Columnist Sandy Thompson: Education must be a funding priority

Sandy Thompson

Friday, May 3, 2002 | 3:35 a.m.

WHY DO WE increase funding to widen or build roads in the Las Vegas Valley? To handle the increasing traffic of a continually growing community.

So why don't we increase education funding in the Las Vegas Valley to handle the increasing number of students in a continually growing community?

If we treated roads as we do education, Rainbow Boulevard would still be a two-lane street expected to handle 100,000 cars when it was designed for only 50,000.

The Clark County School District is expected to handle the traffic of an interstate highway with funding that supports a two-lane street. It continually is asked to handle increasing numbers of students, cut the dropout rate, raise test scores and, ultimately, turn out "better educated" students (and don't forget the part about preparing more students for college) without adequate funding.

Last week the School Board grappled with ways to cut $12.6 million from the district budget. Middle school athletics likely will be eliminated and third-grade class size may be increased, among other cost-cutting measures proposed. That's on top of the $74 million the district says it has cut over the last two years.

Throwing more money at a problem is not always the right solution. But the school district can't continue to slice and dice programs if it is expected to truly serve children's needs. We must pay for good teachers, adequate numbers of books and other educational resources, safe learning environments and extracurricular activities. (These are as important as biology classes because the more activities a youth is involved in, the less likely he is to get into trouble.)

If the school district's enrollment figures were stagnant, and the students' needs not so acute, it could survive on the fiscal crumbs from the Legislature. But that's not reality.

Unlike a few vocal shoot-from-the-lip know-it-alls who don't know squat, I don't have any answers to this budget dilemma.

I do have questions:

Attention parents and other voters who are interested in quality education. You must be more vigilant than ever this election season. You need to pin down legislators on how they will help (or hurt) education during the next legislative session when school officials will be seeking a $1,000-per-pupil increase in funding. It will be an uphill battle considering the economy and other demands on the state budget.

But consider this: From 1996 to 2001, there was a 37.1 percent growth in the number of schools. The number of students increased 36.8 percent from fiscal year 1996-97 to 2001-02. How many other school districts across the nation have experienced such phenomenal growth? Although bond issues provide money to build schools to house these increasing numbers of students, they don't pay for teachers, books, resources and upkeep. We as a growing community must make a decision: Either we pay to provide students with what they need or we halt the growth. Let me put it another way: Do we want to build an interstate to handle the increased traffic demands or do we want to crawl down a two-lane road at 5 miles an hour?