Obama Remarks on Math, Science and Technology Education

[*] PRESIDENT OBAMA: Thank you. I am extraordinarily excited to have you all here today.

 

A couple of special acknowledgments I want to make: first of all, two of my outstanding Cabinet members, Secretary Arne Duncan, our education secretary, and Secretary Steven Chu, who is our energy secretary. They are both doing outstanding work each and every day.

 

I want to acknowledge Representative Eddie Bernice Johnson, who is from Texas. And she is one of the members of our Science and Technology Committee and doing outstanding work.

 

NASA Administrator Charlie Bolden is in the house. Where’s Charlie?

 

(LAUGHTER)

 

There he is, right there in front.

 

NSF director, Dr. Arden Bement, is here — right there.

 

Dr. John Holdren, my science and technology adviser. Where’s John?

 

Right there.

 

Melody Barnes, our Domestic Policy Council chair or head, director…

 

(LAUGHTER)

 

… director.

 

And then we’ve got some students from some — some wonderful students from some wonderful schools. Oakton High School in Vienna, Virginia, Longfellow Middle School in Fairfax, Virginia, the Washington Mathematics Science Technology Public Charter High School here in D.C., and the Herndon High School in Herndon, Virginia.

 

Welcome, everybody.

 

(APPLAUSE)

 

Now, the students from Oakton High School are going to be demonstrating the Cougar Cannon designed to scoop up and toss moon rocks. I am eager to so what they do, for two reasons. As presidents (sic), I believe that robotics can inspire young people to pursue science and engineering. And I also want to keep an eye on those robots in case they try anything.

 

(LAUGHTER)

 

It’s an honor to be here, and to be joined by Sally Ride, the first American woman in space.

 

Sally?

 

(APPLAUSE)

 

There’s a person who’s inspired a generation of girls and boys to think bigger and set their sights higher. I want to thank NASA and Charlie for providing the interactive globe, an innovative and engaging way of teaching young people about our world.

 

Welcome Myth Busters from Discovery Channel.

 

Where are they?

 

(APPLAUSE)

 

There they are.

 

I hope you guys left the explosives at home.

 

(LAUGHTER)

 

And, finally, allow me to thank the many leaders here today who have agreed be part of the historic effort to inspire and educate a new generation in math and science.

 

You know, we live in a world of unprecedented perils, but also unparalleled potential.

 

Our medical system holds the promise of unlocking new cures, but it’s attached to a health care system that’s bankrupting families and businesses and our government. The sources of energy that power our economy are also endangering our planet. We confront threats to our security that seek to exploit the very openness that is — is essential to our prosperity.

 

And we face challenges in a global marketplace that link the trader to Wall Street to the homeowner on Main Street to the office worker in America to the factory worker in China; an economy in which we all share in opportunity, but we also share, unfortunately, in crisis.

 

The key to meeting these challenges, to improving our health and well-being, to harnessing clean energy, to protecting our security and succeeding in the global economy, will be reaffirming and strengthening America’s role as the world’s engine of scientific discovery and technological innovation.

 

OBAMA: And that leadership tomorrow depends on how we educate our students today, especially in those fields that hold the promise of producing future innovations and innovators.

 

And that’s why education in math and science is so important.

 

Now, the hard truth is that for decades we’ve been losing ground. One assessment shows American 15-year-olds now rank 21st in science and 25th in math when compared to their peers around their world.

 

And this isn’t news. We’ve seen warring statistics like this for years. Yet, time and again, we’ve let partisan and petty bickering stand in the way of progress. And time and again as a nation, we’ve let our children down.

 

So I’m here and you are here because we all believe that we can’t allow division and indifference to imperil our position in the world. It’s time for all of us in Washington and across America to take responsibility for our future.

 

And that’s why I’m committed to moving our country from the middle to the top of the pack in science and math education over the next decade.

 

To meet the goal, the Recovery Act included the largest investment in education in history, while preventing hundreds of thousands of educators from being fired because of state budget shortfalls.

 

Under the outstanding leadership of Arne Duncan, we’ve launched a $4 billion Race to the Top fund, one of the largest investments in education reform in history.

 

And through the Race to the Top, states won’t just be receiving funding; they’ll have to compete for funding. And in this competition, producing the most innovative programs in math and science will be an advantage.

 

In addition, we are challenging states to improve achievement by raising standards, using data to better inform decisions and take new approaches to turn around struggling schools.

 

And because a great teacher is the single most important factor in a great education, we’re asking states to focus on teacher effectiveness and to make it possible for professionals, like many of the people in this room, to bring their experience and enthusiasm into the classroom.

 

But you are here because you know that the success we seek is not going to be attained by government alone. It depends on the dedication of students and parents and the commitment of private citizens, organizations and companies. It depends on all of us.

 

And that’s why, back in April, at the National Academy of Sciences, I issued a challenge: to encourage folks to think of new and creative ways of engaging young people in science and engineering. And we are here because the leaders in this room answered that call to action.

 

Today we are launching the Educate to Innovate Campaign, a nationwide effort to help reach the goal this administration has set: moving to the top in science and math education in the next decade.

 

We’ve got leaders from private companies and universities, foundations and nonprofits and organizations representing millions of scientists, engineers and teachers from across America.

 

OBAMA: The initial commitment of the private sector to this campaign is more than $260 million, and we only expect the campaign to grow.

 

Business leaders from Intel, Xerox, Kodak and Time Warner Cable are teaming up with Sally Ride and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, as well as the Carnegie Corporation, to find and replicate successful science, math and technology programs all across America.

 

“Sesame Street” has become a two-year initiative to teach young kids about math and science, and Discovery Communications is going to deliver interactive science content to 60,000 schools, reaching 35 million students.

 

These efforts extend beyond the classroom. Time Warner Cable is joining with the Coalition for Science After School and FIRST Robotics, the program created by inventor Dean Kamen, which gave us the Cougar Cannon to connect 1 million students with fun after-school activities like robotics competitions.

 

The MacArthur Foundation and industry leaders like Sony are launching a nationwide challenge to design compelling, freely available science-related video games.

 

And organizations representing teachers, scientists, mathematicians and engineers, joined by volunteers in the community, are participating in a grassroots effort called National Lab Day to reach 10 million young people with hands-on learning. Students will launch rockets, construct miniature windmills and get their hands dirty. They’ll have the chance to build and create, and maybe destroy just a little bit…

 

(LAUGHTER)

 

… to see the promise of being the makers of things, and not just the consumers of things.

 

The administration is participating as well.

 

We’ve already had a number of science-focused events with young people at the White House, including astronomy night a few weeks ago.

 

The National Science Foundation and the Department of Energy, under the leadership of a terrific scientist, Steven Chu, have launched an initiative to inspire tens of thousands of students to pursue careers in clean energy. And today I am announcing that we are going to have an annual science fair at the White House with the winners of national competitions in science and technology.

 

You know, if you win the NCAA championship, you come to the White House. Well, if you’re a young person and you produce the best experiment or design, the best hardware or software, you ought to be recognized for that achievement, too. Scientists and engineers ought to stand side by side with athletes and entertainers as role models. And here at the White House, we’re going to lead by example. We’re going to show young people how cool science can be.

 

Through these efforts, we’re going to expand the scope and scale of science and math education all across America. And we’re going to expand opportunities for all our young people, including women and minorities who too often have been underrepresented in scientific and technological fields, but who are no less capable of succeeding in math and science and pursuing careers that will help improve our lives and grow our economy.

 

I also want to note that this is only the beginning. We’re going to challenge the private sector to partner with community colleges, for example, to help train the workers of today for the jobs of tomorrow, even as we make college more affordable, so that by 2010 America once again leads the world in producing college graduates.

 

OBAMA: Now, I have to say to the young people who are here, we can’t let students off the hook. In the end, the success of this campaign depends on them. But I believe strongly that America’s young people will rise to the challenge if given the opportunity, and given a little bit of a push.

 

We’ve got to work together to create these opportunities because our future depends on them.

 

And I just want to mention the importance not only for students but also of parents.

 

You know, I was in Asia, I think, many of you are aware, for a week. And I was having lunch with the president of South Korea, President Lee. And I was interested in the education policy — they’ve grown enormously over the last 40 years — and I asked them what are the biggest challenges in your education policy.

 

He said, you know, “The biggest challenge that I have is that my parents are too demanding.”

 

(LAUGHTER)

 

He said, “Even if somebody is dirt poor, they are insisting that their kids are getting the best education.” He said, “I’ve had to import thousands of foreign teachers because their all insisting that Korean children have to learn English in elementary school.”

 

That was the biggest education challenge that he had was an insistence, a demand from parents for excellence in the schools.

 

And the same thing was true when I went to China. And I was talking to the mayor of Shanghai, and I asked him about — how he was doing recruiting teachers, given that they’ve got 25 million people in this one city.

 

He said, “We don’t have problems recruiting teachers because teaching is so revered and the pay scales for teachers are actually comparable to doctors and other professions.”

 

That gives you a sense of what is happening around the world. There is a hunger for knowledge, an insistence on excellence, a reverence for science and math and technology and learning. That used to be what we were about. That’s what we’re going to be about again.

 

And I have to say that this doesn’t get a lot of focus. Not once was I asked about education policy during my trip by the press, and oftentimes events like this get short shrift. They’re not what’s debated on cable.

 

But this is probably going to make more of a difference in determining how well we do as a country than just about anything else that we do here.

 

And everyone in this room understands how important science and math can be. It goes beyond the facts in a biology textbook or the questions on an algebra quiz.

 

OBAMA: It’s about the ability to understand our world, to harness and train that human capacity to solve problems and think critically: a set of skills that informs the decisions we make throughout our lives.

 

So, yes, improving education in math and science is about producing engineers and researchers and scientists and innovators who are going to help transform our economy and our lives for the better. But it’s also about something more.

 

It’s about expanding opportunity for all Americans in a world where an education is the key to success. It’s about an informed citizenry in an era where many of the problems we face as a nation are at root scientific problems.

 

And it’s about the power of science to not only unlock new discoveries, but to unlock in the minds of our young people a sense of promise, a sense that, with some hard work, with effort, they have the potential to achieve extraordinary things.

 

Now, this is a difficult time in our country and it would be easy to grow cynical and wonder if America’s best days are behind us, especially at a time of economic uncertainty, especially when we’ve seen so many, from Wall Street to Washington, fail to take responsibility for so long.

 

But I believe we have an opportunity now to move beyond the failures of the recent past and to recapture that spirit of American innovation and optimism.

 

This nation wasn’t built on greed. It wasn’t built on reckless risk. It wasn’t built on short-term gains and short-sighted policies. It was forged of stronger stuff by bold men and women who dared to invent something new or improve something old, who took big chances on big ideas, who believed that in America all things are possible.

 

That’s our history. And if we remain fixed on the work ahead, and if we build on the progress we’ve made to date, this is going to be our legacy as well.

 

So, with that, just as proof of the extraordinary promise of American young people, I’d like to invite Steven Harris (ph) and Brian Ortelano (ph) from Oakton High — High School to come up here and demonstrate what their team has built. And it’s flashing, so far. I don’t see it whirling.

 

(LAUGHTER)

 

Where are they?

 

Give them a big round of applause.

 

(APPLAUSE)

 

All right. What do we got going here?

 

(UNKNOWN): So, we built our robot to compete in a competition called (inaudible).

 

(LAUGHTER)

 

And so, the object of the game is to shoot the balls, that they called the moon rocks, into moving goals (inaudible) team’s robots.

 

OBAMA: OK.

 

(LAUGHTER)

 

(UNKNOWN): And (inaudible).

 

OBAMA: OK.

 

(LAUGHTER)

 

All right, let’s see it toss the ball.

 

(LAUGHTER)

 

Now, what are they aiming at right now?

 

(LAUGHTER)

 

(CROSSTALK)

 

(END OF COVERAGE)

 

 

If I ever again hear the word “hard-wired” used to describe anything other than an electrical system—the human brain, for instance—I’m going to scream. Even allowing for the unfortunate fact that old ideas in science tend not to die out until the mandarins who hold those ideas are in their graves, the dogma of the hard-wired brain has endured for an inexcusably long time given the evidence against it. The motor cortex is supposedly hard-wired, its left half controlling the right side of the body and its right half controlling the left side. But therapy developed for stroke patients can coax the left motor cortex to move the left side of the body, taking over for the stroke-damaged right motor cortex. Even our visual cortex, which you’d think would be as hard-wired as hard-wired can be given the centrality of vision, can change jobs: when people spend a week blindfolded and receive intense tactile stimulation (feeling Braille dots), the visual cortex switches from processing what the eyes send to what the fingertips send, scientists led by Harvard’s Alvaro Pascual-Leone reported in August. Something similar happens in people who are blind from birth. So much for hard-wired.

If not even a structure as fundamental as the visual cortex is hard-wired, can we please retire the claim that boy brains are hard-wired for math and girl brains are not?

There is no denying that, at the elite levels of math, men vastly outnumber women. Women received 27 percent of the Ph.D.s in math awarded by American universities from 1993 to 2002, edging up to a still-woeful 29 percent last year. They make up only 19 percent of the tenure-track faculty in math departments. No woman has ever won a Fields Medal, the “math Nobel.” The Study of Mathematically Precocious Youth, which looks at kids younger than 13 who score 700 or above on the math part of the SAT, found a 13-to-1 boy-girl imbalance, implying what the researchers called “superior male mathematical ability.”

Now for the “however” part. That 13-to-1 ratio was true in 1983. In 2005 it fell to 2.8 to 1. Nothing in the brain that is “hard-wired” can change that quickly. Cross-cultural data on young people with off-the-scale math ability are even more telling, as researchers will report in next month’s issue of the Notices of the American Mathematical Society. They combed the last 20 years of results of the world’s premier math competitions, such as the International and U.S. Mathematical Olympiads and the Putnam Competition (with 12 problems so difficult, most of the 3,500 or so undergrads who take it get none right; the top 25 get five or so right). What was striking was where top-scoring girls come from. Of the 11 girls among the top 25 Putnam scorers in the past 16 years, eight were foreign-born.

The International Mathematical Olympiad, a nine-hour, six-problem exam, showed the same pattern. The highly ranked Bulgarian, East German/German and U.S.S.R./Russian teams have included 21, 19 and 15 girls, respectively, compared with three on U.S. teams. Over the years, 20 percent of the members of Russia’s Olympiad teams were girls, as were one quarter of some other teams. U.S. teams had no girls for 23 straight years; Japan had one in 19 years. Since 1988, Bulgarian girls have won twice as many medals in the international Olympiad as American girls; Russian girls have won three times as many. Countries whose girls excel in the Olympiad have rigorous national math curricula and cultures that encourage girls as well as boys who excel in math. “Whether mathematical ability is identified depends on social, cultural and other environmental factors,” says Janet Mertz of the University of Wisconsin, who led the study. Not only “identified,” but “nurtured”: all the top Putnam scorers received extracurricular training in problem solving. In addition to being mathematically gifted, these kids had to choose to spend free time learning problem-solving strategies. Countries whose girls lag behind boys tend to see math as for nerds only, which drives away many U.S. girls (who are more sensitive to social status than boys).

For anyone still grasping for biological explanations for the math gender gap, consider neighboring countries with a common gene pool, such as the former East Germany and West Germany, or Slovakia and the Czech Republic. The first of each pair regularly sent many more girls to the Olympiad—by margins of 5 to 0 and 3 to 1, respectively. (NOTE: The original version of this column incorrectly stated these numbers.) It’s hard to see that as anything but the result of the starkly different social and other environmental forces in each country, not intrinsic biology. How powerfully do social forces affect brain function? In a 2007 study, girls reminded of the girls-are-spatially-challenged stereotype did worse on a test of spatial ability than those who were not, and brain imaging showed why: they had higher activity in the anterior cingulate, the site of negative emotions such as anger and sadness, and lower activity in high-order visual areas and complex working memory areas, found Maryjane Wraga of Smith College. Anxiety triggered by social forces had muted activity required for spatial reasoning. Scale that up to years of messages telling girls they’re intrinsically inferior and then try to argue that a hard-wired brain rather than the messages society sends explains the math gender gap.

© 2008

Free scholarly material is becoming more available on the internet, and a new web site offers hundreds of free, peer-reviewed articles to college students, including those with non-scientific academic focuses.

Scitable, a site introduced by the well-respected Nature Publishing Group, has more than 200 articles that concentrate mostly on genetics. The submissions are crafted in a way that is applicable to college students, not just scientists and academicians.

Scitable’s January launch came as elite universities across the United States are embracing open-access formats–making research articles available for free online. This marks an abrupt departure from the traditional model of printing research articles in academic journals, which can cost campuses as much as $20,000 annually, open-access experts say. As university budgets stagnate, journal subscriptions are proving unaffordable for even the richest American campuses.

Clare O’Connor, an associate professor in Boston College’s Biology Department, said Scitable articles could be an asset for professors looking to supplement their courses with material that doesn’t come with the skyrocketing costs of textbooks.

O’Connor said she will use Scitable in her undergraduate genetics course next fall, in part because the site’s articles appeal to students who don’t major in scientific fields.

“I know not every [student] is really interested in becoming a scientist,” she said. “But I believe it’s important to have a working knowledge of genetics.”

Vikram Savkar, senior vice president and publishing director of Nature Education, said Scitable’s archive of articles could make genetics more appealing to college students.

“Students find science very intimidating in the way it’s presented to them,” Savkar said, adding that about 40 percent of college students who start their academic careers in a science major switch fields before they graduate. “Science is difficult, and it is rigorous … and we want to make it more clear without dumbing it down.”

With President Obama committed to funding university-based scientific research–Yale University received $3.9 million on April 8 for research on human embryonic stem-cell research, for example–Savkar said it will be important to shepherd the next generation of scientists from the lecture hall to the laboratory.

“But first, they need to start to get a deeper sense of how hypotheses are formed and how the empirical process of science actually works,” he said. “We’re trying to expose students as early as possible.”

One Scitable article written by O’Connor reviews chromosomes’ role in heredity, the ways scientists analyze chromosomes, and chromosome-related abnormalities and diseases. Once a student is finished reading the article, he or she can scroll down and see more articles related to the same topic, eliminating the complex searching process prevalent on some academic web sites.

Free scholarly material is becoming more available on the internet, and a new web site offers hundreds of free, peer-reviewed articles to college students, including those with non-scientific academic focuses.

www.scitable.com

NCAA struggles to find appropriate balance in an era of social networking and technology.

Some students and other fans of college sports have to be careful about the company they keep on Facebook and other social-networking web sites, or they might get themselves — and the program they support — in trouble.

That was the lesson last week for Taylor Moseley, a North Carolina State freshman who expressed a common-enough opinion on campus when he started a Facebook group called “John Wall PLEASE come to NC STATE!!!!”

More than 700 people signed up for the group encouraging Wall–a local standout and the nation’s No. 1 basketball recruit–to pick the Wolfpack by national signing day this week.

But the NCAA says such sites, and dozens more like them wooing Wall and other top recruits, violate its rules. More than just cheerleading boards, the NCAA says the sites are an attempt to influence the college choice of a recruit.

Moseley got a cease-and-desist letter from N.C. State’s compliance director, Michelle Lee, warning of “further action” if he failed to comply. In an interview with the Associated Press April 10, Lee said that people who act as boosters but fail to follow recruiting guidelines could face penalties such as being denied tickets or even being formally “disassociated” from the athletic program.

Adam Kissel, director of the Individual Rights Defense Program at the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, said the NCAA can impose rules on its member colleges. But universities–especially public ones–can’t enforce them if it means punishing students in any way for expressing an opinion.

“A student doesn’t lose First Amendment rights because of a contract the university signs with [the NCAA],” he said.

Moseley, the student, didn’t respond to a request for comment, but the group has been renamed “Bring a National Title back to NC STATE!” and features a photo of Wall.

Though Lee sent Moseley the tough warning, even she finds the rule exasperating. The NCAA, she says, simply isn’t keeping up with the technology reality.

“I think nationally the NCAA needs to address … Facebook and how these groups play a part in recruiting,” she said. “Is it realistic for us to be able to monitor them? What harm is a group like this causing? But as the legislation stands right now, this is the position we have to take.”

NCAA spokesman Erik Christianson said the group considers its rules “technology neutral.” A Facebook page is simply a high-tech way to try to influence recruits, he said.

The NCAA’s concern is “intrusions into a high school student’s life when [he or she is] trying to decide where to go to college,” Christianson said. He said the NCAA is keeping up with technology, noting new rules on text messaging from coaches.

Christianson said the NCAA expects institutions to act as N.C. State did, reaching out to the creators of such groups to “educate” them about the rules. He added that he was not aware the NCAA had ever initiated any action related to a Facebook group or notified an institution about one.
Students and other fans of college sports have to be careful about the company they keep on Facebook and other social-networking web sites, or they might get themselves — and the program they support — in trouble.

The Arizona Republic

Many school districts in the Valley are planning big staffing and program cuts as they prepare to absorb millions of dollars of lost education funding. State-imposed cuts are compounding budget problems for many districts, which are already dealing with failed bonds and overrides, decreased tax revenue, and funding cuts due to declining enrollment. Districts are planning for the worst because they have to reduce costs in time to meet a fast-approaching budget deadline without knowing exactly by how much their state funding might be reduced.

The Scottsdale Unified School District recently announced that it would cut 221 teacher positions in next year’s budget. Paradise Valley Unified could cut 184 teacher, clerical and administrative positions. Mesa Public Schools, which could have to cut $30 million-$60 million, expects to have to ax 310 teacher spots and 130 other positions. District administrators have spent the past month crunching numbers and creating worst-case scenarios to prepare for potentially more than $900 million in cuts to K-12 funding in the 2009-10 state budget. The Legislature is trying to close an estimated $3 billion budget shortfall. Cuts will never reach those heights, according to Rep. John Kavanagh, R-Fountain Hills, chairman of the House Appropriations Committee. “That’s a menu. We haven’t decided on anything and they’ll be nowhere near that number,” Kavanagh said. “I would never let that happen. We will be way, way below that.” But Valley districts find themselves in a bind. Even though districts do not have to approve budgets until July 15, they have to notify employees by April 15 whether they will be offered a contract for 2009-10, said Chuck Essigs, director of governmental relations for the Arizona Association of School Business Officials. “They would take a terminal risk by not notifying a significant number of teachers to be able to survive the worst-case budget-cut scenario,” Essigs said.

President Barack Obama’s federal-stimulus funds, which would mean roughly $832 million for Gov. Jan Brewer to spend on education, should offset education cuts. Schools are also expected to directly receive about $195 million in funding for low-income students and about $184 million in special-education funding, spread over two years. But the U.S. Department of Education has not yet created guidelines for how to spend the education funds, leaving districts uncertain on a time line for aid and on where it could be spent. Districts should see the money by July 1. Scottsdale, like many districts, spends about 90 percent of its $169 million operating budget on salaries and benefits. Facing $28 million in budget cuts, the district has plans to cut at least 28 administrators and 37 classified staff in addition to the planned teacher layoffs. Some districts are holding out hope that legislative cuts will be lighter than expected, but Scottsdale’s co-interim superintendent, David Peterson, did not wait to tackle possible cuts. “I have to be prudent, I have to be fiscally responsible . . . I have to build a budget based on the information that’s been given to me,” Peterson said. Peoria Unified, which could see as much as $37 million in cuts, would have to trim 700 certified staff, many of whom are teachers. John Wright, president of the Arizona Education Association, estimated that thousands of Valley teachers will lose their jobs and many will leave the profession. “This wreaks havoc on peoples’ lives, on their home lives, on their professional lives, on their planning for next year,” Wright said. Districts will make deep cuts and then “cross their fingers” that they’ll be able to call people back. Administrators will also look to run schools with fewer and fewer resources, which means larger class sizes, salary and hiring freezes, reduced materials and supplies, lowered utility costs by raising temperatures in the classroom, and fewer custodians. “Just go down the kinds of things that you’re paying for outside of personnel and you’ll begin to see the impact,” Wright said.

In Scottsdale, high-school athletics will move to “pay for play” and elementary- and middle-school principals will have to decide whether to keep band and strings programs. “It’s very sad that they’re considering music and band in the elementary school so that children will not be able to learn an instrument until middle school unless they take lessons privately,” said Sandi Kravetz, a Scottsdale parent of two middle-school students. Pawitter Mangat, a Gilbert father of three, said the state needs to keep class sizes low. “If the student is not able to get attention in the class, if the student is not able to swim, he or she sinks,” Mangat said.

Avondale Elementary School District already announced that it would be laying off 38 employees because of declining enrollment. The district could see further layoffs due to state budget cuts, losing up to $6 million of its $34 million operating budget. The administration is looking at hiring freezes, pay decreases for all staff, and transportation reductions, Superintendent Cathy Stafford said. “We’ve got to be prepared for anything,” Stafford said. The state needs to find a way to invest in schools, Kravetz said. Arizona is already ranked 49th in per-pupil funding, as rated by Education Week. “Whether that means we need more taxes, all I can tell you is if you think education is expensive, try ignorance,” Kravetz said.

Republic reporters Pat Kossan, Ray Parker, Emily Gersema, Chelsea Schneider, Megan Gordon, Eugene Scott, Sadie Jo Smokey and Jeffrey Javier contributed to this article.