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Thank you for the opportunity to share my thoughts on the process you are undertaking. I know first- hand what an enormous task you face. From 1989 - 1996 I was proud to serve as a leader in the efforts of the Committee for Educational Rights as we sought to have the current system of funding schools in Illinois declared unconstitutional. While we did not prevail in that effort, the suit being dismissed by the Illinois Supreme Court about 4 years ago, we were very successful in raising awareness of the problems that school funding faces today. Efforts to dramatically impact school funding in the late 1980s got a strong start at a meeting in Macomb. People from all over the state and all areas of thought came together to discuss adequacy and equity. One group exercise was to determine what the minimum dollar amount available for each child's education should be. My group, chaired by Jim Nowlan, arrived at the figure of $5,000. We are now eleven years later and we are not up to 90% of that figure. Our efforts helped cause the creation of several commissions or studies that were very similar in scope to what you are now attempting. I listened with great interest at your last meeting when Bill Hinrichs discussed the concepts of adequacy and equity. Our lawsuit did not touch on the issue of adequacy. We could not agree what was adequate. After hearing Bill's presentation I would guess that you might concur that determining educational adequacy is very difficult. The worst part of discussing adequacy is that it could tend to establish a ((minimal competency" approach to school funding. A level that sets what many believe is enough to meet minimums can quickly become a "maximum' We cannot decide that a certain level is all a kid needs to know. They need to have the chance to know everything! But I digress! My point in talking with you today is to empathize with the task you have undertaken, offer whatever assistance I may give you and to gently offer one major caution. I heard a theme or tone to some of the conversation at the last meeting in Chicago that concerns me. It seemed that some of you want to know how much money it will take to raise scores a specified amount. The idea being that if we want to raise test scores by 6 points then we need to throw this much money at the problem and we can cure it. I am here today to caution you against such an approach. We are working with children who come to us at all levels of preparedness, from good homes and bad, with two parents, one parent, or homeless, We take every kid who walks up the sidewalk and we do our best to prepare them to be contributing, productive citizens. But, it isn't as simple as carving out a certain amount of dollars to make it happen. Out products are human beings who aren't as easy to change, improve or alter as hair spray, tires or widgets. We cannot scrap all of the molds and start over again. We take what we are given, factor in their background and experience, and hope that the finished product is one of which we can be proud. Please don't fall into the accountability trap that is so politically popular these days by recommending a positive change in state level funding and expecting it to cure the problems of public education overnight. Systemic change in schools takes a long time. Public education is doing a good job when compared with many of the other societal standards these days. We need to do better and we are working hard to do that with the resources, both human and material, that are available to us. I hope that you can devise a way to make our task more meaningful and more achievable. Best wishes in your work! |
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