Three “Very Icky” Education Bills
The education establishment is hard at work in the legislative process this year. As usual, they want to preserve their already huge K-12 education budget of $3.3 billion. Also, as usual, they want to expand their enterprise and add new spending that will “feed the beast” for years and decades to come.
Last week, we had the displeasure of seeing three bills get hearings for expanding education programming, training, and spending. They are three very icky bills indeed.
Sneaking Pre-K into our public education
First, Senate Bill S1145 is a backdoor attempt at creating pre-K education programs. For decades, the Idaho Legislature has opposed extending public education to include pre-K ages and even into the realm of daycare for early childhood education. Pre-K is not a popular education topic in the Capitol. In fact, if you think about it, the concept of kindergarten was the original extension of public education into early childhood education. The first grade used to be indeed, the “first grade.” But now, kindergarten is so ingrained, it’s taken for granted to be part of the standard public education system.
Expanding public education is not what is needed. In 2017, the Legislature created the K-3 reading initiative program with a $9 million appropriation. Since then, the program’s budget has increased every year to over $72 million, while the outcomes have stayed level at best. Since the program started, only around 32% of third-graders are proficient at grade level, and the number is not increasing.
The outcomes are awful, the public education system is broken, and the Senate is considering adding pre-K education to its list of responsibilities. This bill promises to increase spending each year with little to no accountability.
UPDATE: On March 11th, the Senate killed this bill in a 14-21 vote.
Always asking for more spending
Second, Senate Bill S1147 introduces a new public education funding mechanism for “outcomes-based funding.” Take it from us at the Idaho Freedom Foundation, public education does not need new funding. If the Legislature truly wants accountability in public education, school choice is the best option. Short of that, making existing funding dependent on achieving certain outcomes seems a reasonable step. But when asked about why the need for new funding, all the sponsor, Sen. Lent, could say was it’s because the governor included $35 million in his budget for outcomes-based funding. So, “Just because.”
We are spending over $3 billion on public education, and this bill says we need another $35 million to incentivize better outcomes. Finally, note that the outcomes include graduation rates—something easily manipulated by schools, which can waive certain requirements or even reduce requirements to increase their “outcomes” without improving education.
UPDATE: The Senate is holding this bill on its final reading calendar, as of March 11th.
Do we hire teachers who can’t teach?
Finally, Senate Bill S1069 spends $5 million a year to “…begin a three-year cycle for all Kindergarten through Grade 3 teachers and elementary administrators to receive training in the science of reading, while sustaining ongoing training.” In other words, $15 million in new spending and training for teachers to employ scientifically-proven reading techniques, A.K.A. phonics.
Doesn’t our K-12 public education system already have the prime directive of teaching kids to read, write, do math, and know history? Reading is a fundamental skill we expect education to provide already; it’s their job.
We should not have to create new initiatives and new budget line items to pay for what teachers should already be doing. The $3.3 billion should be sufficient to pay for a program or to incentivize teachers to do the job they were hired to do. If teachers lack the skills to teach reading, then perhaps the teachers should be replaced with those who do have those skills.
Conclusion
It’s a time-honored tradition in government bureaus. Always be growing, always be spending. Here, we have three very icky education bills to pile on more programs and more spending to a system that has tripled its budget in the last 15 years. All the while, student proficiencies have stayed stagnant. When will the Legislature ever say, “Enough is enough?”
From idahofreedom.org