Betsy DeVos and School Vouchers

[Loren Pechtel]

Okay, so if we double our funding, CATO thinks the scores in the SAT math test should go from 800 to 1600?

This looks to my untrained eye like total bullshit. The X axis indicates that "the" cost in 2012 was ~ 190% - OF WHAT? Is that per student, for ALL students, or what? Meanwhile all the test scores hover around zero. So, the graph seems to indicate that by 2012 we were paying 190% of ... something???? ... to enable students to learn ZERO reading, math or science.

I think one of the products of just such a system must have put that together.

It's not that bad--those are changes from baseline. The problems with that graph are students have been going up and special ed is a bigger portion of the budget.

 

[Axulus]

Are people seriously unable to read a simple graph and the caption provided? The average cost to educate a single student for their entire public schooling life for K-12 went up 190%, adjusted for inflation, for a student that graduated in the baseline year of 1970 vs. 2012.

- - - Updated - - -

Cato? Look with great skepticism at their stuff.

This is an example of deceptive data.

1) The graph should not be based at 0%

2) Population growth? It only says inflation corrected.

3) How much of that "education" budget is actually special ed?

Okay, so if we double our funding, CATO thinks the scores in the SAT math test should go from 800 to 1600?

Can you point out the part of that image that says that? Is there some micro print I'm missing?

 

[Nice Squirrel]

Are people seriously unable to read a simple graph and the caption provided? The average cost to educate a single student for their entire public schooling life for K-12 went up 190%, adjusted for inflation, for a student that graduated in the baseline year of 1970 vs. 2012.

My problem is there is no data or methodology attached to the graph. It says that costs went up. That's a no brainier. How did they establish a baseline? Why is the beginning of the graph a dotted line running through the energy crisis of the 1970s? Does the cost of schooling include things like more bus routes and the ADA? Title IX requirements? Building facilities? Teacher's salaries? Administration? CATO does not supply this data.

Also Cato is a conservative think tank. It exists to support pro-market causes, so it will pick facts that support their arguments. If their argument is that it is more expensive to education children, I agree. If their argument is that we should dismantle public schools, I disagree.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

It's not really about government subsidies for business. Most charter schools are non-profit. It's about parental choice for a child's education. There's little basis to assert that public schools are better than charter schools. After all, the return on investment with public schools is piss poor.

So this graph says we only doubled the cost of operating schools over 42 years?

This means we are more efficient at educating our children.

Note that our population has gone up 50% in that time period. There's half your change right there.

 

[Axulus]

Are people seriously unable to read a simple graph and the caption provided? The average cost to educate a single student for their entire public schooling life for K-12 went up 190%, adjusted for inflation, for a student that graduated in the baseline year of 1970 vs. 2012.

My problem is there is no data or methodology attached to the graph. It says that costs went up. That's a no brainier. How did they establish a baseline? Why is the beginning of the graph a dotted line running through the energy crisis of the 1970s? Does the cost of schooling include things like more bus routes and the ADA? Title IX requirements? Building facilities? Teacher's salaries? Administration? CATO does not supply this data.

Also Cato is a conservative think tank. It exists to support pro-market causes, so it will pick facts that support their arguments. If their argument is that it is more expensive to education children, I agree. If their argument is that we should dismantle public schools, I disagree.

Why would you attach data or methodology to the graph itself? The chart does list data sources used.

Here is one document the author published providing much more information:

https://object.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/pubs/pdf/pa746.pdf

- - - Updated - - -

So this graph says we only doubled the cost of operating schools over 42 years?

This means we are more efficient at educating our children.

Note that our population has gone up 50% in that time period. There's half your change right there.

How would a population change affect the cost on a per student basis? If anything, economies of scale should tend to decrease average costs per student a little bit (think textbook costs, for example, and greater buying power overall in many situations). That is even more damning.

 

[coloradoatheist]

So this graph says we only doubled the cost of operating schools over 42 years?

This means we are more efficient at educating our children.

Note that our population has gone up 50% in that time period. There's half your change right there.

It is per student, but it includes all education. The cost is kinda weird because it takes kids graduating from HS in a year and uses that as the denominator for total spending. So if you take each number and divide it by 12 or 13 you get about the cost per kid a year and it's about $13K per kid a year which around what I've seen per kid.

 

[Elixir]

This looks to my untrained eye like total bullshit. The X axis indicates that "the" cost in 2012 was ~ 190% - OF WHAT? Is that per student, for ALL students, or what? Meanwhile all the test scores hover around zero. So, the graph seems to indicate that by 2012 we were paying 190% of ... something???? ... to enable students to learn ZERO reading, math or science.

I think one of the products of just such a system must have put that together.

It's not that bad--those are changes from baseline. The problems with that graph are students have been going up and special ed is a bigger portion of the budget.

Then it's just flat out sloppy work. A 190% change from a baseline of zero is ...
Seriously, I know what they're trying to say, but they don't.... quite .... say it.

 

[Axulus]

Note that our population has gone up 50% in that time period. There's half your change right there.

It is per student, but it includes all education. The cost is kinda weird because it takes kids graduating from HS in a year and uses that as the denominator for total spending. So if you take each number and divide it by 12 or 13 you get about the cost per kid a year and it's about $13K per kid a year which around what I've seen per kid.

That is not how it is calculating it. It is taking the calculated average cost to put a student through the K-12 system for those students that graduated in the given year on the chart. In other words, how much did it cost on average to put just those students who graduated in that year through K-12?

It more explicitly describes it here:

We spent over $151,000 per student sending the graduating class of 2009 through public schools. That is nearly three times as much as we spent on the graduating class of 1970, adjusting for inflation. Despite that massive real spending increase, overall achievement has stagnated or declined, depending on the subject.

https://www.cato.org/publications/c...mpact-federal-involvement-americas-classrooms

 

[coloradoatheist]

It's not that bad--those are changes from baseline. The problems with that graph are students have been going up and special ed is a bigger portion of the budget.

Then it's just flat out sloppy work. A 190% change from a baseline of zero is ...
Seriously, I know what they're trying to say, but they don't.... quite .... say it.

It's the problem of trying to put data on one chart that has different units of measure. You have spending for education and scores are a different measure. It should be more clear.

 

[coloradoatheist]

It is per student, but it includes all education. The cost is kinda weird because it takes kids graduating from HS in a year and uses that as the denominator for total spending. So if you take each number and divide it by 12 or 13 you get about the cost per kid a year and it's about $13K per kid a year which around what I've seen per kid.

That is not how it is calculating it. It is taking the calculated average cost to put a student through the K-12 system for those students that graduated in the given year on the chart. In other words, how much did it cost on average to put just those students who graduated in that year through K-12?

It's not quite clear though. You can have two things. The cost it takes to educate someone to graduate in the last 12 years, or the cost to graduate one person in a year. I am not sure which one it's using.

 

[Elixir]

Then it's just flat out sloppy work. A 190% change from a baseline of zero is ...
Seriously, I know what they're trying to say, but they don't.... quite .... say it.

It's the problem of trying to put data on one chart that has different units of measure.

SOME people would have gone through the trouble of putting multiple scales on the X axis... but that might have made it look like the money spent was worth something - not the kind of thing that CATO would want to communicate.

You have spending for education and scores are a different measure. It should be more clear.

I think there is some nefarious reasoning behind the lack of clarity.

 

[Nice Squirrel]

My problem is there is no data or methodology attached to the graph. It says that costs went up. That's a no brainier. How did they establish a baseline? Why is the beginning of the graph a dotted line running through the energy crisis of the 1970s? Does the cost of schooling include things like more bus routes and the ADA? Title IX requirements? Building facilities? Teacher's salaries? Administration? CATO does not supply this data.

Also Cato is a conservative think tank. It exists to support pro-market causes, so it will pick facts that support their arguments. If their argument is that it is more expensive to education children, I agree. If their argument is that we should dismantle public schools, I disagree.

Why would you attach data or methodology to the graph itself? The chart does list data sources used.

They only list their source, but not their assumptions. There is no data or metadata available so I can infer/verify how they came to their conclusions.

Here is one document the author published providing much more information:

https://object.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/pubs/pdf/pa746.pdf

Thank you. I will look it over.

 

[Axulus]

For those asking about the dotted line (this was a version of the chart prepared in 2011, since updated with newer data sources) - this one gives a little bit more explanation on the source and method:

https://www.cato.org/publications/c...mpact-federal-involvement-americas-classrooms

Here is a link to the table in question:

https://nces.ed.gov/pubs2010/2010013_2b.pdf

And here is a link to the updated version:

https://nces.ed.gov/pubs2016/2016006.pdf

Briefly glancing over the data, the numbers appear to be consistent with the chart on spending.

 

[coloradoatheist]

It's the problem of trying to put data on one chart that has different units of measure.

SOME people would have gone through the trouble of putting multiple scales on the X axis... but that might have made it look like the money spent was worth something - not the kind of thing that CATO would want to communicate.

You have spending for education and scores are a different measure. It should be more clear.

I think there is some nefarious reasoning behind the lack of clarity.

Maybe you can draw it out, not seeing it. Because the scale for spending is $55K up to $300K. Scores might out of 100. Not sure which test they are using.

 

[Shadowy Man]

Vouchers will solve everything right? Once all the parents take their kids out of the "lousy schools", there will be no more lousy schools. Voila!

 

[Playball40]

Charter Schools are not the same as private school vouchers, but just as corrupt.

It's not really about government subsidies for business. Most charter schools are non-profit. It's about parental choice for a child's education. There's little basis to assert that public schools are better than charter schools. After all, the return on investment with public schools is piss poor.

Charter schools ARE public schools. People would not get vouchers for them because they are free. There is a selection process though in theory they are open to anyone. Selection process can be based on location, grades, skill set in certain areas, etc. I went to a magnet high school. It was great, but it has nothing to do with this thread except that in academic competitions we beat the best private schools.

 

[ronburgundy]

I don't know who that is or why it matters. I am going by what is written and not by who wrote it.

Also I thought the right was against government subsidies for businesses. Y'know the whole 'free enterprise' shpeal, where the government keeps its mitts out of other people's lives?

We should also acknowledge how this is yet another tax break for the renters at the expense of the rentees, assuming of course that property taxes go down at all and that the gov doesn't just use the money for some other purpose.

It's not really about government subsidies for business.

Yes, it is very much about making a handful of rich people even richer, and secondarily about using public money to fund Christianity and an aggressive attack on all science and valid scholarship that conservatives don't want people to believe, ranging for the facts of US History to Climate Change and Evolution.

Most charter schools are non-profit.

And yet they create billions in profit for the billionaires who are behind all the voucher and charter school legislation. The executives who run many of these schools make close to 100 times the per pupil salary than executives doing the same job in normal public schools get. Also, hedge-fund managers, bankers, and real-estate developers are creating "non-profit" charters to which they then lend money, and get a 40% Federal tax break on top their lending interest. It is well known among large investors that "non-profit" charter schools are among the best ways to make the biggest and quickest profits.

 

[dismal]

It's not that bad--those are changes from baseline. The problems with that graph are students have been going up and special ed is a bigger portion of the budget.

Then it's just flat out sloppy work. A 190% change from a baseline of zero is ...
Seriously, I know what they're trying to say, but they don't.... quite .... say it.

The baseline was not zero. For spending it was $57,602. As it clearly says on the chart.

I went to public school and I could figure that one out.

 

[Elixir]

Then it's just flat out sloppy work. A 190% change from a baseline of zero is ...
Seriously, I know what they're trying to say, but they don't.... quite .... say it.

The baseline was not zero. For spending it was $57,602. As it clearly says on the chart legend on the right.

FIFY

I went to public school and I could figure that one out.

...and they say public schools are no good!
I bet you can spell better than Betsy, too!

 

[dismal]

That is not how it is calculating it. It is taking the calculated average cost to put a student through the K-12 system for those students that graduated in the given year on the chart. In other words, how much did it cost on average to put just those students who graduated in that year through K-12?

It's not quite clear though. You can have two things. The cost it takes to educate someone to graduate in the last 12 years, or the cost to graduate one person in a year. I am not sure which one it's using.

My version says it's the total amount spent on a k-12 education of a student graduating in the given year.

Then it gives two years: 1970, and 2011. And total amounts. Seems pretty clear.

Also, with regard to some earlier confusion: "a" student seems to strongly indicate it's a per student average.

As would the amounts, really. If anyone thought $166,733 was the amount we spent educating all the students in the country their calibration is a bit off.

I'd bet a testicle it's more than double that.