Congress cuts $191 million from ed tech
Geoff Fletcher, Editor-in-Chief of T.H.E. Journal raises the following questions regarding budget cuts in educational technology:
-What should we have done differently to avoid these cuts?
-More important, what should we do in the future to ensure these cuts do not become the norm?
-Most important, what will you do?
T.H.E. Journal: November 2004 Special Alert
Congress cuts $191 million from educational technology
The weekend before Thanksgiving, Congress passed the Omnibus Appropriations Bill that funds a number of departments of the federal government, including education. While education funding is up about $1.4 billion overall, the Educational Technology State Grants part of Title II D, the section of No Child Left Behind related to educational technology, was cut by $191,841, 000. This is a 27.7% cut in the money that goes to states for local grants to fund educational technology. This is also the money that is used by many state departments of education to support numerous technology and education initiatives throughout the states. full text
posted by Christy Kinnion @ 8:49 PM
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1 Comments:
All three questions are difficult to answer. It is hard to say with any certainty what might have altered the bill's final language. And frankly, I don't think anyone can answer any of these questions without determining what happened to the bill in conference. Both versions of the bill - the House version with some $91 million in cuts, and the Senate version keeping the FY 2004 funding level - were completed and ready for conference well BEFORE the November election.
SOMEthing happened between early October and mid-November that caused conference committe members to reject the decisions of their respective houses and to go beyond the House's recommended cuts. It may be that the Republican's margin of victory on November 2 emboldened House budget hawks to press for deeper cuts to that part of Title II of the bill. It may be that those dollars were traded for greater spending elsewhere. The FY05 Labor, HHS and Education Appropriations bill is huge. Interesting one of the longest sections of the bill concerns funding for teaching abstinence in public schools.
Again, no doubt one can make general assertions about we should have done this, or we should have done that, but ultimately we have to understand the dynamics of he political deal[]s made in conference committee that resulted in the deeper funding cut for technology in education. Unfortunately that info is hard to come by at the moment. The section of thomas.gov, Congress's website, that tracks legistation through both houses and conference to final passage has not been updated to included the needed information.
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