{"id":8151,"date":"2013-05-20T13:00:38","date_gmt":"2013-05-20T17:00:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/?p=8151"},"modified":"2014-02-24T11:01:21","modified_gmt":"2014-02-24T16:01:21","slug":"are-we-budget-cutting-our-north-country-schools-to-death","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/2013\/05\/20\/are-we-budget-cutting-our-north-country-schools-to-death\/","title":{"rendered":"Are we budget cutting our North Country schools to death?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Photo:<\/a>

Heading for a dead end? Photo: KB35<\/a> creative commons, some rights reserved<\/p><\/div>\n

On Tuesday, we New Yorkers will vote on the future of our education system — the future, that is, measured in a 12-month chunk.<\/p>\n

The reality, though, is that we’re in the middle of a cycle that’s much larger than 12 months. For decades, our North Country schools have been shedding kids, with lower and lower enrollment counts. Since the Great Recession, we’ve also been shedding dollars and staff and programs.\u00a0 Check out my conversation with Martha Foley for a lot of the context.<\/a><\/p>\n

The question, really, is where this is all leading.<\/p>\n

Schools have long been the lifeblood of our region’s communities, shaping much of the local spirit and identity, providing many of the best jobs. They also do the important work of nurturing and preparing our children. So what happens if this enterprise literally goes bankrupt?\u00a0 What happens if we can’t afford to keep the doors open or the lights on?\u00a0 Or, more concretely, what happens if we whittle away program after program until the schools are hollow?<\/p>\n

These aren’t pure hypotheticals.<\/p>\n

More and more mainline educators say the 2% property tax cap, the flatline regional economy, and flat or dropping state aid are pushing schools into a death spiral. Governor Andrew Cuomo has essentially argued that local districts have to live within their means and find creative ways to make this all work. But my sense is that a lot of districts in our region aren’t crying wolf.\u00a0 They’re out of ideas, out of money, and almost out of time.<\/p>\n

So what do you think?\u00a0 Short of giving schools a blank check, is there a way to make our rural and hyper-rural districts sustainable?<\/p>\n

And what are you seeing now in your district?\u00a0 If you’re a teacher, is the experience you’re providing still a good one?\u00a0 If you’re a parent, what do you think of the education your child is receiving?<\/p>\n

Comments welcome below and don’t forget to vote tomorrow.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On Tuesday, we New Yorkers will vote on the future of our education system — […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[14426],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8151"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8151"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8151\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8162,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8151\/revisions\/8162"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8151"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8151"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8151"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}