most of the funding for public goes into administration, and whats left is for the "schools themselves" which is usually not much, and many schools remain underfunded for generations.
this post was submitted on 22 May 2025
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It encourages then to develop that grindset early.
PSA, whenever someone asks you to buy something for a fundraiser just donate instead. Especially if you don't want what they're selling. They'll get 100% of that instead of like... I honestly don't even know, but it can't be more than 25%.
If I don't want something, I give nothing. Most fundraisers are pure extortion, and I can't be bothered to check if something is legit or lining someone's pocket. "No" is a full sentence.
Obviously, I'm not saying you're obligated to. I'm saying if you want to financially support them donations are better.
girlscout cookies?
What about them?
How is that 15k statistic calculated? Sounds questionable. Do you have a source? Does that include social spending like the dedication of parents time and personal expenses such as in South Korea? Is that government spending? Are fundraisers only a USA thing?
This gives the figures with sources: https://worldpopulationreview.com/state-rankings/per-pupil-spending-by-state
Regardless of how exactly the stat is calculated, I am sure it is massively inflated by college football budgets
One of the major factors to consider here is that public schools in the US are not equally funded by number of students. Instead, most of the funding is provided by state and local property taxes, meaning that richer areas where houses are worth a lot more, get much better funding for their schools. So while those rich areas' school funding is probably much higher than the global median, the poorer areas' school funding is likely much lower, in a very high cost of living country in general.
The other factor to also consider is that public schools in the US have fairly extensive athletic programs, meaning that they spend a lot of the funds to build and maintain things like American Football ~~stadiums~~ fields, swimming pools, etc., as opposed to only funding actual academic education.
Edit, I've retracted the link about teacher vs coach salaries because it's about College sports, not primary and secondary schools. I still haven't found a good source for this info regarding those.
PS: Aside from fundraisers, it's fairly common to hear teachers telling stories of having to spend their own money to buy supplies for their classes.
PPS: It's also common to hear stories of poor families doing everything they can to move to richer areas just so their kids can benefit from the much better-funded schools. I've even heard of situations where they will register their kids with the address of a relative who lives in a better-funded area, for the same reason.
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These are often for extracurricular things like school trips.
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Schools are underfunded.
- The schools that aren't underfunded have millions of dollars in funds earmarked for sports usually.
i dont think its for k-12, but its mostly for universities, and colleges.
I think #1 is sports. Have you seen some of these stadiums?
Public primary and secondary schools do not typically have stadiums.
Wrt 1, teachers buy out of pocket and request classroom supplies such as tissues, chalk, pencils, erasers, notebook paper, art supplies, graph paper, compasses, protractors, safety scissors, glue, , hand sanitizer, etc
Cattywampus knows what's up
Textbooks are a racket and not just for college students.
Most of the money spent on education involves grifts for stuff like that, not for actual important shit like schools or teachers.
Comparing things like this between countries is not straightforward. For example, Australia spends $14.1k per student while New Zealand spends $8.6k. That's about 5.2% of GDP for both countries. From those numbers, would we conclude that Australia is overpaying, or New Zealand is underpaying, or that the two countries are comparable?
https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/education-spending-by-country
Damn, Norway being only 4% of GDP is shocking, because they also pay their teachers well and have great education in general.
I think that goes to my point about simple comparisons being difficult. Norway has a high GDP relative to its size, so 4% might be more than enough for their situation. You also have to account for things like the labor cost of teachers, which varies by country.
Also the sort of things the schools spend money on. I don't know from experience, but I think US schools pay for police officers to be at the school. That seems crazy to me, and expensive.
The real issue is these funds aren’t evenly distributed per student, school districts are funded by property tax which leads to poorer neighborhoods getting considerably less funding.
Not American, and I have no factual answer but I assume it's because the people at the top just take all the money and leave the schools to fend for themselves. Typical corporate nonsense.
You'd think so, and while you're right that the people at the top make way too much money, docking their entire salary at a large district like mine would only be enough to fund maaaaaaaaaaaaybe just under 5% of the schools in our district. And then you'd be left without leadership. If you cut everyone in my pay scale, you'd have enough to fund all the schools and then some, but you wouldn't have teachers, custodians, tech workers, etc.
But here's something interesting: during the pandemic, since athletics funds were already allocated and athletic events were cancelled, we were allowed to use those funds as we saw fit within the district. Suddenly, we were able to feed every student and staff member for free. Yee haw, welcome to Texan education...
Looking at the global median isn't a good comparison, for starters. Many of those school systems aren't comparable.
That said, there's not likely to be one reason. I could guess at them, but I'd rather not since some will inevitably be wrong.
Not the only reason, but the cost of living is higher in the U.S. than most other locales on the planet.
That was my first reaction. I didn't find the global average spending number reported by the OP, but according to this page, the 2019 average spending of $15,500 per student (38% higher than OECD average) did consider purchasing power.
Have to teach kids to beg for the bare essentials early in life. That way they'll never know it could be different.
Because they're already spending $15/student on basics. Anything extra isn't covered. The problem isn't that they're being over-funded...it's that they're under-funded.
Or perhaps the dollars are being factored into to other workstreams in the system. We may be comparing apples to oranges here.
- Do other countries use student busing? If not, are they considering that impact into their public transportation?
- Do other counties have school meal programs?
- Do other countries factor out athletics into its own separate budget?
- what’s the average age of a public school?
- Is sexual education separated into health budgets?
- Physical Plants just cost more in America than most places, as we contract out both the design and construction and sometimes even the planning/permitting. Are these costs being factored in?
- Are the average class sizes per teacher similar?
- Are special needs costs factored in?
I’d first like to understand the diffs of what comprises that 30% more calculation, from there we can explore why the fundraisers are needed.
That's $15,000 not $15. The answer is schools are corrupt fronts for contractors who milk the district of every dollar. Construction, service, demolition, and reconstruction of buildings is expensive!
I don't know the answer to your question, but I buy whatever the kids are selling. And I make like an idiot that knows nothing about it, whatever it is. (separately, am idiot, but I play it up)
I figure, maybe I can help a little? The money is probably negligible towards whatever the need is, but learning to sling popcorn or cookies, that might stoke some spark of pint-size entrepreneurship in them :j
without digging into the numbers, i can pretty confidently say that schools are more than 30% more expensive than the global median in the US. staffing costs especially.