Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, May 12, 1993                   TAG: 9305120346
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A-4   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

SCHOOL MONEY ISN'T ALL, BUT IT'S A FACTOR

Twenty-five high-school students from Southwest Virginia spent a week in schools in the strange land of Fairfax County in Northern Virginia, whose crowded suburban acreage lies across the Potomac River from the nation's capital. Then, 25 from Fairfax County returned the visit, spending a week in the alien climes of Southwest Virginia's rural highlands.

One lesson seems to have been: In education, as in much of life, money isn't everything.

Money cannot buy for Northern Virginians the community and caring spirit of a Mount Rogers school, where enrollment - kindergarten through high school - is only 80 students.

Conversely, money cannot buy for rural Southwest Virginians the easy access to museums, concerts and so forth that Northern Virginians enjoy by being part of a major urban center.

Money, however, can buy some things: teachers and textbooks, courses and computers. Thus, school-funding disparity continues to simmer as a major education issue in Virginia. Even if the state Supreme Court agrees with a lower court that current funding mechanisms do not violate the state Constitution, the issue will linger as a political and fairness question.

Not necessarily, however, simple fairness - for the matter is more complicated than many, including disparity fighters, sometimes are willing to admit.

The fact, for example, that Northern Virginia students get $2,000 or more spent on them each year than do Southwest Virginia students does not in itself prove disparity.

For one thing, education is a labor-intensive enterprise, and it takes more to hire a teacher in high-cost-of-living Northern Virginia.

Additionally, funding disparities are only sometimes a function of a local district's ability to pay, which the state-aid distribution formula is designed to offset. They also can be a function of a community's willingness to pay for schools.

Nevertheless, the anti-disparity forces have telling points in their favor:

State school aid, coupled with a local match based on each localities' tax base, is supposed to cover costs of a basic education for all children. It just doesn't.

Almost all districts, even the poorest or stingiest, must spend more per student to meet minimum standards than is reckoned necessary by the state formula. The extra money is entirely local (as is money spent to make schools better than the minimum), regardless of the locality's tax base.

A portion of the state sales tax is earmarked for schools. In redistribution of this money to local districts, no provision is made for relative wealth or poverty.

Apart from the state's making loans at favorable interest rates, school construction is an entirely local responsibility, without regard to a locality's wealth or poverty. Thus, the state again discriminates against poorer districts and their children.

Money alone won't determine the quality of any student's education. But it's part of the equation. The futures of Virginia youngsters shouldn't be at the mercy of where they happen to live.