The future of our children's education begins now – not in 2018

During the 2009 legislative session, with litigation pending over whether the state was meeting its “paramount” constitutional duty to make “ample provision” for funding K-12 education, the Legislature attempted to buy time with a reform promise: Engrossed Substitute House Bill 2261.

The bill deferred reforms until 2018. Many legislators were skeptical. As the parent of a then-6-year-old, I hardly felt like giving up on his future until 2018. Further, with no funding identified for the bill, I asked on the House floor, “If we don’t have the courage of our convictions, how can we expect future legislators to have the courage of our convictions?”

In a landmark decision built upon a similar 1978 ruling, the Washington Supreme Court agreed. Once again, it found the state failing its duty to kids. And it noted it “cannot idly stand by as the Legislature makes unfulfilled promises for reform. We therefore reject as a viable remedy the state’s invitation for the court simply to defer to the Legislature’s implementation of ESHB 2261.”

Among other things, the court noted that “at the current pace, the state would not fund all-day kindergarten for all eligible students until the 2090-91 school year.”

It was once understood that the property-based system used for funding K-12 education throughout the United States creates “savage inequalities” – to quote the title of a book by Jonathan Kozol.

That truth, discomfiting to the wealthy and propertied, has been obscured. Instead, wealthy citizens (many of whom didn’t attend public schools, nor send their own kids to them) have funded education “reform” efforts blaming teachers for educational failings. From wealthy enclaves, some have sought to turn poor school districts into “Waiting for Superman” laboratories for social science experiments.

Clearly, the Supreme Court saw through that: “Districts with high property values are able to raise more levy dollars than districts with low property values, thus affecting the equity of a statewide system. Conversely, property-poor districts, even if they maximize their local levy capacity, will often fall short of funding a constitutionally adequate education.”

If we could just flog teachers into better performance through evaluations, why, in the U.S. News & World Report ranking of the nation’s top 100 public high schools, are the four Washington schools in Bellevue and Kirkland? The inconvenient truth in our state is proximity to the eastern shores of Lake Washington is the best predictor of academic success.

Indeed, even of 461 “silver medal” public high schools nationwide that rank below the top 100, almost half of Washington’s 17 standouts are in suburban King County: Bainbridge Island, Bellevue, Des Moines, Issaquah, Kenmore, Mercer Island, Redmond and Woodinville. That doesn’t leave much academic excellence for the rest of the state.

Ultimately, as the court noted, “The Legislature must develop a basic education program geared toward delivering the constitutionally required education, and it must fully fund that program through regular and dependable tax sources.”

This forthright holding will displease monied interests behind education “reform.” It requires them to stop hiding behind anti-teacher rhetoric and put money where their mouths have been.

Many self-styled education reformers were huge contributors against Initiative 1098, the high-earners’ income tax that could have shored-up education funding. Clearly, in a state with the nation’s most-regressive tax system, new taxes must fall not upon the working class but upon the wealthier.

Nor, to invest in our educational future, can we, morally, further shred a social safety net for kids, the elderly and those with disabilities.

For young learners, that future is now. Will the Legislature join the supreme court in recognizing that? Or is political careerism the only future that matters?

Olympia attorney Brendan Williams is a former state legislator.