The USA’s government is tasked with providing affordable and inclusive education to its citizens. However, the effectiveness of implementing educational policies is still in question. Over the last decade, the funding of government institutions to meet the educational expenditure demands has not equitably provided equal access to basic resources in enhancing the performance of students. As a result, I present my analysis on the need to implement an independent evaluation of an institution’s economic situation in providing individual-based school funding and recommend various plans of action to ensure the implementation of this policy.
Key Stakeholders
I will consider the support of the immediate government and community stakeholders, including the federal school funding program’s management team, to interpret the professional implications of my information and provide other clear directions that may arise. The representative to the house of congress will provide enlightenment about the necessary steps required in implementing this policy. For instance, he will help gather enough testimonials and witnesses when introducing my ideas as a bill before the house of congress.
Problem Statement and the Urgency of Addressing the Problem
The federal school funding program relies on an integrated system of providing financial support to schools. This funding method attracts a myriad of challenges and therefore proves ineffective in addressing the funding needs of all targeted institutions. For instance, this policy is implemented on merely generalized data leaving other vulnerable institutions without proper funding (Owens & Candipan, 2019). The policy fails to address the financial gap arising from the collection of local taxes from wealthy and poor households creating a variation in the value of collected funds (Abylkassymova et al., 2019). Therefore, the funding process is bureaucratic, non-inclusive of all schools, and others have been known to benefit from such funding programs. To help address these problems, I recommend adopting an independent evaluation of an institution’s economic situation in providing an individual-based resource allocation matching their resource needs instead of the current integrated federal funding process.
The National Center for education Statistical affirms the differences in the funding claiming major attempts to reduce the disparity has often attracted resistance and controversies (Favero & Rutherford, 2020). Other officials have often disregarded such controversies in reviewing the funding process. For instance, the controversy of 1990 that saw unbiased funding of USA institutions was disputed by such officials as Rob Greenwald and Richard Laine, terming them as mere accusations while claiming that the funding need for a single student had doubled over that period (Favero & Rutherford, 2020). The current federal school funding, therefore, presents a myriad of challenges, and adopting an independent evaluation and funding of an institution will be necessary for overcoming these problems. Implementing selective funding of institutions would ensure a consensus is reached in availing the funding meeting key needs of an institution.
With the current financing policy, the most vulnerable schools have been neglected, promoting the poor performance of students. The National Assessments of Educational Programs provides researched data showing the influence of inadequate funding of the institutions and how lack of funds negatively affects students’ achievements. The data shows that in the last three years, the performance levels of the students from New York, Virginia, New Jersey, and Alaska have significantly increased while those in other low-income states like South Carolina, Mississippi as well as West Virginia portray low academic success. Simultaneously, the scores for students in Virginia, New Jersey, and Alaska in mathematics and science have immensely improved. Students’ performance in South Carolina, Mississippi, and West Virginia has declined over the same period. This data shows the important role of school funding to increase the potential of a student’s success. The difference in the level of achievement of learning between the highly financed and the low-funded states of America justifies the need to consider an assessment of a given institution’s economic position independently funding its programs to meet the performance level comparable to those of wealthy states.
Making Sense out of My Data
To further support my arguments, I will consider a sample of my chosen class variable, class size, and show the relationship between resource allocation and student performance. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, the ranking of the performance of the secondary schools puts institutions with a small student population at a higher standard of performance as compared to those with a large number of students (Favero & Rutherford, 2020). The finding, therefore, supports the idea that small class size or small group learning increases the level of academic performance. To relate such arguments with the resource allocation theory, it would be evident that a better allocation of funds meeting the facility’s needs of an institution provides an appropriate educational infrastructure for students’ engagement in learning for their success. Therefore, it is evident that there is a positive correlation between resource allocation and the level of student achievements in their learning.
With these numerous shreds of evidence suggesting a significant role of school funding in increasing the performance of students, the federal government has remained reluctant in addressing the unequal funding that renders some schools perform below average as would be compared to other learning centers. Considering an independent evaluation of an institution’s economic situation in providing independent funding is, therefore, key to equitably increasing the performance of students. Implementing effective policies to address individualized school funding is, therefore, necessary. A number of these strategies are provided as follows.
Key Recommendations
Adopting policies that focus on resource addition in increasing the academic performance of students is crucial in implementing the policy on an independent evaluation of an institution’s economic situation for funding. For instance, adopting a centralized policy in managing the funding of schools is necessary for implementing independent funding of institutions (Kenny et al., 2020). With this policy, scrutinizing and implementing equitable funding is possible since the government is the only single authority overseeing its implementation. Introducing an inclusivity law that prohibits unnecessary funding of institutions that do not meet the minimum requirement for financial support is also crucial in protecting other interested individuals from benefiting from such funds.
The government should inclusively consider the urgent resource needs of other institutions in ensuring equitable funding of all schools. Monitoring the funding procedures adopted by the assigned personnel is key in keeping the allocation process free and fair. As such, it would be easy to identify the funding gaps in providing additional resources to meet the needs of the vulnerable institutions. With support from educational superintendents, the central education authorities must ensure that due process is followed when funding schools.
Establishing stringent policies that ensure each educational institution provides full information on their spending of school funds allocated to them will also ensure an appropriate audit of checks and balances on the funding’s spending for its effective utilization. The government should also create a financial management system where institutions report their annual spending on the grants they received from the government. This will ensure continuous checks on using these resources to discourage misappropriation of funds from benefiting self-interested individuals. Finally, increasing government spending on education towards enhancing greater access to funding for commonly underfunded minority institutions would also create greater access to funds reaching the low-level communities.
Implementing an independent evaluation of an institution’s economic situation in providing individual-based school funding is, therefore, an effective approach to financing schools. It grants a maximum resource allocation in enhancing students’ performance. This method of funding also ensures a free and fair resource allocation. For effective implementation of selective school funding, the government needs to consider other strategies including centralizing the funding system to enhance a greater control of the funding process. Implementing strict compliance rules that require the benefiting institutions to provide an annual report of the received funds and their spending is also beneficial in accounting for the usage of school funds. Finally, the central government should increase its expenditure on educational infrastructure to increase greater access of funds by the underfunded local schools within the USA. It would, therefore, be appropriate to implement the idea of selective funding of academic institutions in creating a better form of financial support to many educational institutions as compared to the current integrated federal school funding program.
References
Abylkassymova, A. E., Ryzhakov, M. V., & Shishov, S. E. (2019). A retrospective analysis of the Reforms of the content of general secondary education: How they contribute to the consolidation of public consciousness. Scientific Research and Development. Socio-Humanitarian research and Technology, 8(1), 331.
Favero, N., & Rutherford, A. (2020). Will the tide lift all boats? Examining the equity effects of performance funding policies in US higher education. Research in Higher Education, 61(1), 1-25.
Kenny, N., McCoy, S., & Mihut, G. (2020). Special education reforms in Ireland: Changing systems, changing schools. International Journal of Inclusive Education, 1-20. Web.
Owens, A., & Candipan, J. (2019). Social and spatial inequalities of educational opportunity: A portrait of schools serving high-and low-income neighbourhoods in US metropolitan areas. Urban Studies, 56(15), 3178-3197. Web.
Appendix
Appendix A: Cover Letter
Full Names:
Address:
Date:
Name of congressional representative:
Postal Address:
Date:
Subject: A request to introduce my proposed idea of a new policy on implementing an independent evaluation of an institution’s economic situation in providing individual-based school funding.
Kindly consider my request to introduce a new bill before the Congress members and gather witnesses and testimonies in favor of my idea. My choice to consider the issue is to address the generalized and bureaucratic process of the current federal school funding program that presents the problem of delays in its implementation process. This policy is also non-inclusive and does not address the financial needs of the vulnerable institutions that are constantly underfunded, resulting in their low academic performance.
However, adopting selective funding and an independent evaluation of an institution’s economic situation in providing academic support ensures effective scrutiny and equitable funding. To adopt this policy, I consider the following strategies key to be adopted in implementing an inclusive educational funding process. The government should increase its spending on education in ensuring greater access to funding for minority schools. The government should also reduce its over-reliance on the local taxes as its major educational funding creates other alternative sources of income to fund local schools.
The government needs to adopt a centralized policy in managing school funding to address fund embezzlement by self-interested individuals. Introducing an inclusivity law that prohibits unnecessary funding of institutions that fails to meet the minimum requirement would also, allow more vulnerable institutions a greater access to funding. Finally, the central government should monitor the funding procedures adopted by the assigned personnel in remitting and spending school funding to ascertain the appropriate use of such funds. Kindly consider.
Yours faithfully