Intercepts
A listening post monitoring public education and teachers’ unions.

I’ve been router-wrestling all morning, but fixed it in time to discover that an Iowa state legislator has discovered an ingenious way to “free up tens of millions of dollars in administrative expenses that could be spent on teachers and students.”

You guessed it, he wants forced consolidation of school districts.

Fortunately, Des Moines Register reporter Staci Hupp did a little research, and noted that Iowa has 362 school districts today – down from 4,652 in 1950. I can’t find a figure for per-pupil spending for 1950, but the Digest of Education Statistics reveals that per-pupil spending in Iowa more than tripled – in constant dollars – from 1960 to 2005.

Yep, those bigger districts sure do save a fortune.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 10th, 2009 at 15:48 and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.