FROM: State Rep. Jake Wheatley Jr., D-Allegheny, Chairman of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Education
DATE: April 13, 2007
CONTACT: Ben Turner, House Democratic Communications Office, 717-787-7895, bturner@pahouse.net
New day for education funding, openness in Pa.
Under the leadership of Chairman Dwight Evans, the House Appropriations Committee has begun a new era of public responsiveness. In an effort to ensure the public has access and a chance to participate in the budgetary process, all of the Appropriations subcommittees have held a series of hearings across the state.
On March 26, I chaired the Subcommittee on Education’s first hearing in this series, focusing on student achievement and the gaps in it. This hearing was held in Bristol Borough in Bucks County. I would like to thank the citizens of Bristol Borough for their warm and generous hospitality and for the sincerity of their testimony as we move towards finding real, long-term solutions to the crisis we are facing as it relates to student educational achievements, opportunities and funding.
What became obvious to me as chairman of the hearing was the definite need to provide more focused commitment to the issue of the disparities in student achievement and to create a clear plan of action with a rational outline of the necessary resources needed to reach our stated goal. We also need to define what that goal is as it relates to student achievement and to ensure all children with similar abilities are learning and achieving on similar levels academically regardless of socioeconomic or racial status, ethnicity, first language or any physical or mental disabilities.
In this regard, Pennsylvania has a long way to go to achieve this goal. According to the National Assessment of Education Progress, 2003 nationwide data shows a 30-point gap in the achievement between poor and non-poor 4th graders in reading; a 27-point gap between black and white students and a 25-point gap between Latino and white students. In Pennsylvania, these gaps are even wider. The 2003 Pennsylvania System of School Assessment scores show a gap of 38 points between white and both black and Latino students, with a 28-point gap between poor and non-poor students.
Clearly this requires more attention, plans and resources to address and reverse this crisis than we are currently providing.
Another clear message that I took away from the hearing is that we as a state can no longer hide our head in the sand as our communities struggle to provide adequate funding for a collapsing educational system. The funding of education is in critical need of being revamped. This has to be done in an informed and collaborative way. The end result should produce a rational system of funding based on the actual costs of providing every child in our Commonwealth with a high-quality education regardless of where he or she lives. This should include the costs of providing assistance to growing districts, some of which are in Bucks County, as well as funding all districts’ special education needs.
Fortunately, the General Assembly included funding in the 2006-07 budget for a statewide “costing-out” study to determine the basic cost per student to provide an education that will permit our young people to meet the state’s academic standards and assessments, taking into account both the adequacy and equity of state and local funding. The final report is expected to be released by the end of November.
I have been and am encouraged by many of the educational initiatives taken by the governor over his five years in office, but there are many more things we have to address, and we must do so quickly.
We have to move aggressively and quickly to reverse and accelerate the closing of the gaps in student achievement and opportunities. Further, we should move immediately after the costing-out study report is issued to put in place a more rational system of funding our educational system.
I want to thank Chairman Evans again for the opportunity to hear from some of our state’s citizens. I also would like to thank Rep. John Galloway and staff for the tremendous work and efforts in pulling together the hearing in the beautifully renovated Bristol Borough Hall building -- it is certainly a treasure. I also want to thank our great presenters such as Ron Cowell, former chairman of the House Education Committee and current leader of the Education Policy and Leadership Center; Baruch Kintish, Education Law Center; Debbie Wei, principal of the Folk Arts/Cultural Treasures Charter School; Jerry Deluca and Katherine Bassett, Higher Education Division, Teacher Quality, Educational Testing Service; and Dr. Ronald Stainbrook, coordinator of the State Board of Education's Pennsylvania Achievement Gap Effort, the PAGE 1 Initiative.
Most importantly, I want to thank the citizens who came out and made their voices heard. The active participation of citizens like you is crucial to making democracy and government work.
State Rep. Jake Wheatley, Jr.
19th Legislative District – Allegheny County
Chairman of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Education