I'm trying to determine how much...in dollars and percent...of the Oklahoma budget is spent on education. Anyone know? Have a site that shows it...and is easily understood? Someone told me that at least half of the budget goes to education. I'm trying to verify if that is true.
Oklahoma's state budget and Education
- Thread starter Cordellhall83
- Start date
If you believe Wikipedia, that's accurate. 7 billion total budget, 3.6 billion goes to education.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2015_Oklahoma_state_budget
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2015_Oklahoma_state_budget
That's my understanding. So the question for the "we need more money crowd" is just how much do you need...you are getting half? The real question is what is the budgeted funds being used for?
I think it is more telling that (according to wikipedia) the state of Oklahoma had the 43rd highest budget at about 7 billion, putting us between Maine and South Dakota. Which combined are a bit over half of Oklahoma's population.
So, it might be half of the budget, but it is still underfunded. I believe we rank 48th in per pupil spending, and the student population is increasing every year. The problem isn't the allocation of the state budget, it is that administration of Oklahoma doesn't generate the appropriate amount of revenue to fund education (or anything) properly.
So, it might be half of the budget, but it is still underfunded. I believe we rank 48th in per pupil spending, and the student population is increasing every year. The problem isn't the allocation of the state budget, it is that administration of Oklahoma doesn't generate the appropriate amount of revenue to fund education (or anything) properly.
State budgets feel like personal income. The more poor you are, the higher percent of your income goes to just survive. Poor folks can't expect to live like rich folks. #43 size budget can't expect to educate like #25 etc... I was surprised that half of the budget went to education. You listen to the teachers union (who by the way has done a wonderful marketing job) and you would think that Oklahomans only give a fraction to education. Now, what I do think is that those billions aren't being used properly. We aren't getting the bang for our buck.
But Oklahoma is 30th in population, and is paying for education like we're 43rd or lower. We are 48th in per pupil spending, and that will probably fall next year.
And, we rank around there in academic performance. Plus, you have teacher salaries that are lower compared to the states that border Oklahoma, causing a huge increase in emergency certification and unqualified teachers, teaching class sizes up to 32 or maybe higher. How much more do you expect?
Last edited:
I guess you get what you can afford. Population vs spending doesn't matter if the income is low. On a related topic, I went to public grade school/Jr-Sr High in the 60's-70's and we routinely had 28-32 kids in a class. Now it seems class size is an excuse for poor performance...didn't seem to hurt back then...why now?
I would be interested to see dollars per pupil adjusted for cost of living. I know in my company people in Chicago make significantly more than me, so they pay higher taxes and each pupil gets more money than they would in Oklahoma.
I never was in a grade school class of more than 24. Middle School and High School is a little different, but studies have shown the smaller the class sizes for adolescents, the better performance.
We're not a rich state, but through tax breaks we're not generating the revenue we should, or have in the past. So, we can manage to afford more.
How did they gauge academic performance in the 60's and 70's? I would assume students dropped out a higher rate then, than now. But, I could be wrong. Did you go to a district in a relatively wealthy district? Districts with high property values consistently grade out pretty well. It's the inner city/poor, rural districts with poor facilities, undertrained/qualified/experienced teachers that are really hurting with the current budget and have for decades in Oklahoma/the U.S.
Compared to the states around us that have similar cost of living; Arkansas, Kansas and Missouri. We're anywhere from $1,500 to $2,100 below them per pupil.
The real comparison is number of school districts in Oklahoma compared to other states. We need to consolidate and cut that number in half.
I think our population density comes in to play to an extent. We have several western counties that could be better served by having two age groups per class/teacher and a single administrator rather than a principal and a superintendent.
You could potential have regional superintendents that travel and even have regional extracurricular activities.
You could potential have regional superintendents that travel and even have regional extracurricular activities.
Our local representative put forth a bill this year to consolidate admin within some smaller districts It didn't even make it out of committee. I'm not sure why the small districts carry so much stroke to keep something as logical and sensible as this from happening but apparently they do.
Meanwhile, we are putting in a $750,000 astroturf football field....but that's OK because $250,000 worth of services were donated. We're only pissing away $500k.
I actually think western Oklahoma has done okay with consolidation, and some districts are so far apart, that consolidation would be tough. It's eastern Oklahoma that really has a problem. I remember a couple of years ago I heard Le Flore County had 17 school districts. Which is more than Oklahoma County has (if you don't include charter schools)
There was an article, maybe from the Tulsa World, that showed Supt. salaries broken out on a per student basis. The most embarrassing figures seemed to come from the smaller districts in SE OK.
