing political organization, but perhaps it was on his own time rather than on state's clock. Taxpayers want to be sure that their dollars aren't being used to subsidize political activity.

Zais has told EAG that "South Carolina spends $11,700 per student, slightly above the national average," when he, better than anyone, knows that South Carolina spends less than $2,000. He knows it because he said so to the legislative budget committee on education:

Zais asked a Ways and Means panel Wednesday not to cut a key funding stream for classrooms, but he did not ask for an increase. The so-called base student cost primarily pays teacher salaries. The current per-student allocation is about $1,900 because of recession budget cuts. A state funding formula calls for it to be nearly $2,800 this year.

Had Zais accepted the offer of federal dollars from the Obama administration, that figure might have been a bit higher. But he didn't, and in his profile interview with EAG, he ridiculed the offer:

“If South Carolina had accepted its slice of the Race to the Top pie, it would equal $2.22 per student per year, for four years,” Zais said. “The idea that $2.22 would make a big difference is just nonsense. That’s not even a rounding error.”

Then, after delivering a sound smack to the federal government that afforded him a career-long military salary, and that will afford him a tasty retirement package, Zais turned his guns to professional educators.

Such views have drawn the ire of the “education industrial complex,” Zais’ term for those who place the interests of adult school employees ahead of the needs of students, and who claim failing public schools can be fixed with a checkbook.

“Traditional proposals for improving education – more money, better facilities, improved curriculum and smaller classes – will not work. We’ve tried that. We’ve tried that for 40 years,” Zais recently told an audience, according to the IndependentMail.com.

Here again, Zais tells out-of-state interviewers a tale that he knows is untrue. South Carolina's pre-eminent historian, Walter Edgar, could undercut this argument in only a couple of minutes, with an answer spanning three hundred years, and cap it with a "bless your heart" at the end.

See, educators have told lawmakers for generations how much it would cost to provide quality public education to all the state's children. But that figure has always been too high for South Carolina's corporate overlords, and it included too many children -- especially poor ones, and minority ones -- so the legislature has funded what it has chosen to fund, and told educators to make do.

Since the Education Finance Act was adopted in 1977, establishing the base student cost to be appropriated by the legislature annually, that figure has been fully-funded fewer than 10 times. It's all a matter of fact and history. Had Zais lived in South Carolina before coming to take the presidency of a small private college, he might have a better grasp on our state's education history.

And Zais himself has trotted out the old canard "I don't know if the money will be available" when it has suited his agenda to do so.

So to say that spending more money, building better facilities, improving curriculum and reducing class sizes won't work because "We’ve tried that. We’ve tried that for 40 years" is not merely a lie, but what we Southerners like to call a damn lie. That's the opposite of a little white lie.

Know your culture.

No matter. After telling that lie, Zais moved on to a lesser target: Moderate members of his own party.

Zais told EAG that while the nation’s teachers unions – the National Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers – comprise the heart of the “education industrial complex,” they are enabled by weak-willed Republicans.

“The education industrial complex is bipartisan,” Zais said. “We have RINOs – Republicans in Name Only – who are intimidated by the lobbying groups that get the public and the teachers all excited that we’re trying to destroy public education. In reality, we want to make it better and more accountable.”

Surely he didn't have this conversation from his office in the Rutledge Building, on a state telephone. Such blatant political conversation has no place in our state agencies.

Perhaps Sen. Phil Leventis will file another Freedom of Information Act request and find that out for us.

Then Zais described how he defies his oath of office, the one that made him the chief advocate for South Carolina's 700,000 public schoolchildren.

“Our traditional schools have a monopoly,” Zais said. “And monopolies have little incentive for improving or controlling costs. Accountability, competition and incentives have the power to transform the system.”

Zais’ education reform proposals are designed to break that monopoly.

See, those "traditional schools," the ones that Zais calls a "monopoly," are the ones that the state Constitution creates a state superintendent of education to support. It's plain as the nose on one's face.

ARTICLE XI.
PUBLIC EDUCATION

SECTION 1. State Board of Education.
There shall be a State Board of Education composed of one member from each of the judicial circuits of the State. The members shall be elected by the legislative delegations of the several counties within each circuit for terms and with such powers and duties as may be provided by law and shall be rotated among the several counties. One additional member shall be appointed by the Governor. The members of the Board shall serve such terms and the Board shall have such powers and duties as the General Assembly shall specify by law. (1972 (57) 3193; 1973 (58) 44.)

SECTION 2. State Superintendent of Education.
There shall be a State Superintendent of Education who shall be the chief administrative officer of the public education system of the State and shall have such qualifications as may be prescribed by law. (1972 (57) 3193; 1973 (58) 44.)

SECTION 3. System of free public schools and other public institutions of learning.
The General Assembly shall provide for the maintenance and support of a system of free public schools open to all children in the State and shall establish, organize and support such other public institutions of learning, as may be desirable. (1972 (57) 3193; 1973 (58) 44.)

SECTION 4. Direct aid to religious or other private educational institutions prohibited.
No money shall be paid from public funds nor shall the credit of the State or any of its political subdivisions be used for the direct benefit of any religious or other private educational institution. (1972 (57) 3193; 1973 (58) 44.)

See the words in Section 2: "who shall be the chief administrative officer of the public education system of the State"? That means, if there IS a traditional-schools monopoly in South Carolina, the superintendent is the person who leads the monopoly. The superintendent isn't authorized under the Constitution to lead the state's private schools, or parochial schools, or home schools, or unschools. It's in plain English. Which we still teach in South Carolina, right? Isn't it one of the subjects that's tested eight times a week?

If Zais didn't want to do that job, maybe he shouldn't have run for office.

Nevertheless, EAG swallowed Zais's line whole, then cast Zais as a one-man conservative army against a tide of "politically weak" educators and local leaders.

While state superintendents such as Zais have the power to advocate for education reforms, the decision-making power rests with the state legislators. South Carolina is a politically conservative state, but that doesn’t mean Zais’ reforms will be warmly embraced.

His strongest opposition will likely come from local school officials, who wield a surprising amount of political power in the state.

South Carolina is a “right-to-work” state, which means teachers are not required to join their local union. That renders the South Carolina Education Association and the Palmetto State Teachers Association politically weak.

However, the state’s superintendents all belong to the South Carolina Association of School Administrators, and every school board member belongs to the South Carolina School Boards Association. The SCASA and the SCSBA fill the left-wing power vacuum created by the anemic teacher unions.
...
Given the groups’ unique role in South Carolina’s education system, school districts pay for their school board officials and superintendents to become members of these organizations.

As a result, the two associations have multi-million dollar budgets, which allow them to hire a number of lawyers and lobbyists to represent their interests.

In the end, writes EAG, there's Zais the heroic warrior, blocking these "politically weak" educators from dominating the state as they have... er, from dominating... um, well, actually, from not dominating anything.

But after building him up as a conquering avenger, and making the case that he really doesn't have any strong opponents to conquer, EAG is left to offer a summary that's as weak as Zais's own testimony before legislative committees: "He is popular with the people," and "for the first time, the state superintendent office doesn’t serve as the de facto headquarters of the SCSBA or the SCASA.”

That's funny, I don't recall that Superintendents Jim Rex, Inez Tenenbaum or Barbara Nielsen took their marching orders from SCSBA or SCASA, either.

Zais will likely have this article framed for hanging in the office. It's better than anything The State will do for him.

Will Dorchester 2 vote to make needed repairs and renovations?

It comes back to resources, again and again, and whether or not our priorities will include quality public education.

This time, it's Dorchester 2, where voters in November may be asked to decide between raising additional revenue for necessary repairs and renovations, and new construction, or leaving their schools behind a few more years.

The Dorchester District 2 board did not vote to hold a referendum during its workshop to discuss the issue Thursday, but it did move a step toward that goal.

"We have to vote for (a referendum), but I would certainly put my money on it at this point," said board Chairwoman Frances Townsend. "Our needs have become so great that I don't see how we can avoid it."
...
The board was preparing to ask voters to pass a $165 million bond referendum in March 2009 when it decided to shelve the idea, fearing that voters would not support it.

"The economy was so wretched that it was a foregone conclusion that it would lose, so why would we want to burn all of our bridges on a bad deal?" Townsend said.

A referendum in March 2003 that asked for $98 million for schools also failed.

"We didn't tell people (then) that we were hanging on by a thread and we were 20 years behind," said Superintendent Joe Pye. "Now the story's got to change. We've got to tell it like it is. We made it sound like if we don't get this, we'll be OK and that's not the case."

A facilities study should be finished in February or March, then the board can start prioritizing the projects, Townsend said.

Possibilities for projects include new elementary, middle and high schools and facility improvements or repairs, such as new roofs, wireless technology and bathroom renovations.

"When we get the facilities report, that's when we have to make a priority list," Townsend said. "It will have a dollar figure on it."

There's an old adage: Pay now or pay later.

And another, not-so-old adage: Build schools or build prisons.

Seems to make sense, doesn't it?

The State details Zais's parsimony, lack of advocacy

Situations like these make me wish there were cameras in committee rooms, so we could all watch the outright foolishness that occurs in them.

In today's The State, reporter Seanna Adcox adds more details to what we knew about Superintendent Mick Zais's lack of commitment to advocating for South Carolina's public schools and the children they serve.

Zais asked a Ways and Means panel not to cut a key funding stream for classrooms but did not ask for an increase. The so-called base student cost primarily pays teacher salaries. The current per-student allocation is $1,880 because of recession budget cuts, though a state funding formula calls for it to be $2,790 this year.

Noting the economy remains uncertain, Zais told the budget-writing panel his budget request for 2012-13 is largely unchanged from the current budget, with a few exceptions. That included $14.5 million to cover student increases, to prevent a drop in base student cost.

"These dollars go to the classroom, and that's where our priorities should be," Zais said.

With a puzzled expression, Rep. Michael Anthony, D-Union, asked, "Why, then, as state superintendent of our public schools, are you not asking for an increase to catch up?"

Mike Anthony's a straight shooter and a lifelong educator -- one of the precious few serving in the legislature -- and I'm sure he knows hundreds or thousands of educators whose success depends upon adequate funding.

House Minority Leader Harry Ott grilled Zais, repeatedly asking whether he's telling teachers they should go a fourth year without a raise.

The Republican superintendent said he's not sure the money is available, and legislators can provide more than he is requesting.

Budget advisors expect an additional $913.4 million in one-time and recurring revenue because of surplus from the fiscal year that closed June 30, along with more money coming in this fiscal year than legislators budgeted, plus continued growth. But required increases - including property tax relief, health care and reserve funds - gobble up most of that money.

It would cost $553 million to restore the base student cost to $2,790, according to the state budget office.

Ott said the Republican-controlled Legislature is highly unlikely to put any more into public education than Zais seeks.

"Your job is to fight for what you think is important for education. You have to take a position," said Ott, D-St. Matthews. "You get to write your budget for whatever you want. You are the man in charge of the request. We find the money."

Not to put too fine a point on it, but damn right.

Our Constitution authorizes one person -- only one, in the whole vast system of South Carolina's government -- to advocate on behalf of public schools and our children, and Zais won that position. Knowing he's tightfisted and opposes public education, maybe he shouldn't have run for the office. But he did, and he won, and whether or not he likes it, it's his job to tell the legislature how much it's going to cost to bring our public schools up to speed, and to walk the halls in Columbia every day in search of those funds. To do less is to abrogate his responsibility.

One would think that a man who rose to the rank of general in the United States military would understand responsibility and would honor it.

Teachers are usually paid based on their years in the classroom and level of degree. But legislators have suspended the step increases for the last several years. Zais said the Legislature could choose to return to the minimum salary schedule.

"How they make it up is up to them," Zais said.

At best, this is disingenuous of Zais. Our legislative majority isn't going to drop so much as a pecan without someone shaking their tree. As superintendent, you advocate for what you want, and you point out every instance that you don't get it from lawmakers.

For reference, Zais might do well to review the superintendency of Inez Tenenbaum, a superintendent who understood the job. Of course, Inez had been an educator before becoming an administrator. Clearly, it made a difference.

Zais' largest request for additional money - $36 million - would buy enough new school buses to comply with the state's 15-year replacement cycle, so the agency can get buses from the mid-'80s off the road. All but five of the state's 201 buses that date from 1984 through 1987 are for students with disabilities.

He also sought an additional $5 million to keep buses fueled and running. With two-thirds of the agency's fleet more than 15 years old, the buses are expensive to maintain and not fuel-efficient, Zais said.

Last year, the Legislature designated up to $12 million in unclaimed lottery money toward replacing them - overriding Gov. Nikki Haley's veto - but the money depends on how many prizes go unclaimed. So far, the agency has received just $2.2 million, which will buy buses for the School for the Deaf and the Blind in Spartanburg, said Zais spokesman Jay Ragley.

The last time legislators designated money for school buses was 2007, when they approved replacing the statewide fleet every 15 years. That would require buying nearly 380 yearly. But that law has been ignored amid the economic downturn.

The economic downturn has nothing to do with ignoring the school bus law; our legislators ignore laws when the wind blows and when it's still, when it rains and when it shines, when it's day and when it's night. Ignoring a law is taken as a prerogative of holding power.

Seanna, here's a great question whose answer ought to be included as context every time the Educating Finance Act and its base student cost as mentioned: How many years -- and specifically, which ones -- has the EFA's base student cost been fully funded since the law was enacted in 1977? I'm confident that someone in the Rutledge Building could tell you, if Zais would allow his staff to talk to the media. Or, you could file a FOIA request to get the data.

Zais recommends closing an incentive program for teachers earning national certification, which provides an annual bonus of either $5,000 or $7,500 - depending on when they applied - for the 10-year life of the certificate. Nothing would change for teachers already in the program.

Zais said studies indicate the expensive program does not improve student learning, but rather that already-excellent teachers pursue the additional certification.

Indeed, we want to leave behind absolutely no incentive for children to aspire to become teachers, and college students to consider education as a viable and stable career choice, and for education professionals to be compensated for their pursuit of additional credentials and professional development. The quicker we can remove all incentive, the quicker they'll leave the profession and we can get down to the business of closing public schools and selling their assets to private companies.

Will primary candidates visit Scott's Branch High School?

Statehouse Report editor Andy Brack offered a great suggestion for our hifalutin' guests arriving from New Hampshire this week. Among a list of places he recommends they visit while pressing the flesh and sipping sweet tea for the cameras is Scott's Branch High School. Writes Brack:

Scott’s Branch High School. An Upstate professor encouraged GOP candidates to visit Scott’s Branch High School in Summerton to better understand how segregation impacted the state -- and how the past still haunts the present. Scott’s Branch is a school highlighted in the Briggs v. Elliott court case, one of five consolidated into the Brown v. Board of Education in which the U.S. Supreme Court ruled segregation illegal.

Even today, conditions in “Corridor of Shame” schools from Dillon County to Jasper County along Interstate 95 generally are substandard to those in more affluent areas of the state. By visiting Scott’s Branch school, the professor explained, candidates would better understand how a quality education system is key for future generations to become more fully involved in the country’s economic system. In other words, a better education will lead to better jobs for all, but if we don’t invest in education, we won’t reap the rewards, particularly in rural areas.

Capital idea.

Given, however, that none of the candidates in question has made promotion of public education -- or the eradication of inequality in educational opportunity, for that matter -- the cornerstone of his campaign, I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for any of them to arrive in Clarendon County.

Zais: No teacher salary increases again this year

This is another illustration of why the Constitution should clearly require that the state superintendent of education be an advocate for public education.

Zais asked a Ways and Means panel Wednesday not to cut a key funding stream for classrooms, but did he not ask for an increase. The so-called base student cost primarily pays teacher salaries. The current per-student allocation is about $1,900 because of recession budget cuts. A state funding formula calls for it to be nearly $2,800 this year.

House Minority Leader Harry Ott blasted Zais, repeatedly asking whether he's telling teachers they should go a fourth year without a raise.

The Republican superintendent says he's not sure the money is available, and legislators can provide more than he is requesting. Ott says Zais needs to make the request.

The person authorized under the Constitution to represent the needs of South Carolina's public schoolchildren doesn't ask the legislature for the resources necessary to meet those needs. Yet our lawmakers will bray and groan about the so-called failure of our public schools.

Flash: South Carolina's public schools are doing precisely what they are funded to do. We have what we've paid for.

Sen. John Matthews drops a pearl of wisdom about education

Truer words were never spoken than these, by Sen. John Matthews, to the Orangeburg Times and Democrat in Sunday's edition: "If we agree with the premise that every child in South Carolina is due the same quality education as any other, then we as a state should make certain that happens. It won't until we fund education on a statewide basis."

Matthews's comments were part of a larger article on the potential battles facing this year's legislative session.

"The biggest issue is how to deal with available revenue," the Bowman Democrat said. "How we use that will be this biggest fight we have.

"This depends on Republican leadership in the General Assembly and the governor's leadership. Beyond that we need to have a long-term plan to manage our budget. We need to come to a consensus on that to have stability in the system."

But it was his thoughts on public education that jump out:

If we agree with the premise that every child in South Carolina is due the same quality education as any other, then we as a state should make certain that happens. It won't until we fund education on a statewide basis.

That's the very problem: We don't all agree with the premise that every child in South Carolina is due the same quality education as any other.

Disagreement on this simple premise is why it took South Carolina 307 years to adopt a law to appropriate annual funding for public education statewide -- the Education Finance Act in 1977 -- and why the legislature has defied its own law and under-funded the EFA more than 20 of the past 34 years.

Simply stated, a majority of our lawmakers do not agree that educating ALL of our children should be the highest priority of the state, and a majority of them do not agree that educating YOUR child is just as important to the public good as educating MY child.

We -- our state -- grew out of a culture and ideology that believed and demonstrated through public policy that only the sons of wealthy planters should be educated, and that paying for their education was an individual obligation. On our own, as a state, we haven't moved very far from that concept. In truth, it's only because of federal intervention by Supreme Court decision that we educate more than just white children in integrated public schools, but it's largely because we so vigorously resist federal imposition that we bend over backwards, every year, to provide the least, the smallest, the littlest -- dare I say "minimally adequate"? -- necessary resources for public education.

And then our leaders gnaw on educators and public schools for their "failures," beat their breasts in public and demand greater accountability from the ever-smaller corps of missionaries and martyrs who serve ever-larger class sizes with few and old resources.

Other states grew up as America grew up. They matured. They evolved. They agreed with the American proposition that what benefits some of us should benefit all of us. So other states have dealt with these questions of support for public education and moved on to matters of improving, strengthening, expanding education opportunities. South Carolina never did; we have fought tooth and nail against such evolution. When it would have been easier to agree, to fund public schools and mature with the rest of the nation, we've searched high and low for strategies to delay, to avoid, to escape maturity and sobriety. It's inarguable; proof of it fills tomes of our history. It's so obvious and ugly that it's almost poor taste to discuss it in public.

Yet South Carolina won't ever emerge from its self-imposed adolescence until the subject is discussed, and until our leaders -- lawmakers, too -- choose to make different decisions. No matter how many orders our people fulfill for Amazon, or how many BMWs and Michelin tires roll off factory lines, the patina of Nikki Haley's "great day in South Carolina" will be only that: Shiny paint and wax covering a decayed and useless jalopy. Scratch it, and you'll see how shallow and brittle is the greatness.

Matthews said a mouthful, and he's one of a small number who have said it consistently for a generation. "If we agree with the premise that every child in South Carolina is due the same quality education as any other, then we as a state should make certain that happens. It won't until we fund education on a statewide basis."

Why do we have so few like him?

Charles Dickens was right: Poor people care more for others

Don't take my word for it. U.S News and World Report quotes the journal Emotion, which published last month its findings that "the more affluent face fewer obstacles" and are "slower to recognize the suffering of others" than people with fewer resources. More than that, poor people are quicker to act on their empathy -- to show compassion for their fellow sufferers.

The findings challenge previous research that concluded lower-class people are more likely to react with anxiety and hostility when faced with adversity, said the researchers at the University of California, Berkeley.

"These latest results indicate that there's a culture of compassion and cooperation among lower-class individuals that may be born out of threats to their well-being," study author and social psychologist Jennifer Stellar said in a university news release.

Might this help to explain why poor South Carolinians care enough about the education of their children, and the children of other poor South Carolinians, that they consistently vote to raise their own property taxes to pay for improved schools, programs and services, while wealthy South Carolinians in the legislature are content to underfund the Education Finance Act year after year?

Hm?

"It's not that the upper classes are cold-hearted. They may just not be as adept at recognizing the cues and signals of suffering because they haven't had to deal with as many obstacles in their lives," she explained.

The findings, published online Dec. 12 in the journal Emotion, suggest a scientific basis for emotional differences between the rich and poor that are depicted in such Charles Dickens classics as "A Christmas Carol" and "A Tale of Two Cities."

The results also indicate that people from lower socioeconomic backgrounds may do better in cooperative settings than those who are wealthy.

"Upper-class individuals appear to be more self-focused, they've grown up with more freedom and autonomy," Stellar said. "They may do better in an individualist, competitive environment."

Will Mt Pleasant's gated communities secede from CCPS?

Mount Pleasant has a rich cultural history. It was once a mecca for African-American musicians from Count Basie and Louie Armstrong to B.B. King and James Brown. There's no sign of that now, as all those musical landmarks have been replaced by manicured right-of-ways and gated communities. Still, realtors in Mount Pleasant boast, "...[T]here is a certain look and feel to Mt. Pleasant that people seem to find attractive that is difficult to explain."

Mt. Pleasant is home to more luxury communities than other Charleston areas. Recently developed I’on has received natural acclaim for it’s [sic] blend of historic Charleston architecture, a historic district look, and integrated shopping and dining. In spite of zero lot lines and escalating prices, homes in I’on never stay on the market long. Mt. Pleasant in stretching northward past Hwy 41 with homes ranging in price from the high 200’s to well over $1 million.

Mm, tres chic.

The Charleston City Paper reports that some of Mount Pleasant newer residents are dissatisfied with being part of Charleston County -- more specifically, part of the Charleston County Public Schools -- and they're reaching into South Carolina's past for a solution to their dissatisfaction: Secession.

Parents at a public-input meeting for Charleston County School District Monday night proposed making Mt. Pleasant its own school district, an idea that has been bandied about in the past.

Lynn Franchak, who has children attending Cario Middle School and Wando High School, was the first to propose the idea of a Mt. Pleasant school district in her brainstorming group. She says parents have been talking about it since her family arrived in the town six years ago.

"We've worked hard to build a nice life and live where we do and pay the taxes that we do," Franchak said. "We feel that this town is large enough to support its own school district. I also feel as though being part of the Charleston County School District, it brings our standardized test numbers down, it brings our attendance down, it brings our graduation rates down, and so we hurt because of that."

Understandably, no one wants to be "brought down." Perhaps it's true that parents in Charleston's other municipalities aren't excited about having average or below-average standardized test scores, or attendance rates, or graduation rates. It may be that those schools 'cross the river need a few more resources to help raise their results. Might additional tax revenue from the gated enclaves of Mount Pleasant help lift all boats?

Coincidentally, one parent did propose raising taxes to support education, although his idea was not voted to be one of the top recommendations.

Apparently not. Easier to draw some new lines, keep in the luxury and keep out the needy.

The article notes that about 50 parents were split into two "focus groups" at the meeting, and the groups brainstormed a set of recommendations for the county board of education. After "narrowing" the list, it included these:

• Expand the elementary schools' third-grade academies.

• Keep a focus on literacy and expand professional development for teachers who teach reading skills.

• Expand pre-kindergarten programs.

• Stop over-testing to allow more time for instruction.

• Encourage vocational education as well as college-oriented instruction.

• Stop teaching to the standardized tests.

• Consider Montessori school models.

• Keep fine arts.

• Keep physical education.

• Consider improving technology to move toward paperless classrooms.

• Shrink class sizes.

• Improve teachers' pay.

More of these sessions are scheduled, so we may hear more talk of secession, and more about the Mount Pleasant residents suffering from being part of the Charleston County Public Schools.

The public is invited to attend sessions at James Island Charter High School (Jan. 23 at 6 p.m.), Stall High School (Feb. 13 at 6 p.m.), and Burke High School (Feb. 27 at 6 p.m.).

Virtual schools aren't delivering the goods?

Here's another bit of information that virtual-school proponents -- and lawmakers who see virtual schools as a cheap way to deliver public education -- will ignore in their quest to dismantle traditional public schools. It seems that children enrolled in virtual schools don't perform well against children enrolled in real schools.

The number of students in virtual schools run by educational management organizations rose sharply last year, according to a new report being published Friday, and far fewer of them are proving proficient on standardized tests compared with their peers in other privately managed charter schools and in traditional public schools.

About 116,000 students were educated in 93 virtual schools — those where instruction is entirely or mainly provided over the Internet — run by private management companies in the 2010-11 school year, up 43 percent from the previous year, according to the report being published by the National Education Policy Center, a research center at the University of Colorado. About 27 percent of these schools achieved “adequate yearly progress,” the key federal standard set forth under the No Child Left Behind act to measure academic progress. By comparison, nearly 52 percent of all privately managed brick-and-mortar schools reached that goal, a figure comparable to all public schools nationally.

“There’s a pretty large gap between virtual and brick-and-mortar,” said Gary Miron, a professor of evaluation, measurement and research at Western Michigan University and a co-author of the study.

Of course, there are plenty of criticisms to throw at this study and its conclusions. For one thing, it was done at the University of Colorado, and lawmakers in South Carolina love to discount studies conducted at far-off universities, particularly when those studies draw conclusions that oppose lawmakers' goals. It's the same as discounting science, and math, and The Colbert Report: When faced with facts, our electeds produce their own facts.

And if that's not enough, the study was reported by the New York Times. 'Nough said.

For the rest of us, however, the study delivers some interesting information, as the Times article explained.

“E.M.O.’s” — educational management organizations, a term coined by Wall Street in the 1990s — now operate 35 percent of all charter schools, enrolling 42 percent of all charter school students, according to the report. “Charter schools are publicly funded and they are serving public school students,” Dr. Miron noted. “But they are increasingly privately owned and privately governed.”

Did you catch that? Charter schools, though funded by public dollars, are increasingly privately owned and privately governed. Translation: Rather than use public dollars to maximum efficiency in traditional public schools, we are shipping increasing amounts of public revenue into the profit margins of private companies and corporations who run charter schools and, while they're at it, virtual schools.

Some of the management companies are nonprofit organizations — the largest is the KIPP Foundation, with 28,261 students — while others are for-profit companies (K12 Inc. leads this sector, with 65,396). The report focuses on those that have full-service agreements to run schools, as opposed to vendors that offer ancillary services like curriculum development.

The number of schools — virtual as well as brick-and-mortar — managed by for-profit E.M.O.’s dropped 2 percent in 2010-11 from the previous year, but the number of students leaped 5 percent to 394,096. In the nonprofit sector, there was a 12 percent increase in the number of schools to 1,170 and a 62 percent increase in students to 384,067. Nonprofit E.M.O.’s have a better track record of academic success than for-profits, and smaller E.M.O.’s in general perform better than larger ones, at least defined by the federal standard of adequate yearly progress — a metric Dr. Miron called “very crude.”

Crude, indeed -- as educators in traditional public schools have been saying for a decade. But lawmakers didn't listen to them then, so it's fair to assume they won't listen to experts from the University of Colorado now.

Have things changed much since 1872 for educators?

During the holidays, I unearthed a framed copy of a document called "1872 Rules for Teachers." It's not an original but a reproduction, apparently reprinted some years ago by the Student National Education Association. One hundred thirty years later, as we begin a New Year, the rules imposed on education professionals bear reviewing:

Teachers each day will fill lamps, clean chimneys.

Each teacher will bring a bucket of water and a scuttle of coal for the day's session.

Make your pens carefully. You may whittle nibs to the individual taste of the pupils.

Men teachers may take one evening each week for courting purposes, or two evenings a week if they go to church regularly.

After ten hours in school, the teachers may spend the remaining time reading the Bible or other good books.

Women teachers who marry or engage in unseemly conduct will be dismissed.

Every teachers should lay aside from each pay a goodly sum of his earnings for his benefit during his declining years so that he will not become a burden on society.

Any teacher who smokes, uses liquor in any form, frequents pool or public halls, or gets shaved in a barber shop will give good reason to suspect his worth, intention, integrity and honesty.

The teacher who performs his labor faithfully and without fault for five years will be given an increase of twenty-five cents per week in his pay, providing the Board of Education approves.

Hm.

A simple interpretation of these rules might be summed up thusly:

If you choose to commit yourself to a career in teaching children in a school, you will also be given responsibilities that do not involve teaching children; neglect them and you may be fired.

You will be responsibile for supplying your own teaching materials; fail at this and you may be fired.

Your activities during the ten-hour-long school day will be defined for you; vary from them and you may be fired.

Your freedom outside the school day will be heavily restricted, and you will be watched; violate these restrictions and you may be fired.

What you read may be monitored; read questionable content and you may be fired.

Whether or not you attend church regularly will be noted.

It will be your responsibility to save much of your meager earnings for your own retirement, so no one will be forced to take care of you when you are no longer of use to your employer.

If, as a consenting adult, you choose to engage in a relationship with another consenting adult, you will be fired; if your behavior may be interpreted in this direction, you will be fired.

And if, after choosing to commit yourself to a career in teaching children in a school, you live obediently by these imprisonments of the mind and soul, you will be rewarded with a very tiny increase in your pay every sixtieth month, so long as your local Board of Education approves it.

Question to discuss: So, have things changed so much in 130 years, at least here in South Carolina?

Educators in traditional public schools are certainly still given responsibilities that do not involve teaching children -- bus duty, hall duty, lunchroom duty, extracurricular expectations and committee assignments. Thanks to the failure of lawmakers to fully fund school needs, educators are still expected to supply some of their own teaching materials, and lawmakers grumble annually over appropriations for teacher supply funds. Educators have no control over the length of their school day, and very little freedom to deviate from teaching to a test.

What about the freedom of educators outside the school day? Depending on the community or the district, it's woe unto the teacher who sticks the name of a candidate for public office on her car bumper, though the candidate fights tooth and nail for greater school funding and saving education jobs. And woe unto the teacher who questions aloud the appropriateness of religious ritual -- or open evangelizing -- during school functions.

And economic concerns? Indeed, educators have no control over the setting of their salaries or their pension benefits -- all of that power is held by legislators.

For all the advancements in knowledge and technology over the past 130 years, it seems that not much has changed at all for education professionals.

Public schools are no budget priority in South Carolina

I appreciate reading Bill Davis's columns in Statehouse Report, as they're usually quite cogent and pertinent analyses of the state's unncessary misfortunes. His item in the August 5 edition was no different, titled "State avoids fully funding education."

Comprehensive and sensible public education reform could benefit, or be the victim of, competing political agendas in the days ahead.

South Carolina has always struggled with the confluence of education and money, from the time of slavery until modern times. And the 2011-12 school year will be no different based on trends.

In hopes of better competing with regional, national, and international school systems, South Carolina’s legislature in 1977 passed a series of funding bills to funnel money into schools and maintain funding on a per-pupil basis, also known as base student funding.

How has that gone over the past 10 years? Does the word “rollercoaster” ring a bell? Despite claims by legislators that education was cut last and “held harmless” in recent years, the hard numbers tell a different story.

State law requires the General Assembly to fund school districts at roughly $2,700 per-student for the current school and fiscal year, according to state officials. But, the legislature, making use of special one-year temporary laws called provisos, has routinely skirted funding the full amount.

How far off? The actual per-pupil amount this year is $1,880, according to the state Department of Education, with even less in recurring funding. In other words, the base student allocation is roughly one-third off.

As a diligent journalist, Davis was bound to give Su-Pretendent Mick Zais's spinmeister, Jay Ragley, time and space to rationalize the deep cuts.

Though diligent, I am not similarly bound; I will offer my own interpretation of Ragley's answer, in my own words: In South Carolina, under the present leadership at the state and legislative level, adequate funding for public education is not high on anyone's priority list.

Flexibility, flexibility, flexibility; say it enough times and it loses meaning.

And, what a law says is subject to interpretation: You say you don't have enough money to do the job, I say you do. That's life. Deal with it.

Currently, the per-pupil funding is on par with actual dollar amounts from the 1998-99 budget. And the total amount of education funding from the state’s General Fund, which doesn’t include federal pass-through dollars, dropped to $1.8 billion last year in 2010-11. That represented a nearly $300-million cut from the previous year, and is on par with state appropriations from 10 years ago -- before the dot-com bubble burst was completely felt.

Davis included some views from educators themselves on the matter, Scott Price of the South Carolina School Boards Association and Jackie Hicks, president of The South Carolina Education Association.

Price, who is paid to advocate on behalf public education, said he saw the paucity and the up-and-down nature of per-pupil funding as a bellwether of other state priorities.

“If we’re a decade behind in school funding, then we better take a look at the conditions of our state roads, and the number of law enforcement officers we have patrolling them.”

This was far from the first year that Jackie B. Hicks, president of the S.C. Education Association, became frustrated with legislators for skirting the law they passed to set per-pupil spending. She said the legislature ought to follow its own legislation or write a new law to solve the ongoing problems.

“In our state, leadership has not done a good job of putting public education first,” Hicks said. “Provisos have depleted everything,” which, she said, was especially damaging in a state with such a high ratio of children depending on school-based free and reduced price lunch and breakfast programs.

Offering a view into his "crystal ball," Davis concluded, "Failure to act on the voluminous Taxation Realignment Commission final report this year showed how little interest the General Assembly has in affecting major taxation changes. And with next year being an election year and the dominant perception being that an exemption removed is a new tax created, there may be no simple answer to improving state school funding issues."

Which is how many educators are reminded every day that we live in South Carolina.

Brooks to state: Stop posturing, do what's best for children

A note published by the Florence Morning News on Sunday discussed the issue of school consolidation, but it contained a nugget of wisdom voiced almost in frustration by Florence 1 Superintendent Allie Brooks.

Brooks told the Morning News that "consolidating districts to save money should be studied before action is taken because variables change from community to community."

“We have to be concerned about the quality of what we’re doing,” Brooks said. “We might save money in one area, administratively, particularly, but you might be a penny wise and a dollar foolish.”

So true. But Brooks offered his interviewer the most appropriate frame for this discussion, if this or any other questioner wants to take it:

Brooks said, in the end, it’s up to the state to fulfill its responsibility to educate its children. While the legislature appropriated some additional money to education near the end of this year’s budget deliberations, state allocations are down and don’t match the recommended levels produced by the funding formula in the 1977 Education Finance Act.

“If we’re going to support public education, then we’ve got to put the money where our mouths are,” Brooks said. “We’re going to have to stop all the posturing and look at the community and do what’s best for every child.”

That's precisely what has never happened on a consistent basis -- ever in the 34-year history of the Education Finance Act, ever in the 200-year history of South Carolina's pledge to provide for public education (dating to the Free Schools Act of 1811), ever in the 341-year history of the state.

It always comes back to money. Priorities cost money, and lawmakers don't want to spend it. This is how we devolve into conversations about school consolidation, like this one:

School consolidation is an old and familiar issue in South Carolina, where districts have traditionally been built around communities and the idea of a county with a dozen or more separate school districts was for years considered neither unusual nor untoward.

But the number of public school districts in the state is falling — the total is now less than two per county — and recessionary pressure on budgets has given districts still more reason to consider it. This is especially true in the impoverished Pee Dee, where during the past two years districts in Dillon, Marion and Sumter counties have all consolidated, and where a debate is raging over the fate of Florence School District 4. The Timmonsville-based district is on the verge of bankruptcy and many officials, both in and out of the district, see its only real salvation coming from a merger with a larger district, most likely the adjacent Florence School District 1.

While there is more to consolidation than just saving money, and more to saving money than just administrative costs, one clear advantage to combining small districts is the savings produced by elimination of the highest administrative jobs. Where multiple, small districts remain in place, administrators continue to get paid for duplicate positions in the same county to serve their districts despite the cost to taxpayers.

A Morning News study of district salaries showcases the problem. (See our database at http://www2.scnow.com/news/database/educator-salaries/.) While top administrators in larger districts do get paid more than the superintendents and other top brass in small ones, the small districts’ salaries are still significant; most are six figures or more.

An example of the problem can be seen in a comparison of Florence and Horry counties. The superintendents of the five Florence County school districts make more than $500,000 combined in a year, but Cynthia Elsberry, Horry County’s only school district superintendent, makes $205,000 per year. Yet, Elsberry oversees nearly twice as many children as her Florence counterparts combined. There’s no call for combining all of Florence’s districts into one, but such a move would clearly save money.

And the superintendent’s job is not only service that’s duplicated. A 2009 study by Clemson University found that the cost per pupil for administration is generally higher in small districts than in larger ones. But, as noted, there’s more to consolidation than just dollars and cents.
...
Maybe, but Dr. Steve Quick, the recently appointed interim superintendent for Florence 4, said consolidation can do more than save money. Quick should know. He worked in Marlboro County when that county combined districts and served as a consultant to Marion County when it was pondering its recent merger.

Florence 4 has had its share of financial troubles of late. The district is working through a negative general fund balance of $1,464,702 for its school district which has somewhere between 700 and 800 students (acutal numbers fluctuate dramatically).

Quick said consolidation can provide better education and services to its students. Larger districts can offer a wider variety of coures and resources for its students. And, as a veteran of several consolidations, he knows it can be done.

“It’s not that it can’t happen,” he said. “It’s, does the community, and do the administrators and does the legislative delegation have the will to do it?”

Brooks said consolidating districts to save money is a decision that must consider community ties.

“You take any school district in this state or in this nation where schools have been established for a historical period of time: the loss of that identity isn’t something you’re going to forget,” Brooks said.

Dillon School District 2 Superintendent Ray Rogers said identity is important. He said all wasn’t lost when the Dillon County Board of Education recently worked to merge his Dillon-based district with Lake View-based Dillon 2, reducing the number of Dillon County school districts from three to two (Dillon 3 is based in Latta).

“The key thing is, everybody down there had to decide that there had to be an alternative to what was going on,” Rogers said. “When you have a problem, you’ve got to address the problem.”

That has been what’s driven consolidation of late in this the Pee Dee. Districts faced with some dilemma — most often financial — turned to consolidation only when everything else had been tried or considered.

Quick said there’s another option to consolidating districts: consolidating services, programs and funding could help pull troubled districts out of hard times, but it could come with drawbacks.

“Usually the big issue is everybody thinks consolidation means someone’s going to lose a job, and in the economic situation we’re in right now, no one wants to lose a job,” he said.

Today, the Morning News editors issued an editorial in favor of consolidation as a "good and necessary thing."

A long, slow march towards fewer districts is underway. Up to the end of the 19th century, South Carolina had 1,700 public districts, limited by state law to seven square miles, presumably because of transportation concerns. By the 1950s, and with the advent of the school bus, the number of districts had been reduced to 120. Today there are between 82-85 districts in the state (the range is due to problems counting districts in transition, such as those in Marion, Dillon and Sumter counties), and a trend towards lower numbers still is clearly underway. If and when the three Pee Dee counties mentioned above complete their transition to single-district entities, 32 of the state’s 46 counties will operate as unified school districts.

There’s no doubt that consolidating very small districts saves money. A 2009 study by the Jim Self Center on the Future showed that all eight of the state’s school districts with less than 1,000 students (Marion 7, Florence 4 are among them) had per pupil administrative costs that were double, triple or more the state average of $234 per pupil. This is common sense, of course. A recent Morning News story by education reporter Elizabeth Lamb showed that the burden of high, upper administration salaries alone can place a real drag on small district finance.

District consolidation remains a controversial topic, and most district “marriages” remain shotgun affairs where one or both parties are brought to the altar against their will. In recent years, as the economy sank into the Great Recession, failing finances often played the “shotgun” role. Districts consolidated because they had no other choice. The Timmonsville (Florence 4) district likely faces a similar choice in the near future — providing it can find a willing (or slightly coerced) partner.

It is abundantly clear, from high altitude, and maybe from a low one, that consolidation is a good and necessary thing (to use still more wedding phraseology) for small districts. Fiscal efficiency is lacking in districts with less enrollment than a good-sized middle school. One national study puts the efficiency “milepost” at 1,500 students. Below that threshold, districts are generally inefficient. Above 1,500, little additional saving is seen. Students may not be as well-served in microdistricts either. Special classes — and sometimes, even not-so-special ones — may not be available in small districts. Hiring a teacher just for French, Japanese or German, or for higher math and science, is beyond the scope of some small districts. Some extracurricular activities, which are central to the scholastic experience, may be unavailable as well.

And yet, resistance remains. Larger districts, like Florence 1, are often unwilling to take on struggling partners. Smaller districts are wary of being swallowed up inside a heartless educational colossus. They do not want to give up hoary tradition, community spirit, or hard-earned autonomy.

And bigger is not always better. The same study that suggested 1,500 as a minimum for efficiency, also noted that large districts could be out of touch with students’ particular needs. Breaking up some of the really big districts might be a good idea, too.

For now, however, the pressing needs, at least in these parts, seem to be improving the lot of small, struggling districts. As we have said before, that should be a priority for local education leaders, and local legislators, in the years ahead. There’s only one reason we think that: it will better serve all children in the area.