What goes down.....should go down?
Saw this post over at EIAOnline:
America loves its public school teachers. So much so that it continues to hire legions of them while growth in the number of students continues to peter out. An Education Intelligence Agency analysis of the latest U.S. Census Bureau figures shows that while K-12 enrollment grew only 2.45% between 2001 and 2006, the K-12 teacher force grew by 5.71% over the same period.
I took snippets from the table found here to create this:
EDUCATION INTELLIGENCE AGENCY
Current Spending Statistics of Public Elementary-Secondary School Systems for 2005-06
State Rankings in Enrollment, Teachers, Per-Pupil Spending, and Spending on Compensation
| Amount | ||||||||
| Change | Change | Change | per-pupil | Change | ||||
| Since | K-12 | Since | Per-pupil | Since | spent on | Since | ||
| Enrollment | 2000-01 | Teachers | 2000-01 | spending | 2000-01 | compensation | 2000-01 | |
| USA | 48,380,507 | 2.45% | 3,121,638 | 5.71% | $9,138 | 25.45% | $7,458 | 24.51% |
| ME. | 195,174 | -5.73% | 15,962 | -3.61% | $10,586 | 23.58% | $8,760 | 29.38% |
| MA. | 949,951 | -2.58% | 73,593 | 9.14% | $11,981 | 24.66% | $10,110 | 34.21% |
| NH | 201,044 | -3.56% | 15,489 | 8.01% | $10,079 | 33.73% | $8,094 | 45.94% |
| VT. | 92,340 | -9.51% | 9,009 | 7.07% | $12,614 | 35.94% | $10,141 | 45.89% |
I see that while NH enrollment has dropped 3.56% since 2000, teacher employment and compensation and per-pupil compensation has gone way up (note: inflation has been between 2-3% or so for each year since 2000).
Kids down, teachers up.
Since I saw this after the SAU closed, I can't fill in the relevant number for Gilford, but it would be interesting..... Oh, and in case you were wondering where the data came from:
Notes: 1) Data derived from U.S. Census Bureau Public Education Finances 2006, issued
April 2008, Rankings & Estimates, NEA Research, December 2007, and
Digest of Education Statistics 2002, National Center for Education Statistics.
2) "Compensation" includes salaries, wages and fringe benefit contributions on
behalf of employees.
