Texas Education Budget Cuts - Essay Example

Why Texas’ Plan to Cut the School Budget is Wrong of the Faced with falling municipal revenues due to economic conditions not seen since the Great Depression, Texas, like many other states, is faced with tough budgetary choices. This paper addresses why Texas’ public school budgets should be exempt from budget cuts and examines some of the effects such cuts would have on the state, on our community and on the future of our children. Why Texas’ Plan to Cut the School Budget is Wrong “To eat the seed corn” means to eat the corn that was meant be saved to start next year’s harvest.

The expression describes an act of desperation; a deal with the devil done to provide short-term relief that merely forestalls a now-guaranteed disastrous long-term consequence, for it turns temporary hunger pangs into inevitable starvation. To eat the next year’s seeds is to fail to invest in the future. It is myopic generational theft that insidiously steals from tomorrow by mortgaging the future. Such is the same with Texas’ ill-conceived plan to cut public school budgets. We’ve all heard the mantra that the future is high-tech and in Texas, even traditionally low-tech industries like oil exploration have gone high-tech.

According to Southwest Economy: The history of Texas lies in cattle and oil. But increasingly, the future of the state is becoming linked with the ever-evolving high-tech industry. High-tech employment has grown more than twice as fast in Texas as it has in the nation during the 1990s.The high-tech expansion has had an indirect impact on the state's economy by keeping other industries humming [.] One of the best examples of the indirect effects is the impact on the state's construction and real estate industries. (TI 1997) Texas owes a great deal of its present prosperity on the high tech industries of the future which added 14,600 jobs in 2008 even while the rest of the United States slipped into another recession, and those high-tech jobs paid an average of “$84,800 – 82% higher than the state’s average private sector wage” (Savaoie 2010).

In total, there are an estimated 492,400 jobs with a $41.8 billion payroll (2010). According to Texas Instruments, today’s Texas is the nation’s second leading exporter, with high-tech products and equipment accounting for 70% of the state’s $74 billion exports (1997). How in the world can Texas expect to maintain that kind of economic advantage in technology without a sufficiently educated workforce? Before any future budget cuts are considered, the numbers at present are startling. According to the state’s own website, in 2006 Texas was almost at the bottom in SAT scores (49th in verbal and 46th in math), was 40th in per-pupil spending, and only graduated 68% of its students from high school. (TX 2006) It’s highly unlikely that any of Texas’ dismal rankings will improve with additional budget cuts.

It’s important to note the radical ways the teaching environment had already been altered this past decade due to budget cuts. Paid advertizing on lockers, in school buses, corporate-sponsored musical instruments and band uniforms; some public schools are already so desperate for funding that nutritional school lunches have been replaced with fast food items provided by the likes of Taco Bell to be washed down with soft drinks from the ubiquitous vending machines whose revenue is drawn from the bloated, insulin-resistant student body.

At a time when obesity is a national epidemic, budget shortcomings have cut gym classes from the curriculum and students have been introduced to new school-sanctioned activities like “Pepsi Appreciation Day.” Just a few days ago, a study was released linking junk food to low IQ scores; children are more susceptible to bad nutrition than adults because of their smaller body size and the fact that they are in the process of accumulating mass (“they are still growing”). (AFP 2011) While economic priorities have shifted away from academics, in Texas budgets for high school football is still considered sacrosanct.

A recent New York Times article noted the passing of a $119 million bond in Allen, Texas, to build a “long overdue” $60 million 18,000 seat high school football stadium akin to something straight out of the popular television show, “Friday Night Lights” - and there are four other stadiums in Texas that are even larger. (Bishop 2011) So what is Texas to do? With a projected budget shortfall of $28 billion and the nation’s u6 unemployment figure over 17%, is it finally time for a state income tax?

The answer to that question is beyond the scope of this essay, but what is clear is what the answer is not: since it was the high tech jobs and industry that acted as 300-pound linemen, protecting Texas’ economic line of scrimmage from the most recent recession, the answer is not more budget cuts to an already underfunded public school system. As Texas’ supply of hydrocarbons inevitably shrinks to zero and vanishes with the rest of yesterday’s economy, it would be as foolish to undermine the foundations for tomorrow to avoid some budgetary pain today with school budget cuts, as it would be to “eat the seed corn.

” References Savaoie, Anne Caliguiri. “U.S. High-Tech Industry Sheds 245,600 Jobs in 2009.” techamericafoundation.org. James, Josh. 28 April 2010. 10 February 2011. < http://www.techamericafoundation.org/cyberstates2010-texas> TI. ne. 9 September 1997. ti.com. < http://www.ti.com/corp/docs/kilbyctr/hightech.shtml/> Zeitvogel, Karin. “US falls to average in education ranking.” google.com. ne. 7 December 2010. 10 February 2011. Bishop, Greg. “A $60 Million Palace for Texas High School Footbal.

” nytimes.com. ne. 29 January 2011. 10 February 2011. < http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/30/sports/30allen.html> TX. ne. February 2006. state.tx.us. AFP. “Junk food diet linked to lower IQ – study.” news.yahoo. ne. 8 February 2011. 10 February 2011. < http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20110208/lf_afp/healthfoodlifestylechildren>