Seattle Public Schools could be closing more than twenty schools for the 2025-26 school year. The district is facing a shortfall of $105 million this year and similar shortfall in the years to come. To compensate, the district is proposing to close more than 20 K-8 schools. You can find more information about the school closure proposals, including a “racial equity analysis” on the district’s new Well-Resourced Schools platform.
The district has lost 4,465 students between the school years ending in 2020 and 2023. Yet the school district increased their per pupil funding by $4,630 (for a total cost of $22,113.85) between those school years. We would expect that with such a substantial increase in funding student achievement rates would improve as well. But they did not.
Politicians and state candidates on both sides of the aisle are calling for “MORE FUNDING!!” for government schools. Every session, the state legislature increases funding for government schools, despite the fact that student achievement is not improving. The legislature adds new curriculum and programs that are mandated for students such as Ethnic Studies, LGBTQ+ History, Comprehensive Sexuality Education (CSE) and Social Emotional Learning (SEL).
Below are the academic assessment results for Seattle Public Schools for the 2018-19 school year (there is no data available for 2019-2020 due to Covid) and the most recent 2023-24 school year. As you can see, the scores dropped in each subject area, despite the district serving fewer students with substantially more funding.
Seattle Public Schools is not an anomaly. You can look up almost any district in the state of Washington and find similar funding and similar assessment scores. The government schools are failing Washington students and the only thing elected officials and candidates want to do is throw more money at the problem – the insanity of doing the same thing and expecting a different result. The truth is the policymakers know that more money and more woke policies in government schools will not help the students. Until you, the parent, the taxpayer, are willing to hold them accountable they will continue to play political games with your money and your children.
