This week state Superintendent of Public Instruction Chris Reykdal announced that Washington’s once-vaunted school funding law, HB 2261, passed with great fanfare ten years ago, has failed.  The WEA union pushed hard for the law, saying the law would ensure every child learns. 

Superintendent Reykdal says he wants to change the school law and replace it with something else. Naturally, he wants more money to ensure that every child learns.

The legislature passed HB 2261 in 2009, and then used it to increase taxes and double spending in the schools, from $13.5 billion in 2011-13 to $27.3 billion in 2019-21.

Here is what Superintendent Reykdal said this week:      

“Even at the time it was created, our current funding model was not enough to meet the various needs of our students and educators. We cannot expect all of our students to succeed in an educational system that was not designed for them.

All means all. We want all students prepared for post-secondary aspirations, careers, and civic engagement; but we cannot get there without transforming the system and thinking hard about the kind of schools we want our young people to grow up in. To succeed, students need great teachers and curriculum, yes — but they also need access to social, emotional, and mental health supports, among many other things.”

Ten years ago lawmakers said HB 2261 would ensure that every child learns. Governor Gregoire said:

“...the financial system of education will be linked closely with education program outcomes”....and HB 2261 would help “...those who are struggling in our public school system so that every single child gets a world-class education...”

Rep. Pat Sullivan (D-Covington), Sen. Fred Jarrett (D-Mercer Island), and Rep. Ross Hunter (D-Medina) made similar comments. Mary Jean Ryan, head of the State Board of Education, said, “These [spending] bills offer a new investment strategy for a vastly better K-12 system.”  She asserted increased spending would “...yield significant improvement in education results.”

Ten years later, after doubling spending on the schools, Superintendent Reykdal reports that students are not performing any better on state tests in math, reading and science.

He now says schools have failed to meet improvement goals on 2018-19 state tests in math and reading, and that African-American children are falling even further behind white children in learning.

He says racism is to blame, pointing to the “curve ball of systemic racism” as one cause of failure in the schools.

Superintendent Reykdal’s new plan has nothing in it to address the “systemic racism” he has identified, even though he is the chief administrator of the system he says is plagued with racism.

In fact, he supports a policy of discrimination against charter schools, which offer learning opportunities to mostly minority, low-income children.  Sixty percent of charter school students are African-American, Hispanic and other minorities, yet they are denied access to local levy funding and to funding to pay for modern buildings and other facilities.

Low-income, minority children are learning more, and being accepted at colleges and graduating at higher rates, because of the success of charter schools across the country.

Yet Superintendent Reykdal’s plan has nothing in it to expand access to charter schools for families, although his counterparts in New York City oversee 260 charter schools serving 126,400 students in a system of about one million students, about the same number of students as Washington state. New York City is governed by Democrats; and voted 86% for Hillary Clinton in 2016, hardly a bastion of radical right-wing thinking. Despite their left-leaning politics, New York officials provide low-income families with access to charter schools.

Instead of pushing for even more money, school officials should tackle the endemic racism that Superintendent Reykdal identifies head on. The best way to do that is to put parents in charge, through optional charter schools and more learning choices that provide all children access to a great education.