You’ll never guess what teachers’ unions think we need to improve school performance. Yep: More taxes. That’s never not the answer from that crowd. The answer couldn’t possibly be to spend existing resources more wisely, trim bloated school bureaucracies, or embrace teaching methodologies that actually work.
Bogus claims about school funding
During a March 5 event introducing Senate Bill 26-135, to ask voters to direct TABOR refunds partly to schools, State Sen. Jeff Bridges claimed that Colorado “schools [are] funded near the bottom of the country.” He continued, “Right now Colorado ranks near the bottom nationally in what we invest in K12 public education.”
Rae Solomon wrote March 13 for Colorado Public Radio, “Democratic backers of the bill say Colorado schools have been chronically underfunded by about $1 billion dollars a year for more than a decade, resulting in a tattered education system where teachers are underpaid and burnt out, classrooms are overcrowded, and students can’t get services they need. U.S. Census data consistently puts Colorado’s per-student funding in the bottom 20 states.”
Huh. Really? Because when I download the data from the 2023 Census files for “Public Elementary-Secondary Education Finance,” the most recent complete records now available, Colorado ranks 27th among states in per-pupil spending (or 28th if you count D.C.), right near the middle of the pack, at $14,858. (I dropped this data onto my web site. Note: The state reports more, $15,805, based on 2023-24 data.)
Here’s what Bridges and CPR don’t tell you. State spending levels have little to do with outcomes. I also looked up 2024 data from the National Assessment of Educational Progress, and Colorado ranks 12th in 8th Grade math and 3rd in 8th Grade reading. True, most states (not all) that outperform us also spend more. But lots of states that perform worse also spend more.
Let’s take the biggest five spenders plus D.C. Colorado outperforms D.C. ($31,629 per student), New York ($30,012), and Vermont ($26,345). New Jersey ($26,280) outperforms Colorado. Colorado outperforms Connecticut ($25,081). Massachusetts ($22,947) outperforms Colorado.
Maybe you’re saying to yourself, “Look, idiot, you also have to take into account things like cost of living and demographics of students.” Yes, I agree. Here I’m responding only to the claims that Colorado ranks near the bottom of spending (not true) and that higher spending automatically guarantees better outcomes (also not true).
I hasten to point out that all of the states basically suck at educating kids overall (although some students do fine), so we should not take relatively high ranking as a sign of excellence. Even Massachusetts, which scored highest both in reading and math, saw only 37% of 8th graders perform at or above proficiency in math and 40% in reading. For Colorado the figures are 32% and 35%. Generally, public schools are spending astonishing sums of money for poor to mediocre results.
What would actually improve schools
True, increased spending on schools in certain contexts can improve outcomes. See a 2024 meta-analysis (or working paper) and my previous comments on the matter. But spending alone won’t fix underlying structural problems, and more fundamental reforms would achieve better results.
Essentially what we need are great teachers teaching great content. If we don’t have that, all the money in the world will not result in excellent education.
The goal of teachers’ unions generally is to pay teachers more without holding them accountable for their performance. We should not find this surprising; these unions lobby on behalf of teachers, not students.
Here’s an interesting tidbit from a recent Chalkbeat article: “Less than 4% [3.3%] of all Colorado teachers were rated [partially effective or ineffective] last school year, state data shows.” If you believe that only 3.3% of Colorado teachers are partially effective or ineffective, I have a high-speed rail line to sell you in California.
Whether you look at NAEP or CMAS test results, you will find that most students are not reaching proficiency in reading or math. Those results are not compatible with the obviously ridiculous finding that 96.7% of Colorado teachers are effective or highly effective.
Yet when we look at Senate Bill 135, there is not a single word about improving teacher accountability or replacing poor-performing teachers with better ones. Instead (looking at the March 13 version), we find only language about “increasing teacher pay, improving teacher retention, lowering class sizes, and increasing access to career and technical courses.”
Another issue is that kids from wealthier families tend to do fine regardless of their school, largely because they learn more at home, while disadvantaged kids tend to struggle. So what we really need are intensive interventions for struggling kids in early grades. There are no such requirements in 135.
Insofar as we’re worried about teacher compensation, part of the problem is that local governments drive up housing costs by restricting the building and use of housing. The legislature has made some progress in reducing such harmful regulations and should do more. That would help not only teachers but everyone else worried about high costs of living.
Coloradans are right to be skeptical of the value of throwing more money at schools, especially when the increased spending lacks accountability and effective targeting.
Ari Armstrong writes regularly for Complete Colorado and is the author of books about Ayn Rand, Harry Potter, and classical liberalism. He can be reached at ari at ariarmstrong dot com.
