CommenTerry: Volume Forty-Eight | Eastern North Carolina Now

    Publisher's note: The author of this post is Dr. Terry Stoops, who is the Director of Education Studies for the John Locke Foundation.

History teacher ignores history of state K-12 spending

    Last week, the News & Observer published an op-ed by Angela Scioli, a history teacher at Leesville Road High School in Raleigh and founder of Red4EdNC. The piece took aim at the Republican-led legislature for "no longer investing in our students." One of her main points was that things were so much better when she was in school.

    She begins her op-ed by declaring, "I am the product of the time in North Carolina when we invested in our young people through public education." Elsewhere Ms. Scioli indicated that she graduated in 1989 from Millbrook High School in Wake County, suggesting that those halcyon days "when we invested in our young people" were the 1980s and early 1990s.

    That means that Ms. Scioli's secondary and postsecondary schooling occurred during the administration of two-term Republican governor Jim Martin. Unfortunately, Scioli does not credit Governor Martin in her op-ed, an oversight I am sure has nothing to do with her distaste for the current executive and legislative leadership.

    While education spending was on the rise during this period, Ms. Scioli apparently did not examine historical data that indicates how much North Carolina spent on K-12 education compared to other states. According to the National Center for Educational Statistics, North Carolina's total per pupil expenditure ranked 38th in the nation when she graduated from high school in 1989 (See Facts and Stats below). In 1990, the average North Carolina teacher earned around $3,700 less than the much-exalted national average.

    Furthermore N.C. Department of Public Instruction financial data indicates that Wake County received one of the lowest per-student appropriations from the then-Democratic state legislature in 1989. State education funding for Wake County ranked 123rd out of 140 school districts and barely reached the average total per-pupil expenditure for the state. In other words, the Wake County Schools were not rolling in the dough during her attendance.

    The fact that North Carolina's, as well as Wake County's, public schools currently have rankings and expenditures that are similar to those from the late 1980s and early 1990s is not the point. The point is that she "had the most inspiring, innovative and experienced teachers in public school" despite a relatively low per-pupil expenditure in the state, teachers who made thousands less than the national average, and a district that barely reached the state average expenditure.

    When Ms. Scioli claimed that the state is "no longer investing in our children the way we should be," she should have considered (or the editorial page editors should have asked her to consider) that those "investments" might have been less than she perceived them to be. As a history teacher, surely she knows that many of us fall into the trap of believing things were much better in the past, even if the available data and historical record tells us otherwise.


    Total per pupil expenditures, by state, 1988-89

State/Jurisdiction Name	Per Pupil Expenditures, 1988-89
Alaska	$7,462.00
New York	$7,296.00
District of Columbia	$7,199.00
New Jersey	$7,069.00
Connecticut	$6,860.00
Vermont	$5,774.00
Rhode Island	$5,757.00
Massachusetts	$5,705.00
Wyoming	$5,639.00
Maryland	$5,556.00
Pennsylvania	$5,477.00
Delaware	$5,396.00
Minnesota	$5,289.00
Michigan	$5,255.00
Florida	$5,153.00
New Hampshire	$5,018.00
Washington	$4,995.00
Wisconsin	$4,986.00
Arizona	$4,922.00
Oregon	$4,907.00
Maine	$4,903.00
Virginia	$4,822.00
Illinois	$4,753.00
Colorado	$4,687.00
California	$4,646.00
Indiana	$4,588.00
Ohio	$4,555.00
Nebraska	$4,484.00
Iowa	$4,380.00
Kansas	$4,369.00
Missouri	$4,359.00
Hawaii	$4,293.00
Georgia	$4,279.00
Nevada	$4,251.00
Montana	$4,212.00
Texas	$4,103.00
North Dakota	$4,088.00
North Carolina	$3,986.00
West Virginia	$3,931.00
South Carolina	$3,917.00
New Mexico	$3,745.00
South Dakota	$3,649.00
Tennessee	$3,649.00
Oklahoma	$3,519.00
Louisiana	$3,512.00
Alabama	$3,484.00
Arkansas	$3,311.00
Kentucky	$3,236.00
Mississippi	$2,977.00
Idaho	$2,960.00
Utah	$2,761.00

    Source: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data (CCD), "National Public Education Financial Survey (State Fiscal)," 1988-89 (FY 1989) v.1b


    NCES — National Center for Education Statistics


    "By the time I was in high school, North Carolina was investing in the future. I had the most inspiring, innovative and experienced teachers in public school. They challenged me and made me hungry to be like them — their command of their subject, love of language, excitement about learning and the creativity they brought into the four walls of our classroom were infectious!"

    — Angela Scioli, a history teacher at Leesville Road High School in Raleigh and founder of Red4EdNC, in a recent op-ed published by the News & Observer