The Uncomfortable Question of Basic Education

The Spokane School District is looking at a potential $10 million dollar hole in their budget, and as you might expect it’s the state’s fault. From the Spokesman-Review:

Some freshmen could be without sports teams, elementary libraries may be staffed only pat time and classrooms may not be cleaned every day. Those are just a few of the possibilities the Spokane Public Schools board is considering to fill a projected budget gap next year.

Because of declining enrollment and mandates unfunded by the state Legislature, administrators need to make more than $10 million in cuts to the district’s $285 million budget.

The article was written by Sara Leaming, normally one hell of an education reporter, which is why I’m disappointed that she put the unfunded mandate piece in. Let’s go a little later in the article to see why that’s a bit silly:

Additionally, other options were suggested for future years but not for this year. Those could include closing another elementary school and relocating some programs to reduce the number of building leases the district pays, examining the use of hgh school buildings including Havermale, and reconfiguring the elementary band and strings program.

“Until the Legislature fully funds basic education, we are going to go through this on an annual basis,” (board president Christie) Querna said.

It’s a rather startling juxtaposition to go from orchestra for elementary students to complaining about basic education, isn’t it? Band is a perk; if they want to pay for it out of local levy funds, that’s swell for them, but there’s no way that I think it could be considered “basic education.”