Some community leaders in Chicago are calling on students to skip their first day of school. Instead they want the students to go to a school in the suburbs and enroll there. Why? The school in the suburb spends approximately $17,000 per child/per school year. The school in the downtown, poverty-stricken area only spends approximately $10,000 per child/per year. Now this is due to the system that puts property tax money into the local schools. Schools located in wealthier neighborhoods get more money since property values are considerably higher than those in the surrounding downtown area. They are also claiming this as a race issue. The white population versus the black and brown population is seemingly to be at each other again.

So what is this message sending to students? If treated unfairly then go on strike/boycott basically. After all, adults get to use this technique to negotiate what they want. The problem I’m seeing with this idea is that the students are going to overflow the suburb school and that is not going to help the spending line. If more students are enrolled then the amount spent per child will decrease to cover the other students. Granted the amount will still be more than the downtown schools it still doesn’t solve the problem. The students are pushing their way into a school and not dealing with the problem at their school.

It doesn’t help the problem has been ignored or pushed aside for years. I would suggest that all the property tax money that goes to funding schools should be divided fairly among all schools. All schools should get the same amount. If the argument of one school provides more activity than another, then there is a solution there too. Divide the funds so that so much is allotted per activity provided by the school. I don’t understand why the system is ignoring the fact that the city public schools are getting far less money per child than the suburb schools.

The opinions are based that the suburb schools are whiter, less black/brown population whereas city schools have more black/brown, less white population. This is some opinion may be true as to the cause, but it’s not the sole reason. Those in charge of the system could change the direction of flow of funds. That is where the real problem lies. Granted some systems are crooked and race may very well be an issue here. Those in control of the system and funds need to be held accountable for this injustice. Start putting the money back into all of our children’s education. The children are our future and all should be created equal.