Race, Resources and Achievement

Abstract

With the growth of expenditure on education increasing more rapidly than available local tax resources, there is increased concern about rationalizing school procedures and allocations. Increasingly, schools will have to account for both input and output. By excluding school policy from the public agenda wasteful programs are maintained and the schools become more vulnerable to uninstitutionalized political pressures. DURING FEBRUARY AND MARCH of 1971 the Public School System of the City of New York suddenly found itself short several million dollars, a problem which has come to plague many school systems. The Board of Education indicated that it would lay off teachers, paraprofessionals and other personnel to make up the deficit. Blame for the deficit was shifted back and forth between the Board and the City Council with considerable discussion of who promised what to whom. A new coalition of teachers, parents' groups and community activists descended upon Albany and City Hall demanding that the funds be found to preclude cutting of services in the School System. The New York State Senate sent in an investigating committee which found that the Board's financial procedures were utterly chaotic and that in fact the Board really didn't