Opinion: Shapiro must step up, be a champion for public schools
Recently over 350 school board members, parents, educators and community members from all around Pennsylvania wrote an open letter to Governor Shapiro. The signees are from well-resourced and underfunded school districts; from rural, suburban and urban ones. We share a common conviction: Every child in Pennsylvania deserves a high-quality education. We are convinced that the only way to provide this is to fully and fairly fund our public schools.
The Commonwealth Court ruled last February that the administration and Legislature are failing to provide each student with a high-quality public education, violating the state constitution and undercutting our potential as a commonwealth. Many of us watched closely last year hoping to see the governor forge a solution to address the court’s order to correct the deep disparities in our public education system. Instead, we saw a failure of leadership, from an underwhelming initial budget proposal to an abandonment of key campaign promises to “fully fund our schools.” Even as the budget process was finally completed at the end of 2023, we were disappointed that there was no funding for Level-Up or any other program that would address our massive, and unconstitutional, educational opportunity gap.
We realize some want to direct education dollars toward programs that propose to “help students escape”’ from under-resourced schools. Whether we are discussing EITC or vouchers, let’s be clear: these programs fail to get the commonwealth even one penny closer to meeting its constitutional obligation to Pennsylvania students. Privatization methods siphon funding away from public schools and into programs that have failed to prove any positive academic achievements for underprivileged students. Yet even if these programs worked well, they would still fail the vast majority of Pennsylvania students because they do not and cannot address the root problem.
The root problem is that Pennsylvania has been underinvesting in public schools for decades, with economically disadvantaged public schools seeing particular divestment. The importance of public schools must be acknowledged and prioritized. Public schools are where all students are guaranteed an education — full stop. It doesn’t matter whether students have a disability, what their family background is, what their religion is, or what mistakes they’ve made — public schools are morally and constitutionally obligated to provide a “thorough and efficient” education to every child.
Our public schools are foundational to our children and our communities. Unfortunately, the commonwealth’s decades of underfunding them has created a $6 billion gap between what our students need and what they get. This lack of resources is particularly concentrated in schools that educate students from lower-income families and students of color. In a brief that Governor Shapiro wrote in support of the plaintiffs in the school funding case, he said, “The evidence before the Court shows that the resources of Petitioner schools and Philadelphia are inadequate… educational outcomes in those districts are both significantly worse than those in other districts across the Commonwealth and inadequate in their own right.” And these disparities cause lasting harm, translating into lower graduation rates and lower lifetime earnings.
To address this challenge of insufficient funding from the commonwealth, we must commit to ensuring our public schools, especially the long-underfunded ones, have the resources they need to provide a quality education. These students — all of them — need someone to champion them. We need Governor Shapiro to step up and lead, to address this foundational problem with decisiveness and determination. Our students need historic results, which ensure our public schools are fully equipped to provide every student with a thorough education that ensures they graduate ready for college, career and civic life. There is no greater challenge before our commonwealth right now. But together, we can do the right thing. Please consider calling or texting Governor Shapiro’s office to express support for providing every student in Pennsylvania with access to a high-quality, public education. His number is 717-787-2500.