Illustration: Luba Lukova
EDITORIAL • Teacher Layoffs and War
Our government’s perverse definition of “national security” was on display again this summer. By large majorities, the U.S. Congress approved a so-called emergency appropriation of $33.5 billion to escalate the war in Afghanistan—adding to the more than $1 trillion that the United States has already spent waging wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Meanwhile, as schools faced the potential layoff of an estimated 300,000 teachers across the country, Congress dawdled until the second week in August, finally approving $10 billion to save the jobs of about half that number. The catch was that Congress “found” the money by cutting $12 billion in spending on food stamps (the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program)—a measure that the Food Research and Action Center says will hurt 40 million people, almost half of them children, when the cuts take effect in 2014. As Connecticut Rep. Rosa DeLauro, who voted for the bill, said, “I cannot in good conscience condone what we have taken away. . . . The bill shamefully pits these priorities against each other.”
This juxtaposition of robust war spending and inadequate support for education highlights the moral bankruptcy of political and economic leaders who seem to find endless piles of money to kill people abroad but not much to educate them at home. And, of course, the relationship is plain: The more dollars spent on war, the fewer available for human needs—whether alternative energy, food stamps, in-home elder care, public libraries, or keeping teachers in their classrooms.
The fact that our schools being decimated by state and local budget cuts is not considered an emergency ought to spark outrage. Goldman Sachs is evidently “too big to fail,” but not our public schools. Inevitably, even with the belated education aid, teacher layoffs will inflate class sizes throughout the country. To pick one of thousands of examples, Lakesha Carpenter, a kindergarten teacher at Nuffer Elementary School in Norwalk, Calif., was recently laid off when her district cut most teachers with fewer than 11 years experience. Lakesha has taught for “only” 10 years. K-3 class size ratios in her district have expanded from 20-1 to 28/29-1. Any elementary teacher can tell you what another nine students per class will mean for children’s education. This scenario is being repeated with sickening frequency in countless school districts throughout the country.
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http://www.rethinkingschools.org/archive/25_01/edit251.shtml
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