Governor Dean to Cut Education Spending

Author: Liz Lathey

In light of Governor Howard Dean's recent announcement that the state will be reducing its education budget by between $7 to $8 million next year, Vermont is facing new problems in terms of how it will enact reforms to better its educational system.
Improving education has become a nationwide initiative, due to several recurring problems students face when they have received less-than-adequate elementary and high school educations.
Reports also indicate that disadvantaged and minority students have been displaying a lack of progress in recent years, which some claim is due to ineffective teaching.
Studies have shown that many students at the university level still need to be placed into remedial math and English classes. According to the National Commission on Excellence in Education, in 1993 to 1994, 40 percent of public high school science teachers did not have a major or minor in their field and 34 percent of public school math teachers did not have a major or minor in their field.
Despite these statistics, Vermont's quality of education has improved slightly in recent years. For example, the state recently managed to lower the number of schools on the Vermont Department of Education's "Needing Improvement" list from 28 to 4.
In addition, the Department of Education recently released a report that Vermont's college board scores are at a 10-year high. However, they are still about 40 points below the national average.
Although Vermont has scored higher than many states on the National Assessment of Educational Progress, between 60 and 70 percent of fourth and eighth grade students are still not considered proficient in math or science.
Vermont's standards and assessments also do not seem to be up to par, as the Princeton Review ranked the state 44th in the country for its assessment program.

SCHOOL CHOICE

At a time when a college degree is becoming more and more necessary for one to attain a desired career after school, a focus education reforms at the lower levels remains imperative. Supporters of Vermont's school choice program argue that it gives students more of a chance for a quality education.
School choice gives parents and students the opportunity to choose which school a student goes to, theoretically mitigating some of the problem areas in Vermont's education system. With the initiation of school choice, schools need to improve the quality of the education they provide in order to attract more students.
Advocates of school choice in this year's election include gubernatorial candidate Jim Douglas, candidate for lieutenant governor Brian Dubie and congressional candidate Bill Meub, all of whom are Republicans.
Other goals of the state's push to improve its education system include higher academic rigor, more reliable assessments and better teachers. Vermonters for Better Education (VBE) proposes that the state set higher academic goals which would serve as guidelines rather than directives.
VBE also suggests that rather than using unreliable testing programs such as the New Standards Reference Exams, Vermont should continue participating in national standardized tests like the National Assessment of Educational Progress.
Finally, VBE suggests that all teachers take a test before attaining licensure, even those who are already employed as teachers.
THE COST OF EDUCATION

Although lowering Vermont's education budget certainly will not aid in educational reform, studies have shown that the state's high spending on education has not always yielded better results.
Previous high costs for education have been directed towards lowering the student to teacher ratio (13.4:1) relative to the national average (16.9:1).
Although Dean's cuts may not do serious harm to education as it is, the outgoing governor's decision calls in to question how Vermont will ahieve the above-average standards it desires.