What is Helium

Is money for education used to benefit students or staff?

Results so far:

Students		44%	129 votes	Total: 290 votes
Staff		56%	161 votes	Total: 290 votes

Students

1 of 7

Speaking from the perspective of an educator, funding for our schools is spent on the students. In Kentucky we have a Site Based Council at almost every school which consists of the principal, 3 teachers and 2 parents.

They are given the task of deciding how our funding is used within the school. That means they have to see how many teachers they can employ based on the number of students we have, since that is the basis of our funding. They also set the amount of classroom funds that each teacher receives, if any.

Usually the teachers in our area get from 250 - 450 dollars for the whole year. This is to buy supplies such as paper, pencils, markers, resource books, supplemental supplies, and offer educational field trips. Normally the maximum amount will not even cover paper, pencils, and general resources used every day in the classroom.

A field trip is almost non-existent. The cost has risen dramatically due to fuel price increases. Even if parents try to offset the cost by helping with entrance fees, it still is too far out of our reach financially. The cost of a 30 mile field trip is approximately 240 dollars plus the cost of the driver. That has eaten your money right there, so teachers are reluctant to even suggest a field trip.

I know that I spend around 1000-1200 dollars of my own money every year supplying the needs of my students. I can only imagine what it costs a new teacher who is just beginning her career. That is why teachers learn to share materials, ideas, and help new teachers who obviously are overwhelmed trying to get through the first few years financially.

There seems to be this notion that teachers have such a glamorous job with money just overflowing. I would interject this notion, that the grass looks a whole lot greener when you are viewing it from the 200K per year occupation.

All teachers in Kentucky must have a bachelor's degree, then a master's degree by the tenth year of teaching. A huge percentage has 30 hours on top of a master's degree, which is a Rank 1. We are not even close in salary to most occupations that hold as many degrees as we do.

When I read articles and hear the public say that teachers have such gravy jobs they need to consider that none of the funding for schools is spent on the staff. I eat in a noisy cafeteria, I get a whopping 20 minute lunch, I get to use the potty one or twice a day, I spend my money I earn to help my students, I deal with unruly kids and parents, and work on the average of 10-12 hours daily. I am not in it for the big bucks or so called funding fringe benefits.

Maybe some teachers live in areas where there is better funding sources, but I think most schools stretch and stretch just to be able to hire the teachers they need, much less have money to just throw around. Trust me it is not spent on the staff.

Learn more about this author, Kathy Myers.
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Staff

1 of 6

by John C. Osborn

The real question here should be who benefits more from the money spent on education, since all benefit somehow.

With that said, even though my words fall on the staff side of this debate, I see college administrators as benefiting more in this game than anyone else involved.

In the California State University system, you have student tuition increasing as administrators get fat pay raises, and as faculty unions fight to keep their salaries aligned with the cost of living. The logic by administrators: higher education is still cheaper here than other states. Makes sense, only tuition increases are being seen all over the country.

In my three years at Humboldt State University, I saw no improvement in the quality of my education as tuition increased. Rather, I watched as school administrators slashed budgets, laid-off teachers and packed more students into classrooms.

Perhaps if I stumbled upon an excellent teacher - you know, one of those "I'm hear to give you kids a good run for your money, to make sure you learn something by the time this class ends," then maybe it was worth the extra hours of work after school and the thousands of dollars of loan money I'll be paying back for a good portion of my "adult" life.

Rarely did that happen, since it seemed that the most of the teachers who cared most were the part-time lecturers who felt the budget cut's ax first. You know who always remained strong after the fallout from the annual budget cut dispersed though - administrators, stronger than ever, usually with more money in their pockets.

This strange phenomena seems to be sweeping across the county, imploring state legislatures to slash the money they give to education. This seemingly never-ending financial crisis forces legislators to decide between funding publicly funded education or pumping more money into correctional facilities.

Woe to the unlucky students not born into a family with enough disposable income to fully fund their college experience. Even a hundred dollar tuition increase a year can break the back of a student funding their educational experience.

What do students get out of it?

We get a piece of paper, a status-elevating symbol that means less and less to employers as four-year degrees open fewer and fewer doors, forcing students to either spend more money on an advanced degree, or be content with a job that barely pays the bills still.

Whose pockets do we the students line twice, through increased tuition and taxes?

College administrators act more and more like chief executive officers of a corporation, scrutinizing every single dollar spent at the institution to find those that don't pay for themselves, as if college were a for-profit venture and not a public service. Money is spent to beautify campuses rather than "smartening" classrooms, to fund marketing wings of the university rather than academic wings and to recruit rather than retain.

So who benefits most from every dollar spent on education?

Certainly not students.

Learn more about this author, John C. Osborn.
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