Margolis: Shumlin’s education plan big and bold – and probably expensive

Peter Shumlin does not think small.

Having set the stage in his first term for revolutionizing the state’s health care system, he began his second on Thursday by proposing to do no less for its systems of public education. Scorning the standard high-toned, feel-good inaugural address, Shumlin used almost his entire speech to the joint session of the Legislature to present an ambitious plan for making better education available for more young Vermonters, especially those of low income. High quality education, the governor said, should be available to all students “no matter who they are and how much money their parents make.”

In the governor’s view, this is neither optional nor impractical, but an economic necessity. Vermont’s schools are good, he said, but only 45 percent of high school students go on to higher education, and the good jobs of the future require “skills beyond high school.” Providing these opportunities, he said, was vital for the state’s economy. While he offered no actual data to support his claim, he ticked off a list of several employers from around the state who have present and potential job openings, but only for applicants with advanced scientific and technological skills.

To make sure more students go beyond high school, Shumlin proposed:

• Universal early childhood (pre-kindergarten) education;
• Granting free school lunches to all low-income students now eligible only for the reduced-price meals, using “locally owned Vermont food” as often as possible;
• Allowing more high school seniors to take college courses and a new scholarship plan that would partially pay the tuitions of students who stay in the state after graduation;
• Requiring all schools to teach algebra to ninth-graders and geometry to 10th-graders, courses now required in fewer than half the state’s public high schools.

As Shumlin acknowledged (“I’ve asked a lot,” he said) that’s a bold set of proposals, and potentially an expensive one. How expensive was unclear from Shumlin’s speech, which mentioned only one dollar figure — $17 million, now part of the state’s Earned Income Tax Credit budget to finance early childhood education. He did not explain exactly how that would work, or whether the funds diverted from EITC, a federal program, would have to be replaced.

So lawmakers, educators and others are likely to pose lots of questions about the governor’s plans, and quite likely some opposition. Requiring all high school students to take algebra and geometry, for instance, might be seen as a challenge to the traditional “local control” of schools. Even some educators might have qualms about Shumlin’s exclusive stress on science, math and technology learning, perhaps at the expense of English, history, language, and the social sciences.

Seen in their political context, though, these proposals could serve the governor well. He has been sending signals these last few weeks of possible cutbacks in social programs, health care benefits for low-income patients, and has been openly calling on local school districts to hold down their budgets for next year.

None of this sits well with liberal lawmakers and with Democratic-leaning interest groups such as the teachers union. But this was an unmistakably left-of-center approach to education Shumlin outlined Thursday. Those youngsters who are not going on beyond high school, he pointed out, are those from lower-income families, as are the children most in need of pre-kindergarten programs.

Shumlin might even be able to argue that the benefits to low-income Vermonters from his education proposals would outweigh any harm to them from the social service cuts he has suggested.

But only to low-income Vermonters with children. If he is planning to divert funds now earmarked for program that benefit the elderly or the disabled, legislators who support those programs could well balk at his school plans.

At any rate, many lawmakers in both parties are likely to demand a fuller explanation of the total cost of these proposals before acting on them. Republicans keep pointing out that the governor has yet to disclose how much his health care plan would cost, or how it would be paid for.

Beyond calling that $17 million for early childhood schooling “the largest single investment,” Shumlin offered no cost estimates. Some of the proposals, though, could add up to considerable sums. To offset the often “oppressive” debt some students incur in college, for instance, his proposed “Vermont Strong Scholars Program” would repay students the tuition payments for their final year at the University of Vermont. And he said he would propose increasing appropriations for UVM and the state colleges “to be used entirely for financial aid and scholarship for Vermonters.”