A Time to Say Thanks to our Nation's Parents and Teachers

This Thanksgiving we salute the herculean efforts of parents and teachers dedicated to improving the quality of education in schools across our country, especially when their time and resources are so precious. Thank you for the countless volunteer hours you have committed as class parents, field trip chaperons, Board members, committee members and coaches. Thank you for taking the time to read with your kids at night and for supporting them with their class projects. Thank you for helping to make classrooms more exciting and enriching atmospheres for our children to learn in. Thank you for supporting the myriad of school fundraising campaigns. Thank you for your tireless leadership, dedication and inspiration. Without you, our schools, classrooms and students would not be where they are today.

Parents and teachers deserve even greater appreciation given that they are making these investments in time, money and energy at such a tumultuous time for American public schools. Steep cuts to education over the last number of years have had a serious impact on the quality of education in our country. Parents and teachers have been left to bridge the gaps...and they are vast.

According to a report published by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities in September 2012, restoring school funding should be an urgent priority. The steep state-level K-12 spending cuts of the last several years have serious consequences for the nation:

• State-level K-12 cuts have large consequences for local school districts. Some 44 percent of total education expenditures in the United States come from state funds (the share varies by state). Cuts at the state level mean that local school districts have to either scale back the educational services they provide, raise more local tax revenue to cover the gap, or both.

• The cuts extended the recession and slowed the recovery. As of July 2012, local school districts had cut 328,000 jobs nationally compared with 2008. These job losses have reduced the purchasing power of workers’ families, in turn reducing overall consumption in the economy.

• The cuts counteract and sometimes undermine education reform and more generally hinder the ability of school districts to deliver high-quality education, with long-term negative consequences for the nation’s economic competitiveness.

• Local school districts typically have little ability to replace lost state aid on their own.

• These cuts are occurring at a time when schools face demands from parents, employers, and civic leaders to bring greater numbers of students to higher levels of academic proficiency, in large part because workers will increasingly need higher levels of educational attainment to thrive in the workforce.

• At a time when the nation is trying to produce workers with the skills to master new technologies and adapt to the complexities of a global economy, large cuts in funding for basic education undermine a crucial building block for future prosperity.

• “As U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan has said, “It is very difficult to improve the quality of education while losing teachers, raising class size, and eliminating after- school and summer school programs.”

Report by the Center on Budget & Policy Priorities, September 2012

As we take a closer look at the current climate of state funding we find:

• Twenty-six states are providing less funding per student to local school districts in the new school year than they provided a year ago. 

• Some states are beginning to restore their school funding over the past year, but those restorations are, for the most part, far from sufficient to make up for cuts in past years. 

• School funding remains well below pre-recession levels. Thirty-five states are providing less funding per student than they did five years ago. 

• Seventeen states have cut per-student funding by more than 10 percent from 2008 levels.

• More than two-thirds of states — 35 of the 48 states surveyed — are providing less per-student funding for K-12 education in the current 2013 fiscal year than they did in fiscal year 2008.

These statistics are alarming; however, they also represent an opportunity. Rather than relying on government funding to ensure our children receive the quality of education they deserve, why not create a system of financing that is reliable and within our control?

DonorNation empowers schools, local businesses and community members with a tool that allows them to become self-sustaining. It is like the old Proverb “Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day. Teach him how to fish and he will eat for a lifetime.” Enough of government funding cuts! We have the power to be the change. Together we can ensure every school has enough teachers, the right programs and adequate learning time so our children not only learn, but thrive.

At DonorNation, we share the underlying belief of our country’s teachers “every student can succeed if given the right opportunities”.

So once again, thank you to the parents and teachers who refuse to see the quality of our children's education diminish and work tirelessly to counter-act the effects budget cuts have on our education system. We are very grateful for the difference you make each and every day.

Happy Thanksgiving!