In yesterday’s post, we pointed out the futility of predicting electoral behavior, and then went on to make an “if…, then…” statement.
Following up on that, it may be useful to think through the implications of Question 3 being defeated. What happens then?
The State has already mandated a “floor” of $30,000 for teacher salaries. That’s had the effect — and this will become more the case as contracts come up for negotiation — of raising all teacher salaries, given the typical “step” structure of these contracts. Further, consolidation, by forcing ultimate reconciliation of disparate terms of compensation and benefit levels, also has the effect of raising the cost of the total salary and benefits package. Lastly, it’s already “in the air” that we ought to have one statewide teacher contract. As stated yesterday, one of the arguments being made is that of avoiding duplicative efforts and expense. I’ll believe this one only when I read of layoffs at a prominent Portland law firm!
No, one near-term result of the defeat of Question 3 will be the abrogation of all (or nearly all) local decision-making in the area of educational salary and benefit determinations; these decisions will soon enough be the province of bureaucrats in Augusta.
This means that 80 percent or more of local budgets will be determined elsewhere.
This in turn is part of Essential Programs and Services becoming less of a descriptive model — “here’s what we think you can operate on” — and more a prescriptive template — “Here’s what you must operate on.” Who hasn’t seen this coming?
There’s indeed a possibility that in a effort to minimize disparities in expenditures between districts, even though an extra local expense is often voluntarily assumed, that there will be some limits placed on how much the locals can raise “over and above.” If you think this is far-fetched, just recall the grumbling you’ve heard from Augusta over the refusal of some of the locals to fall in line with the LD1 limits.
The argument for saving money, that is, “efficiency”, in theory has few limits. Why not authorize (presently a school board function) textbooks at the State level? And award the contracts Statewide as well?
We’ve seen similar moves on transportation in the last few years. There’s now a State standard bus. (It has googaws on it that at least some of the rural transportation folks don’t think they need, but heck, it’s all in the package.) The State DOE recently spent $1.3 million on bus routing software it’s offering to the locals for “free”. (Great comments at the BDN article on this, by the way.)
There probably is not a single aspect of the way the schools operate that cannot be centralized; and the numbers can be jiggered to show a savings, by gum!
You get the picture of how the money side will work, if Question 3 is defeated.
But with money goes, potentially, all policy-making and all educational decisions as well.
If Question 3 loses, the gates are wide open for all of these things to happen.
One aspect of education that stands to lose — big time — is local variants, local creativity, local experimentation. Large systems don’t tolerate real diversity. For the good of all, we all must pull together!
Large systems make large mistakes.
Think of those people standing on their rooftop waiting to be rescued from the flood. They hadn’t thought to make an effort to save themselves. Or if they had, they quickly realized — horrible thought — that they didn’t have the means to save themselves.
If “efficiency” wins, we’re all going to be standing on that roof.