Policy Brief No. 2010-2 * 2010-12-01 16:19:52

By Much Better Schools on Much Lower Budgets

Abstract: Editor: Colorado public education is the most important communal undertaking for our state’s future. It is also the most expensive obligation for taxpayers. But as we enter 2011, education faces both a budget crisis and an identity crisis. Legislators will take up another round of unwelcome spending reductions come January. At the same time, school districts from the gritty urban neigh-borhoods of Montbello to the affluent greenbelts of Douglas County are mired in controversy over the very meaning of education. Centennial Institute asked former Education Commissioner William Moloney, who was Colorado’s chief state school officer under Democratic and Republican administrations from 1997 to 2007 and has worked on education policy in a number of other states and nations, to think outside the box about realistic solutions. Here are his analysis and recommendations.