Economic models of education are all the rage these days, especially among proponents of remaking public schooling into one large laissez-faire market. But for the most part, these models are incredibly one-sided, focusing on the costs of schooling and on reforms such as lowering class size or introducing universal pre-Kindergarten without examining their benefits. In a day and age when 22% of African-American men in their thirties have prison records, while only 12% hold college degrees, one needs to compare the costs of not investing in education and proven reforms against the costs of making such an investment. An informative economic model would examine both costs and benefits of various educational programs.
In this vein, the Center for Benefit-Cost Studies of Education at Columbia University’s Teachers College has just published a study by four leading educational scholars on The Costs and Benefits of an Excellent Education for All of America’s Children. Columbia University’s Hank Levin and Peter Muennig, CUNY’s Clive Belfield and Princeton’s Cecilia Rouse look at the potential benefits of a number of proven educational reforms, and conclude that with investments in these areas, the United States could save as much $45 billion annually in increased tax revenues and in reduced public health and criminal justice costs if we reduced the drop out rate by 0ne-half, a feasible target. “Educational investments to raise the high school graduation rate appear to be doubly beneficial,” the study’s authors write. “The quest for greater equity for all young adults would also produce greater efficiency in the use of public resources.”
Among the investments which could improve high school graduation rates are:
* Universal Pre-Kindergarten along the lines of the Perry Pre-School in Ypsilanti, Michigan. Perry provides children with 1.8 years of a center-based program for 2.5 hours per weekday, offering a child-to-teacher ratio of 5:1; home visits; and group meetings of parents. The researchers estimate that, implemented on a broad scale, Perry’s benefit-to-cost ratio would be 2.31 to 1, and that it would create an additional 19 new high school graduates per 100 students.
* Parenting Programs such as the Chicago Child-Parent Center Program, a preschool program with parental involvement, outreach and health/nutrition services, based in public schools. This approach would achieve an estimated benefit-to-cost ratio of 3.09 to 1 and create an additional 11 high school graduates per 100 students.
* Comprehensive school reform centered on small learning communities, such as First Things First, a program that includes dedicated teachers, family advocates and instructional improvement. FTF would achieve an estimated benefit-to-cost ratio of 3.54 to 1 and create an additional 16 high school graduates per 100 students.
* Class-size reduction. This approach – based on the parameters of Project Star, a four-year, randomized field trial in Tennessee – would include four years of schooling (from kindergarten through third grade) with class size reduced from 25 to 15. The researchers estimate that, implemented on a broad scale, class-size reduction along these lines would achieve a benefit-to-cost ratio of 1.46 to 1, and that it would create an additional 11 new high school graduates per 100 students.
* Teacher salary increase of 10 percent for all years K-12. This approach would achieve an estimated benefit-to-cost ratio of 2.55 to 1 and create an additional five high school graduates per 100 students.
4 Comments:
1 curious3
· Mar 26, 2007 at 4:22 pm
Hey Leo,
How much money do you think we should be spending per student in the NYC public school system? It seems to me that the establishment usually answers this question with the answer “More!”. It concerns me that this answer seems to fit their financial incentives putting aside any educational objectives. How much are we spending now per student? 14k? Meanwhile, Spitzer is proposing to spend billions more per year. Many financial analysts think that the growing costs of our system are unsustainable. I just read that Newark is spending more than $17k per student. Their results are terrible. Do you think Newark should spend more? What is your sense for the optimal amount for us to spend?
Ken
2 phyllis c. murray
· Mar 27, 2007 at 5:21 am
GOVERNMENT MUST COMMIT TO EDUCATION
By Phyllis C. Murray
“There are currently two million Americans in prison — 25 percent of the world’s prison population. In the US, it costs $56 billion dollars a year to maintain our nation’s prisons, and an additional $2.6 billion dollars is poured into building new ones annually.
Architects, Designers and Planners for Social Responsibility (ADPSR) are calling for designer to stop investing our national economic and social resources in the construction and renovation of prisons. Prisons drain our economy our money that could be used for education and social services.” January 2006(ADPSR)
March 5, 1991 was Albany Lobby Day: a day for UFTers to have their say about the state of education inside the chambers of legislative officials. The message was clear: Cuts and freezes in the budget, translate into cut to students.
When we looked carefully at the government spending patterns, we noted that approximately $84,000 was spent per juvenile inmate, $56, 000 was spent per adult incarcerated in prisons. Yet the government could not fund intervention programs in our schools. Such programs would have prevented the warehousing of inner-city minorities in prisons which were designed to create jobs for non-minorities in rural areas.What ever happened to the government’s commitment to education and to children? Had governance stopped running for kids and become job mills for a select majority?
In addition to the aforementioned, it seemed difficult to comprehend how 8,800 prison cells were on the drawing board. Yet the prospect of building new schools to replace our crumbling schools had become a dream deferred. So the question was asked: Where were the political pundits who campaigned on a platform for education? How had their commitment to education manifested itself? Today we see the results of these actions.
As educators and taxpayers, we have every right to challenge those who represent us in government. We have every right to hold legislators accountable for the pledges they have made regarding their commitment to education. We can see from the past mistakes of legislators exactly why it would have been more economically sound and beneficial to this nation if the legislators had invested in education.
Leo Casey is right:”One needs to compare the costs of not investing in education and proven reforms against the costs of making such an investment. An informative economic model would examine both costs and benefits of various educational programs.” However, Mary McLeod Bethune said it best, ” Invest in a human soul. Who knows, it may be a diamond in the rough.”
.
Phyllis C. Murray,
UFT Chapter Leader
Region 2 District 8
3 Leo Casey
· Mar 27, 2007 at 1:10 pm
Ken:
Do you ask how much we should spend on prisons?
Why is the logic that we should spend as much on prison as we need to do to keep society safe, but that we should be miserly and penurious when it comes to providing ALL children with a sound, decent education?
Maybe the fact that spending on prisons is increasing at a much more dramatic rate than spending on schools is as much a cause, as a consequence, of the growing prison population.
4 curious3
· Mar 27, 2007 at 9:48 pm
Hey Leo,
I don’t know much about prison spending, but I hope you don’t think we should have a “blank check” approach to prison funding or for any other part of our budget. Is that what you are suggesting? Is there any limit at all on how much we should be spending on education? Is $17k per student miserly and penurious? What amount would not be miserly and penurious? What makes the current amounts spent miserly and penurious?
Are you suggesting that we should decide how much to spend on schools based on how much we spend on prisons? Or that our prison population is growing because education spending is not keeping pace with prison spending?
Meanwhile, whose logic is it that we should spend as much on prison as we need to to keep society safe? Whose logic is it to be miserly and penurious with respect to education spending? I haven’t read those papers.
Better than answering any of these questions, though, I would love to get an answer to my original question: How much should we be spending per student in NYC?
Ken