Bureaucrats don't need money; classrooms do

The News & Record, using the same distortions and half truths used to shill for millionaires during the recent baseball tax fiasco, has now come up with the term ''per pupil capital spending'' in an effort to convince us that we don't pay enough taxes and don't spend enough on education.

How about something called ''per pupil administrative spending.'' I'll wager we don't rank near the bottom in that category. We continue to pay more and more to fund a failed educational system. Based on almost every measurable achievement standard, we pay far too much, not too little. Where do we rank in total per pupil spending?

Not enough classrooms or books? Simple, take some of the money that goes to fund the sprawling, bloated bureaucracy that contributes little, if anything, to teach a child to read or write. I suspect that we do need more classrooms, much more so than bureaucrats. So instead of using our tax dollars to fund a jobs program for mostly useless bureaucrats, put the money into the classroom. Look at the number of bureaucrats in any religious school versus the public schools.

Look at the cost per pupil in each. Then compare results. How smart do you have to be to figure out the problem?

Tony Moschetti
High Point

News & Record
May 24, 1998