The Bitter Battle in New Jersey Education
This past week New Jersey students took to the street in protest of Governor Chris Christie’s proposed cuts to education. The idea of the protest began when a former graduate of a New Jersey high school and current freshman in college, Michelle Ryan Lauto, decided to create a Facebook page expressing concern over the cuts. The page, which called for the school walk out on Tuesday, April 27th, reached over 18,000 Facebook followers.
The Facebook page is the latest twist in what is a bitter battle between the new governor, teacher unions, and voters. Christie, who has vowed to cut spending and return fiscal responsibility to New Jersey citizens, urged schools to take more initiative in cutting wasteful spending and ordered pay freezes for teachers. His initial budget proposal cut public education by $820 million and college and university aid by $175 million. He has also been known to accuse schools of sending home election materials for parents through students, a move he likened to using kids as drug mules. Perhaps the first shot occurred after Christie told voters to reject school budgets if they did not include salary freezes for all teachers. It seems that Christie has won his first battle. On Tuesday, April 20th, 58 percent of school budgets were rejected by voters.
Yet these moves by Governor Christie have not been without repercussion. One reaction was the creation of the Facebook page urging students to take an active role in protesting the severe cuts. Despite many school principals urging their students not to ditch class, some schools saw up to half of their students join the protests.
Another reaction has been from the teacher unions. The New Jersey Education Association (NJEA) has been exchanging political quips back and forth with Governor Christie. One newspaper reported that NJEA President Barbara Keshishian refused to fire a local union president who wrote about praying for Christie’s death. On Monday, the NJEA released a statement claiming that Governor Christie and Education Commission Bret Schundler were misleading the public with wrong information.
New Jersey remains in a tough situation with a $10.7 billion budget deficit. Christie’s direct arguments to lower spending really resonant with New Jersey voters, yet naming the ways in which it will be cut has caused great cause for concern across the state. There are certainly grave consequences of cutting almost $1 billion in state education funds that should surely be considered.
Currently, New Jersey has one of the highest graduation rates in the country, yet there are still thousands who dropout every year. One organization, the Alliance for Excellent Education, predicted that if the number of high school dropouts from 2008-2009 alone (19,573 dropouts) had been prevented from dropping out, it would result in over $5 billion dollars in lifetime earnings. That lost earned money turns into lost potential tax revenue. Could cutting funds from primary and secondary education later increase the dropout rate and result in a more substantial loss in tax revenue down the road?
Perhaps one of the hardest hit areas of New Jersey education has been that of community colleges. With a downturned economy, more New Jersey citizens are returning to school via community colleges. With surging enrollments and decreasing state aid, many community colleges all across the United States are having to turn students away. Community colleges leaders recently told the New Jersey Assembly that community colleges “would be unable to meet the rising demand for affordable in-state college” with the current proposed cuts. This is a pressing concern considering that jobs which require at least an Associate’s Degree are projected to grow twice as fast as those that do not. Could cutting funds from higher education, especially community colleges, limit New Jersey economic growth in coming years?
This presents a terrible predicament for the state. Most can understand that the state budget is in crisis and most can comprehend that sacrifices must be made, yet it is hard to deny that the proposed budget cuts will severely affect the 1.3 million elementary and secondary students, the 244,038 college students, and 8,707,739 residents of New Jersey both now and in the future.
Photo Credit: New York Times
