Gov­er­nor Pat­ter­son has uni­lat­er­ally decided to with­hold fund­ing for New York’s pub­lic schools, despite the legislature’s pas­sage of a deficit reduc­tion plan. This results in an effec­tive mid-year cut to school dis­tricts that are already hem­or­rhag­ing from last year’s trim­ming. I under­stand that New York is in the mid­dle of a very large finan­cial cri­sis, and that schools have not always been par­a­digms of fis­cal respon­si­bil­ity, but we get the point. My school is being respon­si­ble as I am sure many other schools in the state are, cut­ting down on sup­plies, cut­ting staff, cut­ting extra cur­ric­u­lar activ­i­ties, short­en­ing sports sea­sons, can­cel­ing con­fer­ences and vir­tu­ally every form of pro­fes­sional devel­op­ment that is not free.

The cuts hurt. But what hurts more is when the gov­er­nor lists schools as a pow­er­ful spe­cial inter­est look­ing to derail any fis­cal reform efforts, as if schools are in the mid­dle of some ponzi scheme to waste the states money. NEW YORK’S KIDS ARE NOT SPECIAL INTERESTS, but they should be of spe­cial inter­est to the state. It is not the stu­dents’ fault that a dys­func­tional state gov­ern­ment squab­bled for years while the money ran out but they are the ones who have to play less games, or hope that the school musi­cal might be back next year if the dis­trict can scrounge up some money. Con­tin­u­ing to can­ni­bal­ize the pub­lic school sys­tem is short sighted and the day will arrive down the road when the state will reap what it has sewn.

I grew up in this state and have lived here my whole life, but I am encour­ag­ing my stu­dents to move away from here as I am cer­tain other edu­ca­tors across the state are doing. That causes me great sad­ness, as does every­thing in New York pol­i­tics these days.