Portland Public School leaders are considering slashing elementary and middle school PE teachers in response to apocalyptic budget news from Salem. Let’s assume that this isn’t just a negotiating ploy to force the teachers’ union to accept pay freezes. A coalition of parents, health care providers and corporations wants the school board to find other cuts or preserve Phys Ed next fall by dipping into $33 million in reserves. Great: Childhood obesity is a genuine problem that will cost us more down the line as pudgy young people grow into illness-prone adults. Schools can’t replace good parenting — more veggies, less TV — but can teach kids the habit of regular exercise. Except preserving PE doesn’t solve the problem.
Portland, like many other government entities these days, is at a crossroads. With rising costs and an economy that has put a significant dent in tax revenues, there’s plenty of will but not nearly enough cash. Given the current reality, governments from coast to coast are wrestling with one question: What do we cut in order to balance the books? Every year in Portland, the question for the school board is what to cut. Every year finds more cuts that lead to fewer programs that do a poorer job of educating Portland’s children. The school board is only dealing with the immediate realities facing it, of course. If you only have $5, you’re not going to be able to pay for the $8 hamburger you’re dying to get your hands on. It’s difficult to prepare children for the future when you’re lacking money in the present.
Here’s a question we need to address: When do we recognize that there’s no more “fat” to be cut? That what we’re really cutting into (and have been for some time) is actually meat, the things we should and must be doing to educate our children? The fact that Portland is seriously contemplating cutting Physical Education from the curriculum should serve as a wake-up call, an indication of just how bad things have become. The system is broken; the current model does not work…and yet Portland’s schools continue to be run as if tinkering around the margins will make things all better. It won’t, and it hasn’t for some time. So why can’t we as a city ask ourselves what we want and expect our schools to do? Why can we not discuss what we expect our government to do? And why do we continue to expect something for nothing?
From where I sit, cutting Physical Education seems like a ploy staged to get the attention of those whose expectations of our public schools far outstrips their willingness to pay for those expectations. Generally speaking, we despise teachers. I know; I use to be a teacher, and I well remember the disrespect. “Those who can, do. Those who can’t, teach.” Everyone thinks that they know what should happen in our schools, and yet no one, except teachers, are willing to take responsiblity for sitting on the front lines with their children. Parents expect schools to be warehouses, to babysit their children so they don’t have to. When something goes wrong in a school, it’s blamed on teachers. When something goes right, teachers rarely get the credit. Parents are rarely ever willing to accept responsiibility for their children, but they’re certainly more than willing to blame teachers for not being all things to all people.
This is a clear case of getting what you pay for. If you’re not willing to pay for your child’s education, you can’t claim to be surprised when your child doesn’t get an education. It’s a pretty simple proposition, really. Something for nothing doesn’t work; Portland’s public schools are living proof of that. Cutting Physical Education is just another waystation on the road to leaving our children unprepared to compete in the world they’ll inherit. Today, it’s PE. Tomorrow, it might be History, or Science. If you think I’m engaging in hypoerbole, you clearly haven’t been paying attention. I may be referring specifically to Portland’s public school, but I could be talking about any major city.
Childhood obesity is a major problem. Then again, so is substandard education. Welcome to reality.
Isn’t it about time we accepted responsibility and did something to ensure that our children graduate with a diploma that actually means something? Or are we really OK with an education that barely qualifies most of our children to work in a 7-11? Here in Portland, the answer to that question is self-evident.
