The Common Denominator Online: Matt Wennersten

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Class Notes
	Which way for the new superintendent? (Published January 12, 2004) By MATT WENNERSTEN

A new year is a time for reflection on the past year’s events and predictions for the coming months.

Reflect on this: By the end of next December, the brand new contract of the new superintendent of D.C. Public Schools, Elfreda Massie, will be up.

For those of you who missed it, Massie was confirmed in a one-year appointment at the last school board meeting. It seems that DCPS wisely wanted to avoid a lengthy search for a position notoriously hard to fill. Who would want the top job of on an embattled school system when the mayor is on record as wanting to abolish the position?

It is curious, though, that the appointment was made with such little fanfare that most DCPS employees found out about it not through a scoop by the local media (the usual way DCPS communicates with employees) but by a change in the DCPS Web site banner. I would wager that many teachers still don’t know that Massie is no longer "acting." Of course, those who attended the school board meeting Dec. 17 and stayed to the bitter end would have heard the announcement in person.

And what a school board meeting it was! Parents literally locked out of the building. A meeting room so packed with concerned students, parents and teachers that security guards had to be called in to manage the crush of people. Angry students and parents testifying for several hours on the sad state of funding for the schools. School board President Peggy Cooper Cafritz refusing to answer questions from students and parents with the comment, "Tonight we are listening, not answering. Listening."

The biggest bombshell, however, was a neutralizer. Citizens and school staffs had rallied to the stated board meeting to protest the proposed cuts to high schools of $28 million, including the abolishment of over 500 positions. In her first major act as superintendent, Massie announced at the beginning of the meeting that DCPS had found money to fund positions through the end of the school year – in other words, no cuts.

Any on the school board who thought this would take out some of the vehemence of the parents who came to testify thought wrong. Even without cuts, there is plenty to protest about DCPS funding. This current round of funding will only prolong the train wreck, not avoid it.

As we begin the new year, it’s worth looking at our personal finances and figuring out where we stand. Similarly, it’s worth taking a closer look at DCPS finances. If you caught the last 2003 issue of the New York Times Sunday magazine, you would have seen that D.C. spends the most of any state in the nation, a whopping $13,993 per student. Two important things about this statistic:

1. It’s from the National Education Association (www.nea.org), and

2. It’s wrong.

Last year, DCPS spent roughly $10,874 per student – still a lot of money, but less than New York or New Jersey, the other high spending school systems. DCPS asked for more but didn’t get it. So, it’s interesting to know, why ask so much? Where is this money going?

A good way to look at it is to compare DCPS to the other school districts in the area, like Montgomery County, Md., or Fairfax County, Va. Montgomery and Fairfax spent $8,963 and $8,530 per student, respectively (source: National Center for Education Statistics, www.nces.ed.gov). In other words, they spent about $2,000 less per student, and, in general, their students perform better on national standardized tests (roughly 30 percent of Maryland and Virginia 8th graders are proficient in math and reading vs. less than 10 percent in the District, based on the National Assessment of Educational Progress http://nces.ed.gov/nationsreportcard).

Let’s look at the money in four broad categories – teaching, administration, support services (including special ed) and buildings. When it comes to instruction, D.C. spends the least: $4,498 per pupil vs. $5,640 in Montgomery and $5,240 in Fairfax, or almost $1,000 less for every student enrolled. No wonder Maryland and Virginia students seem to be doing better.

What about central administration? Haven’t there been massive scandals and overspending? Surely this is out of control. Actually, not. D.C. spends a bit more, $1,080 per student, but not massively more than the $918 Montgomery spends or the $798 in Fairfax. School systems across the country average about 10 budget of their budget in central administration costs, and DCPS is exactly in line with the average.

Clearly, something must be up in support services and buildings, and it is. D.C. spends three times what Montgomery and Fairfax spend ($3,023 vs. $826 in Montgomery and $1,035 in Fairfax) on support services. Looking deeper, this $2,000 extra expenditure per student is mainly due to runaway special education costs, including $93 million in private school tuition for special ed children whose needs have not been met by DCPS, and worse, $13 million in lawyers’ fees from special ed lawsuits.

Put simply, DCPS spends more per pupil than other jurisdictions because DCPS has not served special ed children in accordance with federal law, and total spending on classroom instruction – in other words, teaching and learning – is actually less than the surrounding jurisdictions.

The other part of the DCPS budget monster is the buildings. DCPS spends about $700 more per student ($2,273 vs. $1,579 in Montgomery and $1,458 in Fairfax). This one is more understandable, as enrollment has declined, capital spending on buildings has been slashed and DCPS is saddled with huge, aging buildings rattling half-empty with kids. You can’t turn down an old-fashioned steam boiler – either you pay to heat the whole building, including unused classrooms, or you close the school.

So now, as the new year begins, it’s time for resolutions and predictions. Here is where Superintendent Massie must choose: Confront the runaway special ed budget? Divert more resources to instruction? Find other places from which to cut money?

New funding is unlikely. Mayor Anthony Williams has already made clear that he considers the allocation of funds for DCPS already too high, which is curious when we’re under-spending on instruction. What is likely instead to happen is more cuts. Proposed cuts to teachers during the school year prompted a firestorm of protest at the last school board meeting.

Planning ahead, and knowing that the school system has to make cuts in the current political environment, I predict the summer of 2004 to be a summer of school closings, with at least one or two large but empty high schools closed and teachers laid off by stealth once kids are on vacation and parents less worried about "their" teachers. With the booming real estate market and Mayor Williams’ announced plans for an Anacostia redevelopment centered around city land near RFK Stadium and the D.C. Armory, I wouldn’t be surprised if Eastern Senior High School on East Capitol Street is one to go.

Many, if not all, New Year’s predictions are wrong. The way we fund education in D.C. is also wrong. Let us hope our new superintendent makes my predictions wrong and the budget right. Happy New Year!

***

Wennersten is a third year mathematics teacher at Bell Multicultural High School in Columbia Heights and a graduate of the D.C. Teaching Fellows program (http://www.dcteachingfellows.org). Please send stories, comments or questions to mwenners@yahoo.com.