The Times editorial board starts to worry about whether the stimulus dollars are going to buy any education reform. The awkward tension around saving jobs and reforming schools — at the same time — is starting to surface. In fact, you can’t help but think that if South Carolina Governor Sanford had actually put forward a sensible alternative proposal for spending his state’s share of the education money, instead of just a political gimmick, he might have been able to create an issue that someone other than Republican primary voters would have cared about.
Related, saw some data the other day indicating that based on current revenue estimates if states spend 70 percent of their stimulus money by June of 2010 almost half of them will actually be increasing education spending, about 20 of them by 4 percent or more and five in double digits. Some will still be hurting and I don’t think these estimates account for structural problems like pensions. Still, while The Ed Trust is planning to monitor how the dollars are spent shouldn’t someone do a specific study to see whether states with surpluses in the wake of this actually reform more than states with deficits? Or maybe we don’t want to know…
You can see The Commodore hold forth on all this here.