Comment by strawhatguy

Spending is the issue. That money is spent on something, and it isn't (all) teaching either.

The chart in the link below shows employee vs students headcounts over 6 years. Even though student rolls went down almost all employment in the school system went up. Do we really need a +22% increase in Student Support Services when there are fewer students? Even teachers (only?) went up by 2.8% according to this (and again, students went down)? And why would librarians of all positions seem to be the ones whose positions were cut?

Basically, 'education' is nothing more than a jobs program for the politically connected, as clearly the focus is not on kids. And education is safe, because it's hard to argue against it, even if you're not talking about actual teachers.

Honestly I would expect if funding were cut, and particularly the admin, support, 'paraprofessional', and other non-teaching staff were fired, you'd find those test scores approach the pre-pandemic levels.

Will that happen? Of course not. These are politically connected people after all. We should all be angry.

https://x.com/johnfaig/status/2019108852365656477?s=20