Lack of school funds may not be main cause of student failure

Great story by George Will in the Washington Post.

Why is it that George Will ALWAYS says things so much better than I do? It’s so frustrating!

Anyway, his point is exactly what we were talking about on “Rob and Karie” two days ago. First, a few facts. Arizona spends less per pupil in the classroom than just about any other state. Our kids are underperforming in major areas.

However, states that DO spend a lot per pupil, in some cases twice as much as we do, don’t necessarily educate their kids any better than we do.

I consider myself a champion of education. I support more funding per pupil, but I can acknowledge that more money doesn’t always equal more success.

But what we find here, and everywhere, is that socioeconomic status means more to the potential success of an individual student than anything else.
But it’s not the POVERTY that is doing it … not entirely.

It’s the student who shows up at school without a good breakfast, yes, but it’s the student who shows up at school from a lower-income home and is LESS prepared than the well-to-do kid.

Here’s a statistic: by the time they reach age 3, children of professional parents have heard some 45 million words addressed to them, as opposed to 26 million words for working-class kids, and a mere 13 million words in the case of kids on welfare.

And, socially, as we know, like tends to marry like, which means classes don’t tend to mix and marry and have children. This explains, in essence, why the rich kids are bred and reared to succeed.

Maybe it doesn’t’ matter how much we spend??