Seattle Schools Community Forum

This NPR story is aptly titled, Can More Money Fix America's Schools ? The bottom line to that question is yes BUT no one seems quite sure what is the best bang for the buck and many legislators are loathe to give out extra dollars if there is uncertainty about what to do.  (But more on that in a minute.) That's a super broad question.  Does it mean:

Seems this topic is all the rage.  This story is a three-parter with the other part coming next week.  I haven't had time to read it thoroughly but it has a very good interactive map that shows you who spends what.  We began with the question: "How do we pay for our schools?"  From a leaky ceiling in rural Alabama to a four-day school week in Arizona. From $9,794 to $28,639. Next week, we'll wade into the debate over the difference money can make in a classroom. And yes, it's a debate. National average for school spending - $11,841 Seattle: $10,610 Bellevue: $9,192 Issaquah: $8,096 Highline: $9684 Spokane: $11,610 The center of the state and the far NW of the state spend a lot more. 

NPR has been getting dollars (a la the Seattle Times) for education reporting from the Gates Foundation.  And boy, does it show in their Common Core reporting. First, their FAQs on Common Core read a lot like what comes from Gates.  Two, they even have one FAQ "fact" wrong which is that Oklahoma has a bill going thru its Legislature to walk away from CC.   The fact is that the bill passed both houses of their Legislature and has been sitting on their Governor's desk for about a week.  (She has the choice to sign it into law, wait until the time period to sign runs out and it automatically becomes law or veto it.)  This morning they had a piece on how most states are nowhere near ready for CC because the curriculum (books and teaching materials) are not ready.  (This is true but that's certainly not the only implementation problem.  What I find troubling is the subtle insertion of editorializing in these pieces.  I'm not sure I even min...