Uncertainty dominates the debate over reopening schools — uncertainty over COVID-19 spread, over safety precautions, and over how we support schools.
Almost half of House Democrats think the answer is an additional $305 billion for an 18-month “stabilization” fund for K-12 public schools.
But it is at least a year too early for Congress to consider this massive increase in federal taxpayer spending. Instead, public schools should follow the lead from the private sector by right-sizing their staffing models.
Economic recessions inflict terrible human costs for their duration, but they do have one upside: They force bloated private-sector companies and government entities to rethink their priorities. Conserving labor allows organizations to be more efficient and, consequently, causes living standards to rise in the future. In other words, doing more with less in one business unit frees up labor to provide more goods and services in other organizations.
Advocates routinely paint a misleading or inaccurate picture of supposed reductions in public school funding.
Some people do not want to hear that, even though America’s public school system experienced only a 21% increase in student enrollment between 1992 and 2018, school systems and politicians increased the number of administrators by 75% — a rate nearly 4 times the increase in students — and increased all other staff by 57%. As for teachers, their ranks only increased by 30%, slightly reducing class sizes.
Spending per student in public schools, adjusted for inflation, has increased by 38% since 1990. But, shockingly, public school teachers experienced a slight decline in their average salaries during this period. For this, thank the increased costs of the staffing surge, in addition to health and retirement benefits.
Since the 2007-08 school year when the Great Recession began, enrollments have increased by less than 3% while public school employment has increased by 8%.
Similar to all organizations in the private, nonprofit, and government sectors, public schools can use this time to rethink their priorities and determine whether they need to increase staff endlessly at a rate that far exceeds growth in student enrollments, a phenomenon that dates back to at least 1950.
Critics may argue that the growth was for good causes, such as smaller classes and more administrators and support staff, but they cannot dispute the growth themselves. Nevertheless, while spending advocates point to estimates that suggest more money leads to higher student achievement, actual experience suggests otherwise.
Meanwhile, the federal government has massive debt, but states and school districts have reserves. Given that public schools historically have been funded and controlled locally, they should look to state and district reserves first. Going into the COVID-19 recession, state reserves were at an all-time high — about $75 billion.
For example, look at two large districts each from the east coast, the west coast, and the center of the country — ones with both high and low levels of “unassigned fund balances”: Philadelphia with $84.1 million in unassigned fund balances and Miami-Dade with $107 million, Chicago with $346 million and Houston with $512 million, and Los Angeles with $984 million and Seattle with $35 million. Collectively, they had just over $2 billion in reserves as of 2019, and that is just six of the nation’s 13,000-plus public school districts.
Given that 92% of public school funding comes from state and local governments, public schools should rely on state and school-district reserve funding first. When using their reserves to help public schools, states should prioritize the health of students, teachers, and staff and the school districts most in need.
In June 2021, we will have a better picture of the economic and fiscal landscape facing federal, state, and local governments — including public school districts. If there is no COVID-19 vaccine, broadly reliable treatment, or herd immunity by then and state and school-district reserves are moving toward depletion, then Congress can consider if the federal treasury has the capacity to increase funding for public schools.
But if the economy is on the upswing next spring and summer because of improved health conditions, such a bailout will not be needed, and the federal debt will not be unnecessarily increased. Until then, school districts would be wise to rethink their priorities, tap into state reserves as provided, and use their own “unassigned” reserves to weather the storm.
Benjamin Scafidi is the director of the Education Economics Center at Kennesaw State University and a Friedman Fellow with EdChoice.
