65 Degrees of Separation

By Walter C. Jones
Morris News Service

ATLANTA -- For folks who enroll their children in the same elementary school they attended, the first parent-teacher meeting usually comes with surprises.

Besides the sensation that desks have shrunk and doorknobs have slid lower, the introduction of the faculty can be eye-opening. In addition to the classroom teachers, the cast also will include a nurse, counselors, reading specialists, a platoon of clerks, vice principals and assistant librarians.

The natural reaction is to wonder if all those support jobs existed 20 years earlier but were out of the average pupil’s sight. In most cases, they did not exist then.

It’s the buildup of support personnel and administrators that’s coming under attack by a national movement which will likely include legislators in the Georgia General Assembly.

Called the 65-Cent Solution, the concept is to require that 65 cents of every dollar allocated to education be spent in the classroom. The average state now spends less than 62 cents, according to the National Center for Educational Statistics, 63.3 in Georgia.

Advocates of the 65-Cent Solution see an opportunity to become the champions of increased classroom spending without necessarily raising taxes to do it. That means making every local district hold administrative and support costs to 35 percent, things like central-office wages, teacher training, buses and lunchrooms.
It’s a classic wedge issue in that it pits educators against one another, teachers against administrators and parents against school boards. It also makes a steeper hill to climb for advocates of supplemental programs like free lunch.

Republicans in other states have jumped on the idea as a way to neutralize the criticism they’ve gotten from Democrats as being unsympathetic to public education. It could be tonic for Georgia Republicans especially as Democrats here charge them with cutting $1 billion from primary education since the GOP took control of the governor’s office.

It may also be a solution to a lawsuit against the state that complains taxpayers don’t supply enough money to meet the legally mandated basic level of education.

All organizations, as they mature, almost inherently create more and more managerial and support positions as the top brass worries about new ways to ensure that the workers are doing their jobs. School systems aren’t unique. Delta Air Lines and General Motors both recently realized they had grown so much that they each had thousands of white-collar workers who added no revenue to the bottom line.

Voters who have a corporate background understand how staff jobs multiply and drive up costs. Keeping those costs in line makes sense to them. Beyond salaries, travel and benefits, there is an added price to extra administrators -- their memos that must be answered by somebody, their meetings that must be attended instead of otherwise productive activities, and their projects that consume resources.

Opponents of the 65-Cent Solution in other states call it a ploy to de-fund education while pretending to support it.

Rural districts, which depend more on school buses, and inner-city districts, which employ more counselors and other non-classroom workers, would feel the sting the most. By coincidence, those are the districts typically represented by Democrats who are in the minority in the House and Senate, so their cries probably won’t be heeded.

An organization called First Class Education is backing the 65-Cent Solution. It estimates reaching its goal nationwide would fund another 325,000 teachers or a computer for every student. The group cites surveys showing the plan is hugely popular with the public.

In Georgia, the organization estimates its proposal would pump $192 million more into classrooms each year by adjusting 1.7 percent of the average district’s budget.

Now that Gov. Sonny Perdue has shot down a proposal to shift local school funding from property taxes to sales taxes, the 65-Cent Solution could be an attractive alternative. It may not give direct property-tax relief, but it could make landowners feel like Republicans have assured that their money is at least better spent.
If Republicans define the issue as being one of classroom spending versus bureaucratic waste, then school-funding supporters -- typically Democrats -- would have to struggle to avoid being on the defensive. Of course, the Democrats, school boards and teacher organizations succeeded in beating back the sales-tax idea, and they could triumph again if they define the issue first as a choice between prudent, adequate funding or arbitrary spending cuts.

The race is on to see whose spin determines the direction this issue bounces.

Walter Jones is the bureau chief for Morris News Service and has covered Georgia politics since 1998. He can be reached at (404) 589-8424 or walter.jones@morris.com.