Education
2025 State of Education Spending in Pennsylvania
Overview The national trends impacting education in Pennsylvania in 2025 include an impending fiscal cliff, under-enrolled schools, and population decline, all of which lead to school closures…
Read More: 2025 State of Education Spending in PennsylvaniaPennsylvania’s future is in the hands of the next generation. Parents and students—not activist agendas—should drive the Commonwealth’s education policy. While policymakers have been entrusted with ensuring the next generation receives a quality education, parents should be empowered to choose the quality education that meets their unique child’s needs. Charter schools and tax credit scholarships are integral pieces of school choice, but more reforms are needed to make school choice a reality for all Pennsylvania students.
Education
The Patriot Can Do Better Than This…
Our friends at The Patriot-News here in Harrisburg just posted an online poll that asks the following question: The state Senate has passed a school voucher bill that…
Media
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Philadelphia School District Faces the Budgetary Music
It doesn’t take an advanced degree to figure out that something’s rotten in the school district of Philadelphia—or that school choice is the antidote. More than half of…
Media
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Big Government and the Higher Education Bubble
This past weekend I participated with some middleschoolers in a 30 hour famine to raise money for starving families. As we discussed poverty and debt the leader motioned to me…
Media
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Chart of the Day: Pennsylvania School Revenue per Student
Critics of state spending cuts claim there is a lack of funding for public schools. But from the 1995-96 school year through 2009-10 (the latest year with data available…
Media
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Union Guts More Teaching Jobs
Yes, the chickens are truly coming home to roost. But before status quo apologists cry ‘fowl,’ economic realities due to union strong-arm tactics and unsustainable benefits programs…
Media
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Who are Teacher Unions Protecting?
The Patriot-News published my letter that questions whether teacher unions protect teachers. Union lobbying to create an unsustainable pension program is directly connected to the Central Dauphin School Board’s…
Media
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School Choice: What the Research Says
As the benefits of current school choice programs become clearer, it is time to take our eyes off the past and look towards the future. Jay Green argues that…
Media
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Good Teachers Matter
According to the findings of a National Bureau of Economic Research report, teaching quality is closely reflected by test scores—when looking at a teacher’s impact on students’s test score gains…
Media
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I’m Bringing Some Gumbo to the State Capitol
Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal refused to let government unions push him around. His reward? A sweet victory not just for himself, but for the taxpayers, parents, and students of…
Media
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Education Spending: The Rest of the Story
Since Gov. Corbett's budget proposal, those who profit from Pennsylvania's $26 billion a year public school system have been gnashing teeth over what they claim is an "underfunding" of the…
Commentary
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Pennsylvania Higher Education Spending
Pennsylvania taxpayers subsidize higher education through appropriations to 14 state-owned universities (Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education, or PASSHE), four state-related universities (Penn State, Pittsburgh, Temple, and Lincoln), community colleges,…
Fact Sheet
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School Choice in Milwaukee Increases Graduation Rates
The latest analysis of the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program finds that students receiving scholarships to attend the school of their choice are more likely to graduate from high…
Media
Read More: School Choice in Milwaukee Increases Graduation RatesCriminal Justice Reform
Does School Choice Reduce Crime?
Yesterday, Charles noted a key Wall Street Journal piece on a Council of Foreign Relations report. That report concluded that educational failure is dangerous for our national security and…
Media
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No School Tax Referendums in Pennsylvania this Year
Remember the gnashing of teeth over “cuts” in state education subsidies (driven by the end of federal stimulus money)? The education establishment and partisan critics of Gov. Corbett insisted this…
Media
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Violent, Failing Schools Will Lead to Unsafe, Ailing America
That’s the upshot of a story in this morning’s Wall Street Journal. It begins: Flaws in U.S. schools are increasingly causing a national-security risk, producing adults without the…
Media
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It’s Good to be the King (of Charter Schools)
We blogged last month about HB 1973, a bill that would gut funding for cyber schools. Now it turns out there’s a bill—recently introduced to the House Education Committee—that…
Media
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Principled, Punchy Pols Are Popular Pols
I’ve written previously in this space about Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, who has garnered enormous popularity while governing courageously. Today, with a new Quinnipiac poll about Gov.
Media
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Does School Choice Harm Public Schools?
This is a common question among school choice skeptics about whether school choice drains funding from public schools. According to new research by The Friedman Foundation for Educational…
Media
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Does Underfunding Pensions “Help the Kids”?
A letter I recently submitted to the Allentown Morning Call on state education subsidies and pension funding: The Morning Call’s article on state subsidies to school districts has…
Media
Read More: Does Underfunding Pensions “Help the Kids”?Education
Pennsylvania K-12 Education Spending
Pennsylvania's K-12 education revenue increased from $13 billion in 1995-96 to $26 billion in 2009-10. Adjusted for inflation, that represents a 44% increase in revenue per student. …
Fact Sheet
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Exposing Two Class Size Myths
The Patriot-News reports that while schools in the mid-state have laid off some employees, most districts are still below the national average student-teacher ratio of 15.1. The student-teacher ratio…
Media
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