122. Schooling is very expensive.

122. Schooling is very expensive.
The United States is proving to the world that no country can be rich enough to afford a school system that meets the demands this system creates simply by existing.
Ivan Illich
There is an enormous global expenditure on formal education. (Harber p7). Huge amounts of money are spent to prop up schools and propagate the idea of their inevitability. According to the Observer, 1.2 billion pounds is spent on education EACH WEEK in this country. (Amelia Hill “Depressed, stressed: teachers in crisis.“Observer 31/08/08) Even when it becomes obvious that schools are not working, are not doing what we are led to believe they do, the solution is seen as more resources, more money and more and more school.

There are fiscal and financial benefits of school. They provide jobs for teachers. (434,900 full-time equivalent teachers in mainstream schools in England. January 2007 figures- full reference in teachers intro). Yet all those teachers are paid from the public purse. The echelons of jobs generated by schools, from cleaners, caretakers, playground assistants to dinner servers and secretaries, from builders and maintenance workers to classroom assistants all have to be paid for. Beyond school, layers and layers of bureaucracy at local and national level support them; from school inspectors to administrators, from educational psychologists to accountants, lawyers to ministers, the number employed and paid for out of taxation increases hugely. If we add in OFSTED, examination boards, textbook manufacturers, exam markers and exercise book manufacturers then we have a huge proportion of the population ‘gainfully’ employed in propping up a system based on the idea that an adult imparts knowledge to a group of children.

Other ‘benefits’ include the provision of ‘free’ childcare to enable parents, especially mothers, to work. I remember one brilliant teacher at my son’s school (only one) who spent her time struggling in an inhumane system to retain and impart humanity. Meanwhile, her own children were passed from pillar to post, from childminders to other, much less able and less caring teachers. It seemed odd to me that raising and educating strangers’ children is valued more than raising and educating your own. Of course, not everyone enjoys, or can stand, spending large amounts of time with their own, or anyone else’s, children. This is a sad indictment of the adults we have become.

Other ‘financial benefits’ of school include removing children from the labour market, where they may compete with adults for jobs and the supposed future benefit of work capacity of the schooled. This latter ‘investment’ idea of schooling, that we are putting money in now so that we will benefit later, is an interesting one. Recently (October 2008) ideas about investment in anything is being questioned as markets collapse that have been built on sand, as the idea of money making money, of anywhere being a safe place to put money are being found to be false. We must question the application of this flawed financial model to our children. They are not ‘economic generation units’, and we devalue us all by treating them as such. Idris Shah once pointed out that the number of people who believe in an idea is not proportional to the sense of the idea. The many who believe schooling is a ‘good thing‘, like the many who believed in the money markets, are mistaken.

Schooling is seen as a way out of poverty. But when that schooling does not allow questioning or challenging society’s structures that require there to be poor people as a warning to the rest of what might happen if they step out of line, then it can change nothing. Schooling doesn’t question capitalism or the idea of disposable people only valued for their economic input into the global machine. It props up obscene systems that need and thrive on the poverty of millions. As long as we have an economic system that requires there to be poor people, ‘excess’ people, no amount of schooling for acceptance will change that. In fact, it will prevent it being challenged.

The economic benefits of school are greatly out -weighed by the costs. The question is: who benefits?

The costs of school have increased hugely over time. Illich argued that these escalating costs act to discourage non-schooled learning. (Illich) In the huge education industry the needs of children are lost. The immediate function of facilitating an interaction between teachers and children becomes buried and subject to ever escalating costs beyond the classroom.

So what does it cost? In 2006 £49 billion was spent on schools (check whether this is England or England and Wales). This is an 83% increase in school spending. That is a lot of money. (Independent October 2007 check date “ 83% increase in school spending brings 1% boost in productivity”) .The article title, referring to productivity, indicates that children are merely economic generation units treating schools like factories, with the belief that more money in should bring more output in terms of grades obtained, exams passed, targets met.
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In 2001, educational institutions expenditure accounted for 11.9% of total government spending. (Need updated figures) Per capita, (for each child in school), estimates vary as to how much is spent per year. Hansard 17/05/07, stated that £3580, was the per capita allocation for 2005 to 2006. However, in January 2006 23,670 pupils were educated in pupil referral units and other settings. PRUs cost £15,000 per year per pupil. (Daily Mail 21/5/08) In 2006 the BBC claimed that government spending was £5000 per pupil in state schools in England and Wales and that this was set to increase to £8000 per child by 2012. (bbc.co.uk 23/3/06)

If we add in OFSTED costs of 105 million per year in 2000-2001(BBC 23/3/06), which increased to £236 million in April 2007 (Polly Curtis; “Who watches the watcher?” Guardian 27/3/08). We need to add in the £1 billion per year on anti-truancy initiatives that don’t work (ref in truancy) and the 5 billion spent between 2001 and 2007 on failing to improve basic skills for the adults who leave school unable to read, write or add up. (MEN 29/1/09 “£5 billion spent yet education standards still don’t add up”) we find an enormous amount of our money is being spent on these dreadful institutions.

At school level, most of the money spent is on staffing costs, to pay personnel to provide custodial care, indoctrination and to select children for social roles. (Illich) Very little is spent on educational resources. Of the 3 or 5 or 8000 a year per child less than £16 per child per year is spent on books. (Independent 6/6/06 “Time to bring schools to book”)

Other calls on cash-strapped schools intervene, like £30,000 to hire security guards. (“School spends its book cash to keep out vandals” Alice McKeegan and Yakub Qureshi Manchester evening News 7/7/08 p20) or payment of insurance against parents suing. (“Insure against parent’s schools told” Telegraph 4/7/08) Many people are benefiting by being well paid to subordinate our children.

So what is the direct cost to parents of this free childcare? In September 2008 it was estimated that parents pay about £16,000 to put a child through state education. From £366 per year on transport and buying 46 pairs of shoes. (Research by Norwich union cited in Metro News 1/9/08 “The 16,000 bill for state school”) Parents spend over £1300 per year on everyday costs of a child going to school. (First news 8-14 September 2006, page 3)
This hits lower income families the most. From £388 per year for school meals, £266 on uniform and £207 PE kit, £79 for excursions (based on centre for economic and business research for Asda which has introduced four pounds uniforms Manchester Evening News August 5th 2008) The money required for free child care averages out at over £20 per week, 52 weeks of the year.
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In 2006, the Citizens’ Advice Bureau published a report on the cost of ‘free’ education, noting that children from lower income families were less likely to flourish at school. “For these children, schools can be divisive and contribute to exclusion” (check ref) particularly when it comes to wearing the right clothes and going on school trips. 55% of families in the lowest income groups struggle to meet the costs. Discretionary grants for uniform, with 42% of local authorities offering no help at all, don’t help when uniforms are compulsory at most state secondary schools. In 2005 lone parents, if they were lucky, received £35 grant towards the cost of a uniform where a blazer alone costs £65. The CAB report noted that uniforms were of high cost and poor quality. (Ref to find)

And of course, children grow. At certain stages of their lives they grow alarmingly. Having to purchase new uniforms, school shoes etc, as well as out of school clothes that may be too small in three months, is a huge financial burden on poorer families.
For the better off there is “prom pressure“, as an export from the States, as teens demand expensive clothes and hired limousines so as not to be outdone. It becomes about competing to see who can spend the most, rather than about sharing a celebration.

School building
The launch of the “Building Schools for the Future” programme, at an estimated cost of £35 billion to build or improve 3500 secondary schools by 2020, indicates yet more spending on education. (Guardian 21/7/08 , page 1 “ £35 billion revamp will produce generation of mediocre schools” Robert Booth) but this is actually spending on building, money going to building firms, architects, building material manufacturers and not any aspect of ‘education‘. When the Public Private Partnership came in it meant that taxpayers money was being spent to line the pockets of private companies. In Scotland, the schools built under PPP mean local councils pay back firms over 30 years (which is less than the lifespan of the buildings) “Over the course of the lease the council will generally pay far more than the cost of the building work”. Playing fields are being sold off to pay for it. (1/6/08: “More schools get private finance” http://bbc.co.uk/1/hi/Scotland/3764721.stm)

The buildings so far produced are not looking good. Shuttleworth College is the second school created under Lancashire county council’s £250 million building schools for the future programme, to be labelled ‘inadequate’ since they opened in 2006. (www.Burnley citizen.co.uk/news/2133609-head-of-struggling-school-resigns 19/03/08)
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An audit conducted by the government’s own architecture watchdog revealed that 8/10 of the designs proposed for secondary schools are “mediocre” or “not yet good enough“. The problems identified include bullying hotspots, noisy open plan areas, and classrooms too dark and prone to overheating. The Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment (CABE), stated: “Ministers believe there is a link between pupil performance and investment in school buildings“. On what is this belief based? There is definitely a link between building firm income and this type of government spending. “In many cases, an overemphasis on car parking, has resulted in designs which resemble edge-of-town retail parks, rather than lively educational establishments” (Guardian 21/7/08 “£35 billion revamp will do use generation of mediocre schools” Robert Booth)

Many modern buildings with safety systems, lifts, fire sprinklers, security alarms and advanced roofing are expensive to maintain and as today’s modern building systems will have a life expectancy that will eventually be very expensive to maintain or replace in 25 to 30 years, then this huge rebuilding programme will be hugely costly in the longer term too. (www.Hansen company.com/News/article-sales tax.htm 19th of February 2008 Duane van Hamert) It used to be possible to build houses and public buildings to last hundreds of years. With modern technology new buildings are wrecked in 25 years or even less.

The huge cost of building mediocre edifices as temples of learning, will cost us all dearly, and not benefit children one bit. Who benefits? The building firms, those employed by Partnership with Schools, to oversee the project, those who distract us all with shiny new buildings from asking what will change about the practices inside them.

The academies programme, whereby an individual can put £2 million in to take over the running of a school, while the state provides the rest of the money, costs £27 million to start each academy, compared to £2.2 million for a ‘fresh start’ school. (news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/4599150.stm 11/1/06 “schools fail 1 million pupils”) So that’s why the government is expanding the programme-to give jobs to their mates at a cost to your purse.

Special educational needs and mental health
The cost of putting children through a special educational needs statementing process has to be considered against any benefits of having a label. Special educational needs children bring more money into schools, and therefore cost more even when the label and additional support does not benefit the labelled child. Many have argued that overall increases in expenditure on education increase the number of children with special needs. (Illich, Holt?)
If we look at the financial costs of the damage done by schools, driving kids mad and not equipping them for a sane life in an insane society, the cost of disaffection, crime and destructiveness of those angry children robbed of childhood, then the costs seem to greatly outweigh the benefits.
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Poor countries
In poorer ‘developing’ countries, schooling for children is championed as a route out of national and family poverty. However, the huge financial burden to nations and families of Western-style schooling is often overlooked. When 29,000 under 5s die each day, 4000 because they lack safe water and sanitation, where 12 million have been orphaned by AIDS and 146 million regularly go hungry and 640 million lack adequate shelter we need to question the high cost of public schooling, which takes resources away from health and social infrastructure. This creates more poverty. (statistics from UNESCO http://portal.unesco.org/shs/en/ev/ev.php-URL_ID=11412&URL_DO=DO_TOPIC&URL_SECTION=201.html downloaded on 23/10/08)
When families have to stop growing food for their own consumption to grow cash crops for export to raise school fees this puts them at the mercy of global markets which are never fair or just. By taking money from domestic food purchase and health maintenance the cost of schooling to families impoverishes them further.

The longer term benefits are illusory. When I taught in a secondary school in Kenya the vast majority of pupils, who had studied hard, whose families had made immense financial sacrifices to educate them, would not go into any employment or further study that required secondary education or that earned significantly more than agricultural production. Families incurred debt in the vain hope that their children could work and earn enough to pay it back, support younger siblings and have a ‘better life‘. There is no evidence that this actually happens. What seems to happen is that the huge anger and resentment at the lies our children are told erupt in social disorder. The young, separated for years from home and culture in boarding schools, have damaged connections to their families and damaged connections to themselves. (See separation chapter)

Producing large numbers of young people with qualifications, where there are no or very few jobs requiring those qualifications is a huge problem. (See diploma disease) By raising expectations for millions and millions we do them a disservice. We sell a dream of an unsustainable Western-style consumerist lifestyle as the bait to hook millions into expensive schooling in the hope of the unattainable. This is cruelty of the highest order.

An additional problem in poorer countries is the creation of a new and different type of poverty created by ‘development’ and pushed through schooling. By destroying “wholesome and sustainable lifestyles and instead creat(ing) real material poverty, or misery, by denying the means of survival through the diversion of resources to resource intensive commodity production” (Shiva in Aikman)
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Destroying subsistence agriculture and the means of subsistence and replacing it with meaningless bits of paper, is the way the first world keeps the poorer countries in third position, by creating dependency, destroying self-reliance and selling everything at a huge cost.


Dismantling these huge costly edifices could allow real learning and ‘progress’ to occur. But there are too many vested interests, too many making money out of the educational impoverishment of the rest of us, for this to be even suggested by policymakers, though the crumbling structures may simply self-destruct. And we will all be collateral damage.

As John Taylor Gatto pointed out “In one of the great ironies of human affairs, the massive rethinking the schools require would cost so much less than we are spending now that powerful interests cannot afford to let it happen” (JTG 7 Lessons)
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