by Gordon Southern
What price must we pay for the troubles and poor decisions of our state government?
Only a few months ago, we were hearing “happy days are here again” as the state promised that our property taxes would be lowered and everything would be fine.
I think the veiled suggestion was that local government was not spending our money well. They could survive on a lot less money.
Well, we have found that is not true and everything is not going to be fine. Local governments all over are being forced to cut services.
We were going to pay less taxes, get more services, and the state was going to make sure everything was hunky-dory for us. What a joke! We were actually better off when the General Assembly didn’t do anything but meet and draw their salaries.
Schools are considered to be a unit of local government in Indiana. Schools have been supported primarily by property taxes for decades. Local people decided what they wanted in the way of schools and then supported the property taxes necessary to pay for that. It was a simple system that served us well. Elected trustees or school boards ran the schools.
But that was in a time when the state actually trusted voters and local officials. Today the General Assembly has decided no one can make good decisions but the members of state government. School boards are mere agents of the state who carry out their directives.
Some in the General Assembly actually spoke publicly around our area of taking over the schools so they could get the teachers and costs under control. I guess they have done that, but at what price? The latest directive cutting the budgets of schools may give a whole new face to public education.
Go to some of the meetings, and you will find there is little if any fat in the schools to cut. Schools cut the fat a long time ago in order to meet all of the unfunded mandates the state passed down to them. Now start looking for changes you are not going to like.
Class size is sure to grow. There is no other way to cut the budget as much as the state has mandated except to reduce the size of the staff in each school. Of course, decreasing staff numbers means one thing immediately, an increase in class size. The state is already supporting hiring non-qualified teachers in order to save money, what will they do next?
Now some might say teachers 50 years ago could handle 40 kids, why can’t they do the same thing today? Well they can’t do the same thing today because they lack the authority to enforce the discipline found in schools 50 years ago.
Many of our children today are not nice people. Many have grown up without discipline at home, the need to do chores and respect for elders and institutions.
They expect to be catered to. They take a lot of time and effort to accomplish much of anything. So face facts, if your child is a better student he or she is going to be lost in the chaos of a large class.
SAT scores are sure to drop. ISTEP scores are sure to drop. The main reason ISTEP scores are as high as they are today is because a lot of people are putting a lot of time and effort into helping marginal students to do better. When you have 40 children in a class, there will be no time to give the marginal student more help. They will definitely be left behind.
Music and art will be gone quicker than you can say “The Beatles.” We will raise a generation of children that have little or no concept of the cultural things in life.
What is left in the way of vocational classes will be gone. You cannot afford to waste money on anything that doesn’t to teach to the ISTEP.
Drama, not a chance of surviving. FFA to survive will require all support coming from outside of the school. All elementary and junior high field trips and sports will be gone.
Not only are all of these coming. They may come before the end of the current school year.
It scares me to death, but what I have written about above could be in place by spring break.
That is what I think. What do you think?
• Gordon Southern is a columnist for the Pharos-Tribune. He can be reached through the newspaper at ptnews@pharostribune.com.
