Teachers Digging Into Own Pockets to tune of $1.3 billion

Via

Roughly half the amount that the nation's public school teachers are spending on educational products is being covered with their own money, a new nationwide survey shows.

All told, teachers spent about $3.2 billion on various types of supplies and materials during the 2012-13 academic year, according to the survey, released recently by the National School Supply and Equipment Association. Half that total amount, $1.6 billion, came out of educators' own pockets.

The per-teacher breakdown is as follows: The average educator forked out about $198 of their own money on instructional materials, $149 on school supplies, and $139 on other classroom materials, for a total of $485 last academic year, according to the survey.

In total, nearly all teachers—99.5 percent—reported digging into their own pockets to cover the costs on classroom supplies or materials, according to the association. The portion of teachers doing so appears to have risen over time.

The report, "The 2010 NSSEA Retail Market Awareness Study," was based on a survey of 308 K-12 teachers, conducted by Perry Research Professionals.

Walmart gives $8 million to StudentsFirst

If you needed yet more proof that Michelle Rhee's StudentsFirst is nothing more than an anti-tax group, consider that Walmart has just given her $8 million to con tinue her corporate education agenda.

A foundation associated with the Wal-Mart family fortune has expanded its support for the education advocacy group run by former District of Columbia schools chancellor Michelle Rhee.

The Walton Family Foundation announced Tuesday an $8-million grant over two years to StudentsFirst, which is headquartered in Sacramento but has operations in 18 states.
[...]
The Walton funding is to support such activities as staff costs, lobbying and research. It's not for direct campaign donations, which are made from a separate arm of StudentsFirst.

Public education - a middle class bargain

The USDA has just released their annual report (issued annually since 1960), "Expenditures on Children by Families". finding that:

• A middle-income family with a child born in 2011 can expect to spend about $234,900 ($295,560 if projected inflation costs are factored in*) for food, shelter, and other necessities to raise that child over the next 17 years.
• For the year 2011, annual child-rearing expenses per child for a middle-income, two-parent family ranged from $12,290 to $14,320, depending on the age of the child.
• A family earning less than $59,410 per year can expect to spend a total of $169,080 (in 2011 dollars) on a child from birth through high school.
• Similarly, middle-income parents with an income between $59,410 and $102,870 can expect to spend $234,900.
• A family earning more than $102,870 can expect to spend $389,670.

For middle-income families, housing costs are the single largest expenditure on a child, averaging $70,560 or 30 percent of the total cost over 17 years. Child care and education (for those incurring these expenses) and food were the next two largest expenses, accounting for 18 and 16 percent of the total cost over 17 years. These estimates do not include costs associated with pregnancy or the cost of a college education or education beyond high school.

Child care and education expenses consist of day care tuition and supplies; baby-sitting; and elementary and high school tuition, books, fees, and supplies. Books, fees, and supplies may be for private or public schools. However, according to the report, child care and education was the only budgetary component for which about half of all households reported no expenditure.

Without a free public education, the educational expense of raising a child would be the number 1 expense by far. Consider that in Ohio, the per student public school cost is ~$10,000. That would cost the typical 2 child family $20,000 per year, for a total of ~ $260,000 for the entire K-12 education - more than the total expense the USDA reports for raising a child!

It's hard to imagine a greater bargain that that.

Here's a look at how costs have changed since 1960

Expenditures on Children by Families, 2011

Education News for 06-12-2012

Statewide Stories of the Day

• Language for Cleveland school reform bill finalized at last minute (Plain Dealer)

COLUMBUS - The Cleveland schools reform plan, supposedly a done deal just before Memorial Day weekend, was barely finished in time for today's planned vote. At the close of business Monday, the final legislation due to be voted on by both the Ohio House and Senate education committees still wasn't written -- 17 days after Republican Gov. John Kasich joined Democratic Mayor Frank Jackson and others in a celebratory press conference. Read more...

• Deal struck on Kasich’s schools bill (Dispatch)

Special charter schools for gifted children are out, and there will be no exemption from Ohio’s school-closure law for failing dropout-recovery charter schools under an agreement reached by state legislators on Gov. John Kasich’s sweeping education bill. The House and Senate are expected to pass Senate Bill 316 this week after legislators and the administration reached a compromise on competing versions of the proposal. Read more...

Local Issues

• Youngstown school district must get handle on finances (Vindicator)

When the president of the Youngstown Board of Education used the word “yet” in talking about the district’s finances — “We’re not out of the woods yet” — we wondered if he was indulging in a bit of wishful thinking. Lock P. Beachum has been around public education in the city for many years, having served as an educator — he retired as principal of East High School — and a board member for more than a decade, which means nothing surprises him. However, the system’s ongoing financial turmoil has Beachum baffled. Read more...

• Newark school board ends 'pickup' of administrator retirement costs (Newark Advocate)

NEWARK - Newark City Schools no longer will pay its administrators' share of retirement costs, beginning with their next contracts. Board members approved a resolution Monday to adjust administrators' pay during the next contract cycle to get rid of the district payment of their share of retirement -- commonly known as a "pickup" and a "pickup-on-the-pickup." "The pickup-on-the-pickup is a political hot button," Board President Bev Niccum said. "We want to move away from it." Read more...

Charters spend more on admin, less on class

We observed that SB316 delayed, by 12 months, the requirement passed in the budget to rank schools based upon their classroom spending. As was noted at the time, this was an ill conceived, ill considered plan. As that plan now hits the slow track, research emerges that charter schools spend less in the classroom than traditional public schools.

One of the most frequent criticisms put to traditional public schools is that they waste money on administrative bloat, instead of channeling more funding where it belongs—the classroom. A much leaner and classroom-centered model, some say, can be found in charter schools, because of their relative freedom from stifling bureaucracy.

A new study, however, concludes that this hypothesis has it exactly wrong.

The study, released by the National Center for the Study of Privatization in Education, at Teachers College, Columbia University, examines school spending in Michigan and concludes that charter schools spend more per-pupil on administration and less on instruction than traditional public schools, even when controlling for enrollment, student populations served, and other factors.

Researchers David Arsen, of Michigan State University, and Yongmei Ni, of the University of Utah, found that charters spend $774 more per pupil on administration, and $1,140 less on instruction, than do traditional publics. To come up with their estimates, the authors analyze the level and source of funding for charters and traditional publics, and how they spend money, breaking it out by function. They then use a statistical method known as regression analysis to control for factors that could skew their comparisons of spending on administration and instruction in various schools.

Of the extra $774 that charters devote to administration, $506 went to general administrative services, such as the costs of charter school boards, or the fees of the organizations managing the school.

While Arsen and Ni don't examine in depth the causes of charters' relatively low instructional spending, they speculate that a couple factors could be at work. An obvious one is that more than 80 percent of traditional public schools' spending goes to personnel costs, mostly salaries and benefits—which would presumably drive instructional costs up. Charters, on average, pay lower salaries for teachers with similiar credentials to those hired by traditional publics, and also employ a less experienced and less costly teaching force, the authors say, which would keep instructional costs down.

HEre's the paper in question for your review.

Is Administration Leaner in Charter Schools? Resource Allocation in Charter and Traditional Public Schools

Overpaid? Hardly

The National Education Policy Center debunks that ridiculous AEI report on teachers being overpaid by 52%, and finds evidence to the contrary

This report compares the pay, pension costs and retiree health benefits of teachers with those of similarly qualified private-sector workers. The study concludes that teachers receive total compensation 52% greater than fair market levels, which translates into a $120 billion annual “overcharge” to taxpayers. Built on a series of faulty analyses, this study misrepresents total teacher compensation in fundamental ways. First, teachers’ 12% lower pay is dismissed as being appropriate for their lesser intelligence, although there is no foundation for such a claim. Total benefits are calculated as having a monetary value of 100.8% of pay, while the Department of Labor disagrees, giving a figure of 32.8%—a figure almost identical to that of people employed in the private sector. Pension costs are valued at 32%, but the real number is closer to 8.4%. The shorter work year is said to represent 28.8% additional compensation but the real work year is only 12% shorter. Teachers’ job stability is said to be worth 8.6%, although the case for such a claim is not sustained. In sum, this report is based on an aggregation of such spurious claims. The actual salary and benefits for teachers show they are in fact undercompensated by 19%

TTR TchrCompens Heritage 0