There are serious issues with school funding and distributions of the funds for public schools in the USA. Funding for public schools largely is determined by district lines drawn by local politicians. What district your home address falls into determines what school you attend, which is perfectly logical. Where this becomes an issue is funding for schools is also largely based upon the taxes gathered within that district. So housing and property are more expensive in “better” school districts (this is a factor people look for when choosing a where to live). Because housing prices are higher in better school districts, only higher income people can afford to live within these districts. Higher income means more taxes, means more tax money go towards these schools. Schools in less affluent districts have lower income families and thusly have less funding to work with. Because these school districts get lower value scores in the real estate market, people with incomes that could help improve the situation don’t move there. Your home resells for less in in a lower-scored school district so it’s not smart financially to move into a lower-scored school district. This makes these school districts lower income neighborhoods -- and often (between lower incomes, poorly funded public schools, and other factors) you also have higher crime rates which indoctrinate young people and make the real estate market there worse over long periods of time. This means not only are people with higher incomes that could help funding in the district less likely to move there, it’s also harder to get and pay for teachers to come into these schools.
Taxpayers spend extra income to live in these higher rated school districts with better real estate markets, so when talk of more evenly distributing school funds between districts with lower incomes is brought up, the voters are largely against it. They spent money to have these advantages and don’t see why “their taxes” should go to a lower income district instead of funding their schools and making their extra expense used to live in a more affluent district should go elsewhere and potentially devalue their real estate investments down the line. Thusly, such votes to even out funding distribution fail.
It’s a self-sustaining machine within the system enforcing an economic and class barrier divided by school districts. It’s not right, but it’s how the status quo is made and maintained by capitalistic democratic means.
However, I balk at seeing sports programs getting the blame for these funding issues. The issues are born mostly out of what I discussed above.
School sports programs that seem to do fine and have good funding despite a crumbling school? They’re largely not actually funded by the school. These sports teams have parent run booster clubs that run concession stands, solicit sponsorship from local businesses, and other fundraising methods. The money for new uniforms and field renovations come from these sponsors and the money of the kids’ families -- not the school budget. They aren’t taking money that would have or could have been used for repairs elsewhere. The school can’t use these fundraising tactics effectively because the money the school as a whole needs is much larger amounts and they cannot, as a government owned/run institution, trade donations for advertising space within the school. Plus, the sports the booster clubs support provide entertainment in a relatively safer and more controlled environment for local kids. It’s difficult for me to blame the families for putting effort into raising money for a better football or basketball team when the school is already underfunded, and they know great grades there aren’t going to mean as much as great grades at a better funded school. However, a good sports team could mean a scholarship and a future with a paid for college education for their children. It’s a way up and out over those economic and class barriers.
EDIT: Not to say the sports programs never take legitimate school resources that could be better used elsewhere. It happens, but it does not happen as often as they get the blame for it. There were many times in school when I, as a more arts-inclined student, believed my teachers who blamed the sports teams and got angry at them getting valuable funding the band, choir, art, etc classes and clubs weren’t even though our school’s team wasn’t very good. I also remember the first time I and my mother started chasing some of that down with the school and the school board. It turned out my very well-meaning teachers had been mis-informed. the sports teams weren’t receiving more school funds than any other school club. They received less than some others even. The majority of their funding was all from the Booster Club, and it wasn’t clearly communicated to the teachers where the funding from their budgets was coming from, so assumptions were made. So, you know, grain of salt folks. As an adult now, I see very easily how that could happen and how these assumptions and the us vs them mentality funding and budget cuts fostered made people blind to checking the truth of these sort of things.
