Obama Spends $7B on Public Education for No Gain to Student Performance, DeVos Criticized for Saying She Might Defund Areas of Public Education

Anonymous

Yes, you read that right. The Department of Education has concluded a study of the School Improvements Grant program, which under the Obama adminstration has delivered $7B over the tenure of his presidency to help underperforming schools and found that students showed no improvements in measured standards after the money was spent. In short, $7B of expense was shown to have been thrown down the toilet.

Obama Spends $7B on Public Education for No Gain to Student Performance, DeVos Criticized for Saying She Might Defund Areas of Public Education

To be fair, this isn't a partisan discussion. The Bush Administration kicked off this effort and the Department of Education as well as many policy makers recognized that research showed pouring money into already underperforming schools was a risky proposition and there was a likelihood that little or no benefit would be recognized, but they thought it was worth the gamble to try and help disadvantaged students. Obama took the program and ran with it, doubling the funding though little or no effort was made to evaluate results until near the end of Obama's tenure. In itself, a questionable decision, but at least we now have the findings and results of these actions.

Obama Spends $7B on Public Education for No Gain to Student Performance, DeVos Criticized for Saying She Might Defund Areas of Public Education

Moving forward to the DeVos confirmation. DeVos was widely criticized by liberals for saying she may defund areas of public education. A nice example of partisanship and a willingness to ignore actual results so long as money keeps pouring into that toilet. Why? It's a political message aimed to discredit a political oppononent without once considering the effectiveness of all that money being spent. Without considering the benefit to the people it is intended to help. Should we expect to keep sending money into that toilet just because it feels nice to say we're trying? No, the program should be defunded immediately.

It's simple really, if you can't get results from the money you are spending you should be willing to look with a critical eye as to why you are spending that money, cut where needed, change plans and reinvest with money and resources to achieve your goals. Yeah, it was worth the risk to try and help, both parties saw it that way, but now you know that money needn't be spent any longer because it wasn't accomplishing what was intended. It's not a difficult concept to understand. We all run our personal lives that way, we don't throw money at things that don't benefit us. We run our businesses that way, because if we didn't they wouldn't make money. It is perfectly reasonable to expect the same of our public education system.

Obama Spends $7B on Public Education for No Gain to Student Performance, DeVos Criticized for Saying She Might Defund Areas of Public Education
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