Why are government schools so expensive?
Another great graph from Dr. Mark J. Perry at the Carpe Diem blog.
In the above graph we see that private schools are educating children for about half the cost per pupil than government schools and they do so with a higher teacher-pupil ratio. (The data for the graph come from this Department of Education report.)
In this blog post, I am not going to judge the quality of the education. I believe private schools do a better job even when adjusting for socioeconomic and other factors of the government school population. Suffice it to say, private schools do at least as good of a job as government schools.
However, there is no disputing that private schools do what they do at half the expense. Yet, school adminstrators continue to demand more and more money from the community.
For example, the Lima schools 7.3 mill levy to raise another $2.25 million in annual revenue. Lima City schools is already spending about the national average per pupil. Superintendent Karel Oxley continues to complain that the state's scholarship program and community schools are draining pupils and funds away from the district.
That's right, fewer pupils but she wants even more money. As I pointed out in this post a few days ago, as pupils use the scholarship program or leave to go to community schools, the actual amount of money available per pupil increases because the district does not lose the local and federal share of its revenue.
I appreciate Oxley's passion for her job, but she should know that this well is tapped. It is time for her to reprioritize her budget and tighten the proverbial belt because the community is already overtaxed.
If private schools can educate for less, I am certain government schools can do the same. Perhaps the district can do with fewer administrators. As Dr. Perry points out:
"Private schools can educate students at a lower cost, with more teachers per 1000 students, than the public schools. Reason: Private schools must have significantly fewer non-instructional administrative employees, and therefore significantly lower administrative expenses than their public counterparts."
VOTE NO ON THE LIMA CITY SCHOOL DISTRICT TAX LEVY!
Happy Halloween
Here are some scary images for your Halloween pleasure.
Be warned, these are REALLY SCARY!
Happy Birthday, John Adams
OK, maybe I am a geek for having a favorite Founding Father, but, I actually have two: John Adams Jr. and Thomas Jefferson, who actually were on opposite sides of the political spectrum.
But today, being John Adams' birthday, I will let him hold the title of my favorite Founder for the day. He was born Oct. 30, 1735.
John Adams' accomplishments are many. For example, he was the first respected person to call for independence. He was the one, on July 1, 1776, who stood in front of the Continental Congress and proposed a declaration of independence. He was the one who recommended Jefferson write the declaration. He was the one who proposed George Washington to lead the rebel army. He was the one who created the American Navy. He was the first U.S. vice president. He was the second president.
I could go on and on.
But I won't bore you because not everyone shares my passion for the greatness of the American Revolution and my profound respect for the men who made it happen.
I also subscribe to his philosophy of stating an opinion boldly and defending it ardently.
Happy 272nd Birthday, Mr. Adams.
Karel Oxley continues 'Big Lie' Pt. 2
Let's look at the Lima City School District's bizarre claims that it needs a 7.3 mill "emergency" property tax levy.
Superintendent Karel Oxley has been relying heavily on the idea that the state's EdChoice scholarship program, which offers scholarships to pupils in failing schools, has devastated the district's financial outlook.
She must be using new math, because her claims do not hold water and call into question the quality of the education being delivered in the school district.
Now, the following figures are not exact, but the concept is accurate and demonstrates clearly that the district actually benefits from pupils leaving the district and going to private schools. Because the children also benefit by leaving a failing school to go to a private school, you can say the scholarship is a win-win for everyone in the district.
According to the Ohio Department of Education, in fiscal year 2005, Lima schools had revenue of $9,545 per pupil with the number of pupils at 4,607, which equates to a total revenue of $43.97 million. (The math does not equal the $46.01 million in actual revenue, but that is not relevant for our purposes here because it is the concept and not the actual numbers that demonstrates the district profits when pupils leave.)
Oxley has said that 158 pupils have fled the district for the EdChoice program leaving 4,449 pupils (I recognize this number probably fluctuates, but again that is unimportant in demonstrating the concept). For each pupil who leaves, the state deducts $5,200 from the amount of money it gives the district, which comes to $821,600 (not quite the $825,000 Oxley claims, but close enough for government work, I guess).
When we subtract the $821,600 from the total revenue of $43.97 million, we get a new annual revenue of $43.15 million. When we divide that by the remaining 4,449 pupils, we see a new revenue per pupil of $9,699, an increase of $154 in revenue per pupil.
Read more!
Money not answer to government schools' problems
The above graph from the Carpe Diem blog shows that America's government schools continue to increase the amount of money they spend per pupil while getting worse returns for the money.
Now, in the upcoming election, Lima City School District, as well as school districts across the country, will be begging us for more money come Nov. 6. But more money will not solve the schools' problems. Government schools already have enough money to do the job of educating children, the problem is, administrators are not spending that money wisely.
As Dr. Mark J. Perry notes on the Carpe Diem blog:
1. The Chicago Board of Education, which has 3,300 employees, is larger than the entire Japanese Ministry of Education.
2. The New York City public schools system has 250 times as many administrators as the New York Catholic school system (6,000 administrators in public school system versus 24 in Catholic school system), even though New York public schools have only four times as many students as the Catholic schools.
Public shcools [sic] are an inefficient monopoly with a huge bloat administration, that is certain.
School district administrators continue to find a scapegoat in programs that give parents a choice in education. They try to blame their problems on things such as charter schools and voucher programs.
Here in Ohio, administrators whine about the money they lose when pupils leave failing schools under the EdChoice program, yet they don't mention that they only lose the state funding for that pupil. The amount of money available per pupil probably increases with each pupil leaving because the district still collects the same amount in local tax dollars without the expense of that child's education.
Don't be fooled by administrators' phony accounting figures.
VOTE NO ON THE LIMA CITY SCHOOLS TAX LEVY!
[COLUMN] Keeping cool in California
AP Photo/Marcio Jose Sanchez
Firefighters are blanketed by smoke while fighting a wildfire near Green Valley, Calif., Friday, Oct. 26, 2007.
I had hoped to avoid comparisons between the 2005 Hurricane Katrina disaster in Louisiana and the wild fires raging in California. They are, after all, as different as fire and water.Still, federal and state officials as well as every talking head out there have been drawing those comparisons all last week.
Federal officials, including President Bush himself, have been telling everyone who would listen that the evacuation in California, one of the largest in U.S. history, went so smoothly because the federal government learned from its mistakes in Louisiana.
Hogwash.
Such comments imply that the federal government deserves the credit for the success of the evacuation in California, which is simply not the case.
The difference was not that the federal government reacted differently in California than it did in Louisiana. The difference was that the people in California behaved like adults and actually left their homes when local and state government officials told them danger was approaching.
The people in New Orleans, for whatever reason, decided to weather the storm in their homes instead of following the advice of government officials who told them to evacuate.
Read more!
Karel Oxley continues 'Big Lie'
As the election grows near in which Lima City School District is trying to steal another 7.3 mills in taxes from the hardworking homeowners within the school district, the superintendent continues to spread the "Big Lie" in order to persuade enough of the minority to vote to take money from the rest of us.
The lie of which I speak is the claim Karel Oxley keeps making that the district has lost $825,000 because of the state's voucher program, a program, by the way, that lets pupils in failing schools take a part of the state money allocated to him or her and use it toward tuition at a private school.
Oxley says the district lost 158 pupils. Instead of begging us for more money, she might want to explain why 158 children of her district bolted to private schools at the first opportunity. Still, I seriously doubt the loss of 158 pupils in a district of more than 4,600 children caused a financial hardship.
What Oxley does not say is that as the children leave the school, taking state money with them, her expenses should also see a decline, though admittedly not the full amount, as she does not have to educate the same number of children. If she is going to be honest with voters, she should also mention how much money the district saved by not having to educate those 158 pupils.
It is exactly this kind to phony accounting that has gotten the district in its financial problems, not the granting of school choice for children in failing schools.
VOTE NO ON THIS ATROCIOUS TAX!
[COLUMN] Selection gores prize's prestige
Former U.S. Vice President Albert A. "Al" Gore Jr. won the Nobel Peace Prize?
I could not have been more surprised when I woke Friday morning if I had looked out my bedroom window and saw the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse of John congregating in my backyard. In fact, when I heard Gore "won" the peace prize, my first thought was that the end of times was indeed upon us.
By awarding the peace prize to Gore and his co-recipient, the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the Nobel Foundation sullied the good name of the awards. I imagine Alfred Nobel is probably spinning in his grave at the thought of Gore and a U.N. panel as recipients of the prestigious award.
The Nobel Foundation's choice is nothing but political grandstanding on behalf of European socialists who wanted to make a political statement. The problem, however, is that is a direct violation of Nobel's wishes for the prize carrying his name.
In his will, Nobel created the five prizes and briefly outlined the standards for the awards. Nobel wrote that the Nobel Peace Prize should go "to the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses."
The Nobel Foundation awarded the prize to the IPCC and Al "The Sky is Falling" Gore "for their efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change, and to lay the foundations for the measures that are needed to counteract such change."
I am having a difficult time seeing how Gore's political grandstanding and global fear mongering concerning climate change have anything to do with working "for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses."
Read more!
Union leaders are economic terrorists
Carlos Osorio/Associated Press
Members of the United Automobile Workers union on the picket line outside Chrysler headquarters in Auburn Hills, Mich.
Greedy members of the United Auto Workers union have childishly walked off their jobs in an effort to strong-arm Chrysler to give already overpaid autoworkers more money and benefits and other unreasonable demands.
Just like the unwarranted strike against General Motors several weeks ago, this unabashed act of communistic fervor is yet another example of the union's disregard for the rest of the country. How many workers will be idled -- without the $200 a week strike pay UAW workers will get -- because of their selfishness? How many truck drivers, parts suppliers, etc., will be unable to buy gifts this Christmas because of these crybaby UAW workers? If it goes on long enough, how many ancillary workers will lose their homes? Does the union not care about those people?
Television writers and Broadway stagehands are about to be idled in labor disputes as well. The stagehands are upset because the theaters want to stop the practice of having stage hands report to work even if they have nothing to do. Why should theaters pay stagehands money to sit around and do nothing?
It is time Americans took a long hard look at the union model of employment in this country. Here we are on the brink of a national recession and these overpaid union workers are conducting what amounts to an act of terror against the United States economy. Perhaps it is time to lock up the union leaders in the military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
At the very least, Chrysler should fire every worker who refuses to do his or her job. After all, their contract expired and by not showing up for work, they manifest an intention not to renew that contract and continue their employment. President Reagan did it right when he fired the air traffic controllers. That was a great day in American labor history.
To all you Ford workers, who are next in line to strike, what do you plan to do? Act maturely with common sense, or behave like your GM and Chrysler brethren and take you ball and go home pouting when you cannot get your way?
6th Ward has alternative to Derry 'Curley' Glenn
Finally, someone in the 6th Ward has stepped up to the plate to challenge that windbag, and one of Lima City Council's Three Stooges, Derry "Curley" Glenn.
While both Curley and Josiah Mathews are tax-and-spend liberals who really have no understanding of the proper role of government, Mathews would be a nice change from Curley, though we would all miss his assinine antics.
To see Mathews' plan for the city, I've linked to a PDF (click here) of the PowerPoint presentation he sent to the media. It is clear that Mathews, like Curley, thinks city government is an offensive force to be used to get things done for people rather than a defensive force meant solely for the protection of the rights and liberties of individuals. Nor does he appear to have a firm grasp of economics and economic development, but neither does Curley. Still, Mathews, at least, would, as he himself says, keep his mouth shut unless he actually has something of import to say, a lesson Curley will never learn.
While I can't vote in the 6th Ward, I think the choice there is clear.
Internet commentors in a business meeting
Anyone who has ever participated in an Internet forum or blog will love this video. It takes the comment stream of a forum thread or blog post and puts it into the context of a business meeting. In otherwords, this is what a business meeting would look like if it followed the example of a forum thread. If you doubt this is true, just hop onto The Lima News's forum and follow a large thread to see where it leads.
WARNING: Some of the language is not family friendly!
[COLUMN] Bush veto a free-market victory
A video demonstrating the dangers of socialized medicine.
Kudos to President Bush for his veto last week of a popular and bipartisan attempt by the Congress to move the United States toward a socialized health care system.
Democrats in the Congress, however, have vowed not to give up the fight. While they certainly do not yet have the required number of votes to override the president's veto - only the fourth of his administration - they are planning a massive lobbying campaign to sway Republicans to join their cause.
Unfortunately for the American people, there is a possibility they could be successful. The program itself is popular among voters and today's politicians, lacking any kind of backbone, are more apt to appease voter sentiment than cast logical votes guided by a political philosophy, especially the supposed conservative philosophy of small government, which Republicans long ago abandoned and which apparently died with Ronald Reagan.
The bill in question, the Children's Health Insurance Program Reauthorization Act of 2007, was a blatant attack on our free-market economy and an attempt by Democrats to hijack the nation's health care system and move it one step closer to socialized medicine.
Read more!
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