Or perhaps, the title should read, Education is Getting Smote by the Bush Administration. Of course, with all of his war time experience, W is very good at smiting...how fitting for his christian demeanor.
Take a look at the table summarized at the Chronicle of Higher Education and do the math. Sure, he is requesting a boost for Pell Grants (by 5.6%), but look at the other areas being reduced by 100% and you will know that there is no real increase, but a wholesale decrease in the investment in education.
As determined by the projected requests for the 2006 budget, it looks like our fair president doesn't care much about children, left behind or not.
Slice:
Pell Grants up 5.6 %
Perkins Loans (which really are not financial aid) DOWN 100%
Tech Prep Education DOWN 100%
Trio Programs DOWN 55.9%
Fund for Improving Postsecondary Education DOWN 86.3%
Gear UP DOWN 100%
Teacher Quality Enhancement Grants DOWN 100%
End slice:
You can log in to get the full table, but I don't think that increasing one, very successful program and killing several others is the best thing for education in America.
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4 comments:
Didn't Bush say that he wanted to be the "Education President?" Maybe the taxpayers are getting an education by watching him promiss one thing and deliver another?
true colors emerge quickly don't they? moral values indeed; middle to low income american voters have just totally gotten the shaft with this budget proposal, like they were warned would happen. but at least our President's got "resolve"... of course, it's the resolve to pursue crony capitalism.
- rock city
Don't blame President Bush for education-related problems...as it is so easy to do for everything social ill. Try blaming the University administrators, inefficient and non-productive University practices, University labor unions, the NEA, and all of the other socialism espousing, organizations that have no concept of real world practices. Coming from industry and now teaching at a University I can't help but notice how inefficient, ineffective, and non-responsive the university system is to the needs of their customer...the student. The primary concern is social engineering, and nothing else. What is needed in higher education is a dose of lean business and lean manufacturing practices, less social engineering, less finger pointing, and a whole lot more problem resolution. For countless, years money has been thrown at higher education. What was the excuse when Democrats were in power in congress and the White House?
Signed,
Yet to be tenured
Not yet tenured
Hummm...using business practices to make sweeping change in higher education...that is not a very original idea. How would one make that work, however, is not altogether that easy.
Traditional notions of scale and scope don't work all that well, with the high cost of education, educating, and educators. High Quality education is very expensive, even if administration is lean and mean - which, by the way, if you can find a real life example, let's hear it - and I am not so sure the public is ready to shell out the real amount of dollars necessary to support high quality education at any level.
That said, I do think that we could eliminate about 30% of administrative overhead and not affect the performance of any college or university. Not to mention that the infrastructure of education in America is based on a 100 plus year old model that simply doesn't fit with today's students. What we need, really, is a complete overhaul, repleat with the elimination of tenure and the institution of faculty free agency.
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