Spending blunders plague educational policy.

• Author: Olson, Christine L.

Pres. Clinton's Fiscal Year 1998 budget would pour scarce tax dollars into the same kinds of educational programs that have failed in the past, siphoning off money for administration that should be going to the classroom instead.

Pres. Clinton's $50,000,000,000 Fiscal Year 1998 budget for education--20% more than provided in FY 1997--would pour money into new, unproven education programs and bring the Federal government into the local classroom to an unprecedented degree. In so doing, it would create additional levels of bureaucracy, further restricting the funds that ultimately reach the classroom, while doing little to improve classroom education for those most in need--the nation's impoverished rural and inner-city children.

Americans recognize almost unanimously that the education system is in crisis. The Federal government has spent hundreds of billions of dollars on education since 1965, yet 40% of eight-year-olds are unable to read. Dropout rates for low-income students have risen steadily every year since 1990. The 1998 budget does little to tackle the root causes of this crisis in education.

Before spending more money to build new education bureaucracies, the government needs to examine why Department of Education programs already in place and claiming over $30,000,000,000 in funding each year have failed to help students meet and exceed basic, let alone more challenging, academic standards. Instead of trying to "improve" education by spending billions of additional tax dollars on new programs, Congress and the Administration should enact legislation to give parents more control through school choice options and education savings accounts; send more money to the classroom, not to bloated bureaucracies; and target funds to the neediest children and families.

To achieve his goals, the President seeks to expand the Federal education bureaucracy in seven specific areas: supervising a "citizen army" of reading tutors; computerizing America's classrooms; overseeing charter schools and alternative school choices; controlling the use of Federal funding for school construction; nationalizing standardized testing and teacher certification; using schools as after-school learning centers; and monitoring higher education scholarships.

The over-all effect will be to add layers of bureaucracy and unnecessary, but burdensome, regulations on state and local governments. It will do little to ensure that Federal education dollars are spent primarily on effective programs in schools and classrooms, and even less to empower parents to control their children's education.

Rather than evaluate why the more than 760 Federal programs currently administered by more than 39 agencies have had so little success, the Administration seeks to create additional programs. Several of the initiatives duplicate programs that have been in place for years with little positive effect. Perhaps most significant, these proposals would allow the Federal government to assume an unprecedented level of involvement in state and local education issues, making it even more difficult to limit government's role in the future.

Literacy. The President's latest program for children is too little, too late. America Reads duplicates the objectives of 14 other Federal programs and will create a new Federal bureaucracy. Of the $2,750,000,000 in mandatory spending over the next five years, $1,750,000,000 will be used to fund 30,000 after-school reading specialists and materials. Over the same period, an additional $1,000,000,000 from the Corporation for National Service will fund the recruitment and training of reading volunteers at an estimated cost of $26,000 each.

The President has asked colleges to allocate half of their new work-study slots to the America Reads program. The portion that colleges are required to contribute to such scholarships would be waived if a work-study student became an America Reads tutor. This provision would cost $16,000,000 and result in 15,000 fewer students receiving work-study grants. The Administration also has requested $300,000,000 over the next five years for grants to encourage programs that facilitate family reading.

Several hours of after-school reading, although certainly helpful for students, would do little to correct the problem of illiteracy and low reading scores at its source--the classroom. The inability of youngsters to read offers the most compelling evidence that America's educational system is in crisis. The most recent National Assessment of Educational Progress test found that 40% of fourth-graders read at the "below basic level." Since 1965, the Federal government has...