By Steve Zonies
In response to Jim Parker's In My View in the March 19, 2015, issue of The Valley Reporter.
Entering the data from his Table 1 into Excel and sorting it to compare ascending household incomes to the cost of education per student displayed the following interesting graph.
Note that as the slope of household income increases, the cost of education per student decreases except for the blip in Vermont. This proves two things: (1) Vermont's cost of education is out of line. In fact, we are two standard deviations from the norm; and that's in a small sample of only 10 states. Our rating would probably be much worse in a larger data field; (2) Quality educations can be provided for less. Nine out of the 10 best do it. Obviously, those in control of funding our schools can't (or won't) fix this. Perhaps those who can might show those who can't how to do it. Isn't that what education is all about – teaching and learning?
Consider further evaluation of these numbers: the ratio of cost per student to average family income. Maryland, the best of the best, spends approximately 18 percent on education. Vermont, by far the worst of the 10 best, spends 31.5 percent. That extrapolates to approximately $7,700 additional per household! Ours is the only state outside the bad side of the bell-shaped curve – not a distinction of which to be proud.
I see many students in my line of work so it's a valuable opportunity to follow their life's pursuits. It's interesting to note that after providing them with quality educations, many leave Vermont to pursue their careers; because, and here comes the irony, they can't afford to live here partly due to the high cost of education. After all this effort and expense, we are losing well-educated and qualified young adults.
If I may speak for all of us, we realize the value of education for our youth and our country's investment in the global brain bank. These numbers prove those goals can be met for less.
You and I couldn't run our businesses as inefficiently as our elected (and/or appointed) officials in Montpelier run our state government. This administration has flushed down the toilet tens of millions of dollars on schools and health care alone. Unlike the thugs in Montpelier, we can't just demand more money from our neighbors to compensate for our own ineptitude. Neither can nor should they. We elected our representatives in good faith and have pleaded with them for many years to fix this. Nothing has been done except allowing it to become even worse. To say the absolute and very least, they have disappointed their constituents.
McKinsey & Company reports: "In virtually all advanced countries, government debt has outstripped the ability of its citizens to repay it." 1; and that starts right here in Vermont.
"No taxation with[out] representation." Remember the Boston Tea Party.
[1] HardMoneyJim, March 15, 2015, Pg. 1.
Zonies lives in Fayston.
