Financing In Education

One of the most debated topics in the education world is that of financing. Money always seems to bring out a lot of arguments, and after the mock budget cutting meeting that we took part in in class, I am even more sure than ever that there never is a solution that makes everyone happy. But before we get into the stuff that really makes peoples blood boil, lets first take a quick look at where our money comes from, as well as where the majority of it is spent in the first place.

As I have alluded to previously, though it may come as a bit of a surprise, the federal government actually has almost nothing to do with funding education (less than 1%). The majority of our funding actually comes from the provincial and municipal governments (62% and 32%), through property taxes. There are also smaller pieces coming from other school divisions, first nations and private organizations and individuals.

So where is the money spent? The biggest piece of the pie is given to regular instruction (57%), which is our teachers salaries as well as funding support and admin staff. The next biggest chuck is that of special/exceptional education services (17%). Im not sure if this is where EAL would fall under at this point, but if that is the case it would make sense for this piece to continue to increase. And finally there is one other fair sized piece devoted to operations and maintenance (12%). The rest of them are all fairly small and include transportation, administration, adult learning centers, community education services, instructional and pupil support services and fiscal (all 4% or less).

So what parts of financing do people tend to see as the most troublesome? There are a few different things that can cause some differences of opinion. One of them is what my professor refers to as the law of efficiency. This is the idea that because schools get funded per pupil, urban schools are able to buy a lot more equipment than rural schools because they have so many more students. This doesn't seem very fair, but I really dont see any way around it. I can also now see why, when I used to work in my old school, that we would keep even the kids that dropped out on our enrolment as long as possible, hoping to make that September 30th cutoff.

Another thing that seems to give way to some inequalities is that in places where property taxes are high (urban areas, places where there is lakefront, oil, minerals, etc.), the schools get more funding because so much of their funding comes from those taxes. This explains why places in the north get so little funding, and again, it does not seem fair to me. I think that they are on the right track trying to almalgamate some of the weaker and stronger divisions together, but due to geography, sometimes this is still not a viable solution. There is also some funding that only rural places can get to try and help equalize this, but it does not make up enough of the difference.

When we had our mock budget cutting meeting in class, it really brought to the forefront how hard it must be to make cutbacks. No matter how hard we tried, we could not seem to save enough and still keep everyone satisfied. It is especially hard when everything seems essential, and everyone has different areas that they see as most valuable.

So what did I learn from our discussions about financing? I believe that funding in rural areas is going to continue to be a problem in the years to come, giving way to more discussions about closing schools. I also have come to believe that if you must make cutbacks, you should never cut something out completely. I believe that a much better option is to cut a small portion out of everything. This will help keep everyone somewhat happy, but as long as our budget decreases every year, we will always struggle to find a way to keep our education system strong and our teachers happy.