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Gov. Shapiro brags about $1.1B increase in public ed. funding, bringing total to $11B

August 10, 2024 | | Print Article

Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro is evidently a huge fan of America’s failing, ailing, bloated public school system.

So much so in fact that Shapiro, who was recently snubbed as presidential candidate Kamala Harris’ vice-presidential pick, visited a Pennsylvania elementary school Friday to celebrate an additional $1.1 billion in public education funding that he’s obtained.

“Shapiro and Pennsylvania Education Secretary Dr. Khalid N. Mumin met with students, teachers and legislators at the elementary school to celebrate the record funding for public K-12 education allocated through the 2024-25 budget,” according to Fox News.

“The $1.1 billion in total increases for K-12 public education funding represents the largest year-over-year boost in Pennsylvania’s history,” Fox News notes.

Shapiro took full credit for the exorbitant increase in funding.

“In the bipartisan budget I signed into law last month, Pennsylvania will invest $11 billion in K-12 public education for our students and teachers — that’s $1.1 billion more than last year, a record amount,” he bragged.

“We came together to make the largest investment in K-12 public education in the Commonwealth’s history — because there is nothing more important than investing in our kids and their future — all while building on the progress we’ve made on student teacher stipends, mental health resources, and environmental school repairs,” he added.

“And we’re not only delivering more funding, but also fixing how we drive out that money to our schools under a new formula that directs funding to the districts who need it most – the districts that have been chronically underfunded,” he concluded.

The problem, of course, is that all this taxpayer money will likely do NOTHING to actually help students.

As it stands, data from the Pennsylvania Department of Education shows that total per-student, inflation-adjusted public-school funding has skyrocketed by 48 percent since 2000 and 73 percent since 1990, according to Corey A. DeAngelis of the American Federation for Children.

“The latest data from the U.S. Census Bureau indicate Pennsylvania’s public schools received about $20,435 in funding per student in 2018, which was about 38 percent higher than the national average at the time, and about 76 percent higher than the Keystone State’s current average private-school tuition,” DeAngelis wrote in 2021 for National Review.

“Recent data from the U.S. Census Bureau also reveal that about 29 percent of Pennsylvania’s entire state budget goes toward education,” he added.

Long story short, Pa.’s education system was already overfunded long before Shapiro entered the picture. But how has all this funding fared for students? Not so well.

Released in May of 2023, the Nation’s Report Card, as it’s known, showed drops in math proficiency and reading proficiency, not to mention drops in U.S. history and civics test scores, surprise, surprise, as reported by Patch.com.

To be fair, some of these drops were precipitated by the Democrats’ draconian reaction — shutting down schools — during the COVID pandemic. But critics suspect the rest of these drops were precipitated by PA teachers “teaching” garbage to children instead of facts.

Shapiro had reportedly originally been interested in pursuing legitimate solutions like school vouchers.

“On the campaign trail [in 2022], Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, a Democrat, proposed a new school voucher program aimed at students from low-income families,” according to Reason magazine.

“It was a surprising position for a Democratic candidate to take, though not a totally unprecedented one. For years, a group of Philadelphia Democrats have been vocal advocates for school choice in Pennsylvania—having seen up close the failures of the state’s largest school district,” the libertarian magazine notes.

But then he predictably reneged on that promise after entering office by announcing his decision to veto a voucher program out of the state budget.

In a statement, a group of Senate Republicans said at the time that it was “a shame the governor does not have enough respect and standing within his own party to follow through with his promise.”

Indeed, especially when the facts show charter schools generally outperform public schools.

Vivek Saxena
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