The following list, published by the Idaho State Board of Education, illustrates how they are failing to educate our children:

• Four in 10 high school graduates are not ready for college courses. 45% of high school graduates do not have the skills to advance beyond entry level jobs…
• Roughly one in three high school students fail to meet English and Math standards.
• To restore value to the high school diploma, governors, legislators and state education leaders need to raise standards for all students….
• “When I compare our high schools to what I see when I’m traveling abroad, I am terrified for our workforce of tomorrow.” Bill Gates
• Unfortunately, compared to other countries, the US is not graduating enough students from high school or college.
• Only one country tests better than 4th grade US students in science, by 12th grade, US students outperform only students from Cyprus and South Africa.
• “Too few students are ready for either college or work.” ACT
• Idaho ranks 46th in the nation in terms of college graduates per capita – only Mississippi, Arkansas, Nevada and West Virginia have fewer college graduates.
• In 2004: 41% of Idaho’s college freshman took remedial courses, totaling 12,118 credit hours.
• Students and the State of Idaho spend $1,873,365 on remediation.
  

Of course they published this list to try to illustrate their need for more money. Their solution is always the same. "We need more power and more money!" They are asking us to reward their failure!!!

Simply throwing more money at the problem will give us what it always has, more expensive failing schools!

In Idaho, we've been throwing more and more money at the problem, and the growth rate of faculty and staff is 5 times greater than student enrollment. Great. We're creating jobs, but not serving the children.

The following chart (from Education Excellence Idaho) illustrates the correlation between dollars spent per student each year, and their annual improvement on standardized tests.

Obviously, there is no correlation between dollars spent and achievement! The problem clearly isn't the money!

In John Stossel's hard-hitting report "Stupid in America", he clearly showed how our nation's schools are failing, despite a significantly higher cost per student. If you missed this 20/20 report, use the following links to view exerpts:

Stupid in America

Unhelpful Unions?

Making the Grade

Is the problem the teachers? I believe our teachers are every bit as intelligent, gifted, and dedicated as in the leading schools in the world.

Although his report angered many teachers, I don't understand why. He did not place the blame on the teachers in general. Rather, he labeled government control stifling teachers ability to innovate, and the teachers unions protecting bad teachers. Only the (self-admitted) bad teachers should be up in arms against this! The average and good teachers would actually benefit from a school reform like he proposes.

Notice in "Making the Grade" the teachers in this featured school weren't protected by unions, were free to innovate, and made more money!

Perhaps teachers who are upset by this report should be asking themselves, "Am I a good teacher who is merely upset because the union wants me to be, or deep down am I afraid that I am part of the problem, being protected by the system?"