The bell has sounded. The fight is on another round for more money for schools. It seems wegothroughthis every year or two, and the fight is always the same a demand for more money with little, if any, insight as to the real need.

The biggest problem with these fights is that they rarely address in any detail the reasons for which the money is said to be needed apparently rhetoric is more important than facts. One of the real problems in our schools is the underachievement in some of the schools, and one can legitimately argue that more money is needed to correct this problem. However, if you look below the surface here, you will find that the problem is chronic, and that more money over time has done little good. In fact, a case can be made that the preoccupation with money as the solution has in fact masked the real problems.

To try to assess this achievement problem with respect to money, I did a study of money versus test scores, and I provide it here for those who are seriously interested in finding solutions. The data was obtained from the State Dept. of Education and the Huntsville School System. Here is what I did and what I found:

First I took a sampling of the school systems, looking at funding versus achievement as measured by the SAT test scores. I selected the 18 top funded school systems, and averaging the per-pupil funding and the SAT scores. Then, I selected the 18 bottom funded school systems, and averaged their funding and scores. The results are as follows:

The finding here is that while there is a large difference in funding between the top and bottom funded systems, there is a rather small difference in test results, indicating that funding did not make much difference in achievement.

Then, I did the same thing with respect to test scores. That is, I looked at both the 18 top and the 18 bottom scoring systems, and averaged these data.

In this case, the difference in achievement between the top and bottom funded systems is enormous, but the difference in funding is minimal. This again indicates that funding really has little effect on achievement.

But, I went further I took the same groups of systems, and did the same analysis of funding and test scores over the 3-year period from '96 to '99, in order to see the effect on achievement of an increase in funding over time for the same systems.

Again, It can be seen that a significant increase in funding over this time period had little effect on achievement.

Also, a look at the same data for the Huntsville City School System shows the same results: The funding for the Huntsville schools went from $ 5,496 in 1996 to $ 6278 in 2001, an increase of $ 782 per pupil or 14.2%. However, the test scores for the system increased by only one point, from 62.0 to 63.0.

In addition, a look at all of the 41 regular schools in the Huntsville system shows the same pattern a wide difference in scores with, in this case, the identical per-pupil funding.

The conclusion here is obvious. These statewide school systems and the schools in the Huntsville system, represent a cross section of the Alabama schools, and while money may be needed in specific instances and for specific things, money is clearly not the answer to the big problem -- the achievement problem. For the answers here we must look elsewhere.

Professor Eric Hanushek of the University of Rochester, testifying in the Alabama Equity Lawsuit several years ago, reviewed over 200 studies that looked at the relationship between resources and performance. He found that: "There is no systematic relationship between expenditures on schools and student performance, and there is no systematic relationship between the major ingredients of instructional expenditures per student -- chiefly teacher education and teacher experience, which formally drive teacher salaries and class size -- and student performance."

Professors John Chubb and Terry Moe of the Brookings Institution did an exhaustive study some 10 years ago in which they interviewed some 20,000 students, teachers and principals in 500 schools over the country. They found: "That family background was the major influence on children's progress in school." And they could find "no statistically significant relationship between achievement and any of the school characteristics that are often thought important: teacher-pupil ratios, teacher education, teacher salaries and per-pupil expenditures."

Professors Laurence Steinberg (Temple University), Bradford Brown (University of Wisconsin) and Sanford Dornbusch (Stanford University) completed a study several years ago in which they surveyed some 20,000 students and families in nine communities representative of students in all kinds of schools over the country. Their study is summarized in their book "Beyond the Classroom." They found:

• "It is time to face the music: fifteen years of school reform has not really accomplished anything. Today's students know less, and can do less, than their counterparts could 25 years ago."
• "Our research indicates that a profitable discussion about the declining achievement of American youngsters should begin by examining student's lives outside of school. School is only one of many influences -- and probably, when all is said and done, not even the most important one."
• "Neither the source of our achievement problem, nor the mechanism through which we can best address it, is to be found by examining or altering our schools."

Thomas Sowell in his book, "Inside American Education," states: "The brutal reality is that the American system of education is bankrupt. If allowed to continue as it is, it will absorb even more vast resources, without any appreciable improvement in the quality of its output, which is already falling behind world standards. It's educational failures cannot be justified, or even mitigated, by its many nonacademic social goals, such as the psychological well-being of students, harmony among racial, ethnic, or other social groups, the prevention of teenage pregnancy, or the like. It has not merely failed in these areas but has been counterproductive."

Local columnist, Ben Johnson, writing in The Huntsville Times (6/1/00), discussed one of the most perplexing problems facing the Huntsville School System -- "the insistence of some black youngsters that to be an academic star is to act white or sound white." He says the problem is pervasive in our schools. This is a devastating problem that must be addressed, but it's one of those cultural problems that money cannot solve. Mr. Johnson says that the black leaders in the community must "preach about the importance of education."

Hopefully, the data and information provided here will help focus the discussion on the real issues affecting our schools and our children, money being only one of them -- and, as you can see from the information provided, probably not the most important one. But, above all, our discussions should be civil and constructive.