There’s a tradition in education, former New York City  school chancellor Frank Macchiarola once observed, that if you spend a dollar  and it doesn’t work, you should spend two dollars; and not only that, you should  give those two dollars to the same person who couldn’t do the job with only  one.

That tradition is alive and well in Oklahoma, and indeed is  the animating spirit of the teacher unions push for SQ 744, the so-called HOPE  initiative, a proposed constitutional amendment that would require the state  legislature to increase per-pupil spending to the regional average.

Granted, the education system needs money. You’re going to  need money - lots of it - when you pay above - market prices for everything from  skillets to schoolteachers. News9 recently reported that one Oklahoma school district  spent $10,600 for a skillet. Oklahoma’s state auditor reported that another  district paid $540 for three mop heads valued at $13.50. And of course  public-school teachers on average are paid more than the market-determined  teacher salaries in the private sector (both nationwide and in central  Oklahoma,  according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics).

What 744’s boosters need to explain to weary and wary  taxpayers is this: How, exactly, is more money going to help? Because Oklahoma voters, by a  stunning two-to-one margin, don’t think it will.

A scientific telephone survey of 1,000 likely voters  registered in Oklahoma was conducted February 25 through  March 8 by SoonerPoll, the same firm that conducts the Oklahoma Poll for the  Tulsa World. The poll, which was commissioned by OCPA, has a margin of  error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points.

Now Im going to read you a statement, the surveyor said.  Please tell me whether you agree or disagree: If more money is spent on public  schools in my district, students will learn more.

Only 32 percent of respondents agree with that statement,  while 64 percent disagree.

Even Oklahoma Democrats (39 percent to 57 percent) don’t  think more money will improve student learning. Oklahoma Republicans (24 percent  to 70 percent) are more emphatic.

As it turns out, this pessimism is warranted. Cato Institute  scholar Andrew J. Coulson recently investigated the relationship between  spending and student achievement in our state. He used ACT scores as a  measurement because the NAEP scores for high-school students aren’t broken down  by state. Oklahomas participation rate in the ACT is  high (between the mid 60s and low 70s), hasn’t fluctuated wildly over time, and  is not significantly correlated with its actual scores (I ran a regression to  find out), so its a reasonable measure, he explains. I’ve only carried it  back to 1990 because the ACT was redesigned in that year, making the scores  discontinuous.

As you can see in the nearby chart, since 1990 which,  incidentally, is the year HB 1017 was signed into law spending has risen  dramatically while performance has remained essentially flat. When reality is  this sobering, I guess you can’t blame folks for clinging to HOPE.

Now I suppose we could pass SQ 744 and, magically, things  could be different this time. Perhaps, for once, pouring more money into a  heavily unionized, government-owned-and-operated monopoly would prove to be a  wise use of resources. Sort of like pouring more gasoline into a truck with a  blown transmission.

Heck, for all I know Lucy van Pelt might actually hold the  football long enough for Charlie Brown to kick it next time. The unions can  always HOPE.

Fortunately, Oklahomans know better.

Dutcher is vice president for policy at the Oklahoma Council of Public Affairs (OCPA), a conservative think tank.

This entry was posted on Thursday, March 25th, 2010 and is filed under Columns.