Going to the Numbers (II) 
By Martin Harris

As a first in the brief history of this column, I’ll start with a dedication: this essay, like its January 23rd predecessor, pretty well filled with actual educational numbers and percentages from the National Digest of Educational Statistics, is aimed at what now seems to be a voter minority: those who actually care what the actual numbers say, as opposed to a majority which seems to prefer lofty rhetoric and deceptive statistics involving public education. It matters because public education has become the keystone issue of the suddenly-discovered-by-politicians "affordability crisis" its lowest-in-the-nation pupil-teacher ratio leading pretty directly to nearly highest-in-the-nation per-pupil costs, property taxes, housing unaffordability, young-family out-migration, and so on. Yes, a hostile-to-development-and-business regulatory and political climate fits into the overall situation, but, I’d argue, are overshadowed for immediate impact by the school situation. 

If you get your own NDES book, as I suggested on the 23rd, and turn to Table 112, as I suggested on the 23rd, you’ll find that student test scores, nation-wide, are dismal. Mostly, they’re in the 240 range (out of 500) in the National Assessment of Educational Progress tests, meaning that about 2/3 of all students can’t make "proficient", meaning, in turn, that they can’t function at the expectation level for the grade they’re in. Getting to the top of all States on the NAEP tests, then, isn’t the accomplishment suggested by local newspaper headlines, as in the Rutland Herald, for example, which recently used 48-point type (about ¾ inch) to advise readers that "Vt. Ranks Third in School Achievement." Getting to third means getting to a score of 227 in 4^th grade reading for example, against a national average of 217. A score of 227 means that 39 percent of students made "proficient" and that 61 percent couldn’t. Actually, it’s even a bit worse than that, and difficult to discuss because it’s politically incorrect. Take, for example, the VT-at-227, US-at-217 data above. Ten points above the national average? Yes, but.

The yes-but appears when you recite the unpleasant numbers behind the numbers, specifically how well white students scored compared to how well non-white students scored. Statistically, Vermont is one of only two states which have none of the latter, and therefore Vermont’s overall 4^th grade reading score (227) is the same as its white-students-score (also 227). The overall US score is 217, but the US white students’ score is 228. At Department of Defense schools, the overall score was 226 (a point below Vermont) and the white score 228 (a point above). One might reasonably raise this question: for spending well above the national average on class sizes well below the national average, how do Vermont educators explain their students’ test score results slightly below the national average? 

There are other statistical nuggets in the NDES, nuggets which cast light on questions ranging from administrative costs to transportation costs. Usually, Vermont’s supposedly unique geographical characteristics as a thinly-populated rural state are used to explain the spending level. In transportation, as I showed in a recent column, an education VIP claimed that Vermont spent "more than most states" on transportation for that reason. Technically true: $330 per pupil per year is, in fact, higher than $325, the national average. But then, Utah spends $151. Maybe that’s because it’s a compact urban state. 

Read the numbers for yourself in Table 164.

Vermont really spends a lot more per pupil than other states in administration, both state ($268, compared to US average $165) and local ($719, compared to US $452). The $719 number is first-in-the nation. These numbers, too, are in Table 164. One might reasonably raise this question: for spending well above the average for administration, is the "we’re oh so rural" excuse valid, and is a proposed school district reorganization (fewer but larger districts) a believable answer? Based on past spending history, I’d say no, but it’s not my decision. You decide. 

--Martin Harris is the former president of Vermont’s Citizens for Property Rights.