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The Future of New Hampshire's Public Schools Is on the Ballot
Our students deserve so much better than the chaos the legislature has thrown at our public schools. It’s vital that communities across New Hampshire vote no on the tax cap on November 3.
Nov 02, 2026
On Election Day, New Hampshire residents will face a ballot initiative that aims to place a tax cap on every public school district in the state. Similar proposals to cap property taxes or eliminate them for certain property owners are on the ballots this November in multiple states. But regardless of where the initiatives are being considered, if successful, the financial consequences will threaten school sports, extracurriculars, and even basic academic programming statewide. In the case of New Hampshire, the consequences will be especially negative to schools, families, and children.
At least since the Covid-19 pandemic, New Hampshire school districts have struggled to stay afloat. In September 2026, the town of Milton, New Hampshire was shocked by revelations of a $2.5 million hole in its school district’s budget. Nearby, the Farmington School District was forced to reduce teaching positions in the 2025-2026 school year due to a growing budget deficit. In the western part of the state, Claremont schools cut teaching positions and students washed cars to raise funds. At the same time, New Hampshire launched a universal voucher program to the tune of $102 million, sending a record amount of public money to private schools.
Historically, New Hampshire has largely left local communities to fund public schools on their own. In the 2024-2025 academic year, according to data from the National Education Association, New Hampshire ranked 50th in the share of state revenue contributed to public schools, at 28%. While some argue that New Hampshire has maintained level funding in real tax dollars, the state has simply not made budget increases on pace with rising costs, leaving local taxpayers holding the bill.
The new approach intrudes on that time-honored process of collective decision-making through deliberation. Instead, it places school funding into the hyper-partisan environment of the midterms.
In 2026, a superior court ruled the state had not been fulfilling its constitutional responsibility to provide adequate funding to public schools. New Hampshire Attorney General John Formella is appealing the case to the state’s supreme court, where he is also attempting to overturn the landmark 1993 case that established the state’s responsibility to provide fair funding to all public schools.
In this context, a local tax cap for schools would be detrimental for students and communities in general. While New Hampshire does not allow for statewide referendums on its ballots, legislators supporting the tax cap circumvented this with clever legislation. In 2025, Republican Gov. Kelly Ayotte signed HB 1300 into law, a measure that automatically places a tax cap question on the ballot of every municipality in the state in 2026 and in 2028.
The ballot measure was challenged on multiple fronts in court, including on the lack of clear constitutional standing and on account of being difficult to understand. The state supreme court, which has been plagued by scandals—including the chief justice’s resignation in September over an ethics violation—ultimately rejected these challenges.
The tax cap will require a three-fifths approval of local voters to go into effect. If enacted, it would limit local control of the schools with a tax cap that is linked to the Consumer Price Index (CPI), which, by nature of being tied to non-salary costs, is unpredictable on a year-to-year basis and can easily be outpaced by school costs, especially with rising fuel prices. It would also impose a limit on administrative spending as a proportion of the total school budget.
The effort to institute a tax cap defies New Hampshire’s long history of local control. It’s a tradition that brings residents of towns across the state together for town halls each spring, where school budgets are debated publicly. The process honors the citizens’ right to petition and write warrant articles that meet the specific needs of the locality, including placing limits on spending, if that is the collective will of the people. The new approach intrudes on that time-honored process of collective decision-making through deliberation. Instead, it places school funding into the hyper-partisan environment of the midterms.
Marianne Doane, who has taught in Milton for more than 40 years, is dedicated to its youth. As the president of the local teachers association, Doane has worked across differences to build support for her students and their education. She has organized babysitting services during town meetings to help provide childcare for parents who otherwise might not be able to participate. She has encouraged families to vote by sponsoring civic engagement programming for children outside of polling places. One year, she facilitated an activity for kids to design “I Voted” stickers and handed them out at the polls. In an interview, Doane shakes her head in disbelief about the tenuous position of the schools in her small town.
“Right now if the tax cap passes, the oil bill is $51,000 and the anticipated budget for special education is $500,000,” she says. “In order to come up with that amount, we are looking at losing 12 teachers. We only have 12 teachers at the elementary school. Who’s going to be left to teach?”
Down the road in Farmington, school administrator and veteran classroom teacher Kimberly McGlinchey is running for state representative. Her campaign is centered on defending public schools and addressing the school funding crisis. The district she seeks to represent is split between two towns as part of a legislative gerrymander.
Undeterred by the challenges of running a school and running for office, McGlinchey is clear-eyed about what the tax cap will mean for students.
“The problem with the school property tax cap is it does not consider local needs,” McGlinchey tells The Progressive. “The inflation rate of fuel, food, and materials has increased far more than the CPI. This means there will be a direct impact on programming and staffing that affects student learning and instruction, depleting the quality of New Hampshire students’ education. Limiting the funds without proper budgeting in relationship to needs will ultimately leave schools shortchanged.” McGlinchey has taken this message to the streets, most recently at the town center.
Some communities, like the town of Franklin, New Hampshire, have had tax caps in place for decades. Franklin teacher and union leader Jennifer Weaver says the town struggles to recruit and retain teachers, adding another burden to the long-term staff.
“We’ve been under a tax cap since the 1980s,” Weaver says. “Our [current] tax cap is strangling our community and school.”
Weaver’s warning about the harm of tax caps must be heeded before it’s too late. It’s all part of a multipronged attack against public schools over the last six years that includes the expansion of school voucher programs that funnel public money to private schools.
Our students deserve so much better than the chaos the legislature has thrown at our public schools. It’s vital that communities across New Hampshire vote no on the tax cap on November 3, and learn more about the systematic effort underway to erode public education.
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What Do You Tell a Child When a Teacher Disparages Her Religion?
The Texas State Board of Education has approved new social studies standards taking effect in 2030 that require teachers to denigrate the religion of Islam with biased, ahistorical, and offensive characterizations.
Oct 21, 2026
What do you tell a child attending public school when her teacher singles out and disparages her religion?
That is the question parents of Muslim children in Texas schools might soon confront. The Texas State Board of Education has approved new social studies standards taking effect in 2030 that require teachers to denigrate the religion of Islam with biased, ahistorical, and offensive characterizations.
One of the most controversial edits would require students to study "the Prophet Mohammed’s brutal military campaigns against Jewish and Christian tribes, the normalization of slavery, and the taking of female captives as harem slaves.”
All students have a right to attend public school without being singled out, stereotyped, or silenced because of their faith.
None of these claims stand up to a neutral reading of history.
Even prominent secular historians recognize that the Prophet and many of the Muslim leaders who followed him protected Jews, Christians, and other religious minorities under their governance; that Islamic law outright banned most forms of slavery and never permitted the type of race-based enslavement practiced in the West; and the Prophet was a married man who never had a so-called "harem."
The new curriculum’s characterization of warfare in Muslim history as "brutal" is also deeply dishonest.
All wars are inherently brutal, yet the new Texas curriculum does not require teachers to describe wars undertaken by the United States, European powers, Israel, Protestant and Catholic empires, the Greeks, the Romans, the Mongols, ancient Israelites, and other historical actors as “brutal.”
“Brutal” is not a historical fact; it is a judgment. Presenting that judgment as objective history crosses a line that public schools should never cross.
For a Muslim child attending public school, the new curriculum's misleading claims about Muslim history and its negative characterization of the Prophet strike directly at her faith, her identity, and the values she holds dear. It tells her that the historic figure her family reveres as a model of mercy, compassion, justice, and dignity is someone her own government has chosen to portray as “brutal."
That is not neutral instruction, and the harm caused by this biased curriculum can extend far beyond the classroom.
The anti-Muslim sentiment expressed by a teacher can follow a student from the classroom, to the cafeteria table, and into conversations with her classmates in the locker room. Imagine being a Muslim teenager when your teacher introduces a lesson that denigrates Islam. Imagine your classmates looking at you and asking, “But you're Muslim. What do you think about that?”
No child should have to sit at a desk while the adult entrusted with teaching her is required to pass judgment on the religious figure she loves or her faith. Muslim students should not be asked to absorb that message in silence, to manage the discomfort of their classmates, or to wonder whether their teacher sees their faith as something dangerous or inferior.
They should not have to listen politely while their most sacred figure is reduced to a state-mandated mischaracterization, then be expected to return to homework, group projects, and hallway conversations as if nothing happened.
A classroom lesson should not become a moment where a Muslim child feels targeted, isolated, or forced to choose between respecting the classroom environment and honoring her own religious identity.
These new standards do more than shape what students learn. They risk increasing anti-Muslim sentiment among non-Muslim students, silencing Muslim students, placing teachers in an extraordinarily difficult position, and creating classrooms where children may feel that their faith and the people they love are subjects of suspicion or contempt.
Texas teachers should teach historical facts about Islam and all religions accurately, fairly, and in their proper context.
Students can learn about the development of Islam; the civilizations it shaped; its contributions to math, science, art, and culture; and the positive and negative events in Muslim history, without reducing an entire faith to biased, dishonest characterizations.
Texas public school teachers have a responsibility to teach about the religion followed by one-fourth of the world’s population with the same fairness, accuracy, and respect it owes to every other faith discussed in their classrooms. No teachers should institutionalize hate or force students to defend, much less denigrate, their own faith
A Muslim student should be able to sit in a Texas history classroom and learn about the past without being forced to agree with the denigration of Islam, her Prophet, or her family’s beliefs. She should not have to listen to the person standing at the front of the room pass judgment on her faith and then be expected to carry that wound quietly through the rest of the school day. She should not have to prove that her faith is worthy of respect, that her family is good, or that she is American enough to belong.
All students have a right to attend public school without being singled out, stereotyped, or silenced because of their faith. Their faith belongs here. Their dignity belongs here. And their classrooms belong to them, too.
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California Overrules School Districts to Censor Palestine
The systematic pattern that has developed within California school districts is alarming: File complaints citing antisemitism whenever schools, educators, or students show support for Palestine, then appeal at the state level to overrule the districts.
Oct 08, 2026
The views, analysis, and opinions expressed in this article belong solely to the author. They do not represent the official stance, policy, or position of Berkeley Independent Study, the Berkeley Federation of Teachers, the Berkeley Unified School District, or any affiliated organization.
Colorful, progressive posters fill the walls in Room 202 of Berkeley High School's Independent Study Program. A Rainbow Coalition poster features Fred Hampton with the phrase, "In Unity, there is survival." The Black Panther Party, IWW Local 8, Somos El 99%, Louise Olivereau, Marie Equi, environmental justice, and other progressive causes are represented.
Palestine posters fit in with the milieu of the room. "Berkeley Educators for Palestine," "Stop the Bombing, Free Free Palestine," and "Stop the Israeli-US Genocide in Palestine" are included.
What is uncommon is to bypass teachers and administrators and go straight to a civil rights complaint, unless the complaint is about Palestine, and the people making the complaint are connected to the Brandeis Center.
These posters, along with one titled "Standing with Muslims Against Islamophobia and Racism," resulted in an official complaint filed through the District Civil Rights and Compliance Office of the Berkeley Unified School District (BUSD). No teachers or staff were aware of any concerns surrounding the posters until they were contacted by a district-hired attorney.
Jonas LaMattery-Brownell, Berkeley Federation of Teachers (BFT) co-site representative at Berkeley Independent Study (BIS), told me in an interview, "Some colleagues of mine who were most targeted by the investigation were Jewish, and were horrified that support for Palestine was getting weaponized against them and the school."
Public schools are accustomed to resolving issues in-house. It's not uncommon for students to feel discomfort, and for parents to voice their concerns with teachers and administrators. These concerns often result in meaningful discussions and a better educational environment for everyone.
What is uncommon is to bypass teachers and administrators and go straight to a civil rights complaint, unless the complaint is about Palestine, and the people making the complaint are connected to the Brandeis Center.
Antisemitism Charges
Kenneth Marcus, former Trump official and founder of the Brandeis Center, wrote openly about filing “high-profile cases alleging unlawful antisemitic harassment” in "Standing up for Jewish Students" (Jerusalem Post, 2013). Marcus writes, “These cases—even when rejected—expose administrators to bad publicity... The only way to win these cases is to file them, even when we see some or most rejected.”
The Brandeis Center filed a 41-page complaint in 2024 with the US Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights against BUSD, alleging that “BUSD teachers are using BUSD resources to teach anti-Israel propaganda and promote walkouts demeaning Israelis and calling for the elimination of Jews."
BUSD Superintendent Enikia Ford Morthel testified before Congress that "antisemitism is not pervasive in [the] Berkeley Unified School District" after conducting 12 investigations of complaints filed through the District Civil Rights and Compliance Office. In Berkeleyside, the Berkeley Jewish Parents for Collective Liberation called the Brandeis Center claims "tired, fully investigated, and determined to be baseless."
Liz Jackson, director of K-12 Legal Defense and former senior attorney at Palestine Legal, interviewed multiple witnesses to determine the veracity of the Brandeis Center complaints. Addressing the claim that students during the walkout were screaming "Kill the Jews," Jackson told me in an interview, "I've talked to a lot of students and teachers who were supervising or participating in the walkout and no one can verify that. There was definitely not a chant that was loud that students were chanting in unison. I think it's probably fabricated based on what else they fabricate."
Jackson is aware of about 20 complaints filed over the last two years, all of which involve Palestine. The allegations typically fall into the following categories:
- True, but not antisemitic;
- Fabricated; and
- A grain of truth, but grossly exaggerated.
Jackson states: "They paint a picture by blurring a mix of 1, 2, and 3 to create a picture of rampant, systematic antisemitism. They are manufacturing a curriculum causation theory, which is that teaching about Palestine causes antisemitic bullying."
According to Jackson, the small group of "parents who are pushing this stuff are largely from abundantly resourced, owning class families, while the children who are targeted are largely working class refugees." In 2024, the Brandeis Center tax forms reported $18 million in grants following the Hamas attacks when many official complaints were launched.
The norm is that complaints are filed, usually by parents or external organizations, citing Palestine and claiming antisemitism, then BUSD hires its own attorneys to investigate.
The Palestine posters at BIS were found by BUSD to be one-sided, but not discriminatory, citing insufficient evidence that any student expressed discomfort. The complainants appealed to the California Department of Education (CDE), which overruled the district and found the posters discriminatory, mandating antisemitism training for all BIS staff.
CDE Intervention—Assembly Bill 715
The game-changer is Assembly Bill 715, which passed in October 2025 despite "overwhelming opposition from educators, students, and civil rights advocates," including the American Civil Liberties Union, California Teachers Association, Arab-American Anti-Discrimination Committee, and Jewish Voice For Peace. AB 715 states:
This bill would establish that discriminatory bias in instruction and school-sponsored activities does not require a showing of direct harm to members of a protected group and would not require members of a protected group to be present while the discriminatory bias is occurring for the act to be considered discriminatory bias. If the governing board or body of the local educational agency finds that instruction or school-sponsored activities are discriminatory, as provided, the bill would require corrective action to be taken, as provided.
The Jerusalem Declaration on Antisemitism brought together hundreds of scholars from Holocaust history, Jewish studies, and Middle East studies to provide the following definition of antisemitism: "Antisemitism is discrimination, prejudice, hostility,or violence against Jews as Jews (or Jewish institutions as Jewish)." Additional guidelines include that antisemitism is not "supporting the Palestinian demand for justice and the full grant of their political, national, civil, and human rights, as encapsulated in international law."
According to Mr. LaMattery-Brownell: "It's basic humanity to say that we stand for Palestinian self-determination. Free Palestine is talking about freedom for a people. That's not discrimination. Unless you think that freedom for some people is unfair to everyone else."
CDE Case 2026-0259 found the BIS Palestine posters discriminatory for two reasons
- Conveying a "pro-Palestinian/Muslim message with no corresponding expression of support for Israel/Jews," ignoring the Holocaust posters mentioned elsewhere in the letter; and
- Conveying "an anti-Israel/Jewish message referencing 'genocide' in Palestine without any corresponding negative reference to the Hamas attack on Israel in October 2023."
The Hamas attack on October 7 took the lives of approximately 1,200 Israelis. Since then, according to the United Nations, the Israeli military has taken the lives of approximately 72,000 Palestinians. There is a 60-fold discrepancy here. The imbalance lies in the facts.
The term "genocide" is explicitly referenced by the CDE as "an anti-Israeli/Jewish message." This assumption is unsubstantiated. Many Jewish students, parents, and staff have spoken out in Berkeley in support of Palestine and against the US and Israeli-led genocide, and over 1,400 Israeli academics signed a petition calling for an end to the war in Gaza in 2024. Critiquing genocide and wars is an act of civic responsibility for all citizens, Israelis and Jewish Americans included.
Following October 7, the Brandeis Center claimed that "Jewish and Israeli students have since been subjected to nonstop antisemitic bullying and harassment by their teachers and peers, in hallways, in classrooms, and in school yards." BUSD investigations have found otherwise. And BUSD teachers have experienced the opposite.
Teacher Harassment
Candiss Youngblood, an art teacher at Berkeley High School (BHS) interviewed for this article, was the subject of five different civil rights complaints. Her offense? She wears a patch, approved by administrators, with a heart and rose that states, "Free Palestine."
Students organized a Grief Circle that Ms. Youngblood participated in following the casualties after October 7. The students made a template poster that read, "My hope for Israel and Palestine," followed by open space to communicate their wishes. The posters were hung up for display at BHS, but "late that night, after hours," Ms. Youngblood reported, "admin went and took them all down." Ms. Youngblood was told that the Grief Circle was a "misuse of district funds."
Investigations and disciplinary action followed. Ms. Youngblood was written up for purchasing art supplies from a dollar store that were never used. Harassment followed as parents accused her of antisemitism in mass emails and students hid behind bushes outside her windows to photograph her classroom. "It was scary to be here," said Ms. Youngblood. "Admin wasn't saying we couldn't wear stuff, but they also weren't preventing any harassment from the community."
Weaponizing support for Palestine as antisemitic is coming not just from extremists trying to control public education, but from the State of California.
Ms. Youngblood was a witness to a complaint issued against the Berkeley High Safety Committee, of which she was a member, because they added a norm to combat white supremacy. According to Ms. Youngblood, ActNowK12.org charged that "we were using that norm as a way to silence their participation in the meetings." ActNowK12.org is a collaboration of California Jewish Grassroots Groups and the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) that offers its website as a means to report antisemitism.
Dan Brownson, a BUSD clerical worker and former Berkeley Council of Classified Employees (BCCE) union rep was asked to defend a BUSD staff member investigated for wearing a keffiyeh. Brownson told me in an interview that the complaint was filed by ActNowK12.org, and the investigation revealed that no specific student or parent actually complained. Brownson said: "They asked how it might make an Israeli or Jewish student feel to see the keffiyeh. I said, are we going to go on feelings now?"
Brownson was asked to represent the staff member on account of his own experience fighting spurious claims of antisemitism and dealing with an administrator who yelled at him for refusing to take down a pro-Palestine poster in his cubicle unless the administrator could show him where he was breaking the law, which she could not. Brownson was fired at the end of the year before obtaining a new position.
Mandated Trainings Across California
The ambiguity of the law surrounding an educator's freedom of political speech gives Assembly Bill 715 unprecedented power. Weaponizing support for Palestine as antisemitic is coming not just from extremists trying to control public education, but from the State of California. Appeals of complaints are underway across the state and corrective actions are being widely dispersed.
The entire staff and student body of King Middle School in BUSD were mandated a training on antisemitism by the CDE following a SSWANA (South Asian, Southwest Asian, North African) assembly due to students wearing Palestinian flags; chanting,"Free Palestine"; and excluding Israel from some maps.
District-wide trainings on antisemitism were mandated in the Oakland Unified School District (OUSD) after the CDE overturned multiple cases involving a Palestine teach-in, Palestine posters, a Palestine flag without a corresponding Israeli flag, and Arab American Heritage Month materials omitting Israel from some regional maps.
Conflating support for Palestine with antisemitism sets a dangerous precedent that threatens human rights everywhere.
The Sequoia Union High School District settled a federal lawsuit for $325,000 alleging widespread antisemitism including pro-Hamas propaganda from teachers and discriminatory grading; the settlement included mandatory antisemitism training for all staff. Exhibit A of the settlement mentions "the denial of the Jewish people's right to self-defense" under its expanded definition of antisemitism.
Additional lawsuits in BUSD and the Santa Ana Unified School District over ethnic studies curricula that included Palestine cited antisemitism as did accusations against the Mountain View-Los Altos District who terminated a contract with Acosta Educational Partnerships. All high school teachers and administrators in the Manhattan Beach Unified School District (LA County) were mandated antisemitism training after an AP US History teacher posted slides describing the genocide in Gaza.
Trainings on antisemitism have commenced in BUSD and OUSD with more to come. Authentic teachings on antisemitism are welcome in public education, as are factually relevant discussions on Israel-Palestine. But the systematic pattern that has developed within California school districts is alarming: File complaints citing antisemitism whenever schools, educators, or students show support for Palestine, then appeal at the state level to overrule school districts where the CDE intervenes.
Labeling the BIS Palestine posters discriminatory sends a chilling message of censorship against Palestine throughout BUSD. Conflating support for Palestine with antisemitism sets a dangerous precedent that threatens human rights everywhere. Responding to the CDE decisions, Jackson stated, "They're anti-Arab, they're anti-Palestinian, and they violate our free speech rights and rights to learn."
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'At a Breaking Point': Survey Shows Teachers Working Second Jobs, Spending Hundreds on Supplies
"They are battling education funding cuts, out-of-control Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, limitations on what they can say, much less teach, and an affordability crisis," said one union leader.
Sep 02, 2026
As the academic year kicks off, survey results released Wednesday by the second-largest teachers union in the United States show how educators are struggling because of underinvestment in schools and high prices under a Republican-controlled White House and Congress.
In the lead-up to classes resuming, Grow Progress last month surveyed 2,112 American Federation of Teachers (AFT) members who teach kindergarten through 12th grade about spending, stress, President Donald Trump's policies, and more.
The pollsters found that a majority of respondents anticipate spending at least $100 to $600 on supplies for their classrooms without being reimbursed. Over a quarter said that school funding issues shift costs to teachers, and supply prices keep rising.
While 61% said they are buying basic supplies, that's not all that teachers are shopping for this year. Nearly a third are spending on food, hygiene, and student care items, and around a quarter are purchasing specialized tools and accessibility supports as well as items for classroom setup, organization, and decor. Roughly a fifth are buying books and rewards for students.
Half of the teachers surveyed said they anticipate needing to buy food for their students at some point during this school year.
Over three-quarters of them reported seeing negative impacts of the Trump administration's policies in their schools and communities, with 61% selecting "very negative." They pointed to funding cuts and privatization of schooling, immigration enforcement that "traumatizes students and families," rising costs, vulnerable students losing support and protection, political pressure that restricts teaching and inclusion, and issues with bigotry and hostility.
Gasoline prices have stayed at record highs lately thanks to Trump's illegal war on Iran, which has responded by restricting traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, a key trade route. Just 15% of teachers said their commute will cost about the same this year, compared with 36% who expect it to be "a little more" and 47% worried it will be "much more."
A plurality—48%—blamed Trump and Republicans specifically for "the rising costs of groceries, gas, and other goods," while 28% pointed to government policies and leadership, 18% said tariffs and global instability, and 11% cited corporate greed and profiteering.
Prices for everything are climbing while the national debt races past $40 trillion. The bottom line? The current economy is not working for hardworking Americans. www.nytimes.com/2026/08/29/u...
[image or embed]
— AFT (@aft.org) September 2, 2026 at 9:45 AM
Asked to rank their stress level on a 1-10 scale, with 10 being extremely stressed, 62% selected somewhere in the 7-10 range.
Almost a third of teachers said they were somewhat or very likely to leave the profession in the next year. While over half of all respondents said they can't afford to lose their salary, pension, and benefits, and a quarter pointed to their love for teaching and students, nearly a fifth said the stress and workload make the job unsustainable.
"Teachers are at a breaking point," said AFT president Randi Weingarten said in a statement. "Many work more than one job to make ends meet, and they still dig into their pockets each year for basic classroom supplies, from books to art materials and even food for their students."
"They are battling education funding cuts, out-of-control Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, limitations on what they can say, much less teach, and an affordability crisis that's making it even harder for working families to get by, let alone get ahead," she emphasized. "No wonder they're stressed and talking about leaving the profession. All of this is taking its toll."
The survey results followed a report released late last month by the Center for Economic and Policy Research and the Economic Policy Institute that suggests leaving the field could lead to a pay boost. Sylvia Allegretto, a senior economist at CEPR and research associate at EPI, found that "in 2025, the teacher pay penalty stood at an estimated 25.2%—meaning teachers earned about a quarter less than comparable college graduates in other professions."
"Inflation-adjusted weekly wages for public school teachers fell 6.2% over the last three decades, while wages for other college graduates rose 28.8% over the same period," according to the report. "Teachers typically receive better benefits packages than other professionals, but after accounting for the difference in benefits, teachers' total compensation penalty was 14.5% in 2025."
Allegretto said in a statement that "the decades-long teacher pay penalty has taken a heavy toll on public education. Yet, policymakers have failed to make the needed investments to reverse course. That failure is especially troubling in a country as wealthy as the United States, with more than enough resources for its public schools to be the envy of the world."
It's not just teachers who are contending with soaring costs as school resumes; parents and students are also facing high prices for academic supplies and other essentials, including food, fuel, healthcare, and housing, due to the Iran War, Trump's tariffs, and GOP cuts to key programs.
With the midterm elections just two months away, Senate Democrats on Wednesday released a roundup of recent reporting on how families are struggling with back-to-school season, and said that "as Trump continues to claim affordability is a 'hoax' and a 'con job,' Americans are feeling the strain of Trump's policies on their pocketbooks."
"Headlines from across the country this summer lay bare Trump's cost-of-living crisis as families get ready to send their kids back to school," Senate Democrats stressed. "Parents are worried about the cost of school supplies and their kids' lunches, gas prices are at an all-time high for August, and families' vacations had to be cut short as rising inflation and the cost of airfare hit wallets."
"Trump's attempts to pass the buck belie Americans' reality: His illegal war in Iran, his tariffs, and the rest of Republicans' failed economic policies have made life unaffordable for families nationwide," they added. "Because of President Trump and Republicans' broken promises, working families across the country are now paying more but getting less—and they're fed up."
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Jewish Safety Does Not Require Silencing Muslim Voices
A recent lawsuit where parents at Palo Alto Unified School District sued over a field trip to a mosque is one of the latest manifestations of the policing of California public schools over how Palestine is or is not taught.
Aug 29, 2026
As Jewish-Arab American, I feel the responsibility to work to overturn the dominating narratives that divide my people. I can see clearly the manufactured ill will that has fueled ignorance and the murder of ten of thousands of Palestinians and stripping of the survivors’ dignity. Misinformation about Islam and the silencing of Arab voices are shadows on the wall, distracting us from a deeper truth: that we share a common humanity, and that the best of our cultures and faiths calls us toward kindness, forgiveness, and humility, even as public attention so often fixates on separation.
California has seen a sustained campaign by pro-Israel advocacy organizations to reshape how Palestine is taught—or not taught—in public schools through a plethora of bills aimed to censor ethnic studies, and a recent lawsuit where parents at Palo Alto Unified School District sued over a field trip to a mosque is one of the latest manifestations of the policing of public schools. The lawsuit sparked serious debate on the discretion afforded to public educators in developing course content.
Claims made include that students were encouraged to wear hijabs, that other houses of worship were not included in the class plans, and that students were exposed to a speaker they deemed controversial, Zahra Billoo.
Whatever one’s personal views are on these topics, let’s ground back to facts: A field trip to a mosque isn’t illegal. Lawsuits are often made even in cases where the plaintiff is aware the law wasn’t broken, but the lawsuit itself can be used as a tactic of intimidation and to mobilize negative press attention toward the defendants, as is the case here.
This lawsuit is motivated by a desire to intimidate schools away from exposing students to Islam and speakers who represent the opposite of Israeli propaganda.
Starting with the claim regarding hijabs: Is it illegal to encourage a student to wear the proper attire to enter a space of worship that is optional to enter in the first place? I don’t think so.
Next, a main claim was that “the mosque was the only house of worship included in the program, according to the lawsuit,” as Jweekly put it. This one caused me to pause.
Should you be allowed to take students to a house of worship? If so, then where would we be able to draw the line?
There are hundreds of religions out there. Classes would be going to houses of worship everyday in order to meet the proposed standards. Does it have to be all or nothing? Surely students could be allowed to visit one or two houses of worship without visiting them all, as it would be impossible to determine a reasonable legal standard for this.
I think defining the purpose of the class in question is also very important here. If the purpose of the class is to expose students to minorities, which would be characteristic of a class called “Social Justice Pathway,” it is true that Muslims are minorities in this country. Islamophobia is ironically being triggered online in the responses to this incident.
The Council on American-Islamic Relations is a legal advocacy organization for Muslims. CAIR supports Muslims whose civil rights are directly targeted. It is appropriate to have a representative of that organization address a class focused on social justice. Muslims are materially being denied access and rights based on their religion and identity in the United States. With the other Abrahamic religions being dominant and widely represented, I would assert that Islam is the least represented of the Abrahamic religions in the US and is deserving of students getting a chance to experience it firsthand.
Recent national polling suggests that Muslim Americans experience religious discrimination at higher rates than any other faith group surveyed, including in consequential areas such as employment, housing, banking, healthcare, travel, education, immigration, and interactions with law enforcement.
Another thing that bothered me (but didn’t shock me) about this lawsuit is that it assumes students shouldn’t be exposed to “controversial” speakers. It is hardly illegal for students to hear controversial speakers in school. In fact, a balanced education relies on freedom of ideas and information rather than censorship. Even if a parent finds some of Billoo's statements deeply objectionable, does that mean high school students cannot hear her speak?
Zahra is a staunch supporter of Palestinian rights, and it is convenient for Zionist groups to label her as antisemitic. Articles portraying her as antisemitic rely on the conflation of Judaism and Zionism. Zahra is a supporter of Jewish Voice for Peace and If Not Now, which are composed of Jewish people who refuse to allow Israeli nationalist propaganda to define what it means to be Jewish.
If the plaintiffs are arguing that any discussion of and exposure to Muslims must be accompanied by a discussion of other religious groups—where does that requirement end? Such a rule would be impractical and inappropriate in many educational contexts.
Educators require the agency to make reasonable judgments about which communities and perspectives are relevant to a particular lesson. This lawsuit is motivated by a desire to intimidate schools away from exposing students to Islam and speakers who represent the opposite of Israeli propaganda.
Ultimately, all of this is to say: I reject the premise that protecting Jewish students requires shielding them from Palestinian advocacy or Muslim voices. My Jewishness does not require that.
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Establishment Media: Narrow Wisconsin Loss for Hong Is Massive Defeat for the Left
Her defeat was welcomed by conventional media and pundits impatiently awaiting some sign that a wave of progressive victories was finally being halted by sensibly moderate Midwestern voters. But is this accurate?
Aug 17, 2026
Mainstream media voices reflexively advising “moderate” politics for the Democrats have unveiled a comfortably reassuring explanation of the razor-thin 3,796-vote defeat of democratic socialist Francesca Hong in Wisconsin’s Democratic gubernatorial primary.
Her defeat was welcomed by conventional media and pundits impatiently awaiting some sign that a wave of progressive victories—especially by democratic socialists—was finally being halted by sensibly moderate Midwestern voters. Apparently, Beltway observers had no problem discounting left-wing progressives in places including Pennsylvania, Michigan, Colorado, and most recently with Senate primary winner Peggy Flanagan in Minnesota on August 11.
Wisconsin’s Democratic gubernatorial primary provided the opportunity to serve up a pre-baked narrative favored by many journalists. Following democratic socialist Francesca Hong’s narrow defeat by just 3,796 votes, “The socialists met their match,” The New York Times concluded smugly. Axios similarly declared, “Hong's loss blunts progressives' recent momentum and hands moderate Democrats a chance to prove their electability.“ For other outlets, too, the central narrative was depicted as a decisive repudiation of progressive politics in a swing state.
This theme was rapidly spread across conventional media despite Francesca Hong’s notable inroads for a combative and visionary brand of fighting for economic and social justice.
But the fact remains—much to the discomfort of establishment media and centrist Democratic leaders—that Francesca Hong got over 311,000 votes, just shy of victory.
But in Wisconsin with Hong’s defeat, mainstream media sources found an opportunity to stretch the real picture to fit their established frame. Rather than a major setback for the spreading success of progressive and democratic socialist candidates across the nation, Hong convincingly demonstrated that Wisconsin has a large and powerful base for innovative progressive policies.
Hong, 37, is a former chef and restauranteur and was first elected to the State Assembly in 2020. A diminutive and soft-spoken Korean American making her first run for statewide office, Hong supplied the vision and energy to build a massive statewide campaign machine while running as an unabashed democratic socialist. She was rightly perceived as reviving the traditions of Wisconsin’s much-revered anti-corporate populist governor “Fighting Bob” LaFollette and Milwaukee’s “sewer socialist” movement that ruled the city for much of the 20th century.
But the fact remains—much to the discomfort of establishment media and centrist Democratic leaders—that Francesca Hong got over 311,000 votes, just shy of victory. This outcome was hardly the momentous repudiation of progressive politics in a key swing state that was frequently portrayed.
Hong demonstrated the broad hunger for policies like taxing the super rich, calling for the termination of school privatization, substantially raising revenues for public schools and urban areas, marijuana legalization, and universal healthcare, proposals that far exceeded what "moderate" Dems in Wisconsin have been offering.
Second, she also showed the power of grassroots organizing as a potent political strategy. She amassed an army of 7,000 volunteers, mostly young people. This youthful infusion of energy seems certain to be a major force in Wisconsin politics to be reckoned with in the future.
Third, where Axios headlined Crowley’s victory as the win of a “moderate,” Crowley explicitly labeled himself as a "progressive" in his TV ads, stressing his pro-labor credentials and his support for “guardrails” on highly unpopular data centers.
(However, while Crowley campaigned as a “progressive,” many progressives are troubled by his opposition to the elimination of education privatization via “school choice,” which transfers funding away from public education.)
Fourth, Hong compiled 311,00 votes in her run for governor and brought in more votes—excepting of course the winner Crowley—than any previous Democrat running in a contested gubernatorial primary.
The excitement ignited by Hong’s bold campaign helped in part to produce a huge Democratic turnout. The Democratic gubernatorial candidates raked in a record 792.009 votes, a level normally attained only in presidential campaigns. Meanwhile, the Republican primary winner Tom Tiffany and a marginal candidate pulled in just 490,819 votes.
While The New York Times and other media have dwelled on the meltdown of her big polling lead on election day, Hong’s strong final results show that her democratic socialist politics were not somehow disqualifying for hundreds of thousands of Democratic voters. The campaign showed an enormous base for policies like taxing the super rich, a $20-an-hour minimum wage, a state-owned bank as in North Dakota, paid family leave, an end to school privatization, and universal healthcare that far exceeded what "moderate" Dems have been offering in the state.
With the pressure of Hong’s ambitious program and substantial lead in polling, Crowley felt compelled to label himself as a "progressive" in his TV ads, stressing his pro-labor positions and criticism of data centers.
Crowley is a Black man who overcame a childhood that included homelessness to rise to become the largest county’s top elected official. After entering the primary, Crowley, becoming discouraged by low poll numbers, temporarily dropped out of the race. But the state’s establishment Democrats pulled him back into the race with promises of all-out support, and they delivered. Top Dems like Gov. Tony Evers almost instantaneously uncapped a gusher of funds fueling a flood of Crowley TV ads in the closing days of the primary.
In her first statewide campaign, Hong found herself hammered in the closing two weeks by a relentless media spotlight on her old social media posts. Carelessly left online by her campaign, these posts—calling for “defunding the police” and criticizing traditional holidays like Thanksgiving—do not reflect her current perspective. But they generated derisive headlines and overwhelmingly unfavorable discussion. With the terrifying specter of the Republican nominee hard-line MAGA acolyte and election denier US Rep. Tom Tiffany eagerly poised to feast on her old social posts and aspirational and ambitious program, even some of Hong’s loyal following seemingly trickled away. This late-arriving erosion was likely enough to tip the final outcome away from her to David Crowley.
Still, Francesca Hong came within 0.5% of access with an aspirational program and an innovative grassroots campaign strategy. Yet the dominant media frame for Hong’s narrow defeat—as supposed proof that serious progressive politics are a fatal formula outside the coasts—has been simmering in recent months. Centrists among leading media voices and top Democrats have uneasily watched a parade of left-wing successes in Democratic primaries across the nation, in states as diverse as New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Colorado, and in Minnesota with the election of Peggy Flanagan.
Although Hong fell just short of winning the primary, she powerfully demonstrated the growing demand for a bolder vision by voters.
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America Promises Safe Schools, So Why Are Children Still Exposed to Toxic Pesticides?
Schools should be among the safest places in a child's life, not environments where unnecessary exposure to hazardous chemicals remains a possibility.
Aug 12, 2026
In 1998, my 6-year-old son walked onto his Los Angeles elementary school campus and into a preventable crisis.
A school gardener wearing a full hazardous materials suit was spraying pesticides, unaware that children were nearby. My son, unprotected, was sprayed directly in the face with a toxic pesticide. Within minutes, he struggled to breathe and suffered a severe asthma attack.
He recovered. But one question stayed with both of us: How could this happen at a school?
The contradiction was impossible to ignore: If the pesticide required an adult applicator to wear full protective equipment, why was it considered safe to use where children could be exposed?
California's experience demonstrated that schools do not have to choose between controlling pests and protecting students. They can accomplish both.
Children are not simply smaller adults. Pound for pound, they breathe more air; consume more food and water; and their brains, lungs, immune systems, and endocrine systems are still developing. These differences make them uniquely vulnerable to environmental chemicals. Research has linked exposure to certain pesticides with asthma, learning and developmental problems, neurological effects, endocrine disruption, and other long-term health concerns. Children cannot choose where they spend their days, nor can they protect themselves from environmental hazards created by adults. That responsibility belongs to us.
My son's exposure changed the course of my life. It led me to establish California Safe Schools, a nonprofit organization dedicated to protecting children from harmful environmental exposures. I worked with parents, educators, physicians, scientists, and school officials to create the groundbreaking Los Angeles Unified School District Integrated Pest Management Policy, one of the first of its kind in the nation. Rather than relying on routine pesticide spraying, the policy embraced the Precautionary Principle: When there is credible evidence that a chemical may harm children's health, schools should take preventive action even if every scientific question has not yet been answered. Simply put, children's health should come before convenience.
The policy also established the public's Right to Know, recognizing that parents, teachers, and school employees deserve timely information about pesticides used on school campuses. Families cannot make informed decisions or advocate for their children's health if they are unaware of when or what pesticides are being applied. Transparency became a cornerstone of protecting students.
The Los Angeles policy became a model for California and helped pave the way for the Healthy Schools Act of 2000, which required schools to notify parents and staff before pesticide applications, maintain records of pesticide use, and encourage schools to adopt Integrated Pest Management practices that emphasize prevention and least-toxic pest control methods.
California strengthened these protections even further with AB 405, authored by Assemblymember Cindy Montañez (D-39), sponsored by California Safe Schools, and signed into law by Gov. Arnold Schwartzenegger in 2005.The law prohibited the use on school sites of experimental pesticides, pesticides under conditional registration that had not completed all required health and environmental testing, and pesticides that the US Environmental Protection Agency was phasing out because of health or environmental concerns. The legislation recognized a simple but important principle: Children should never be exposed at school to pesticides that have not been fully evaluated for safety or that regulators have already determined should be removed from use. AB 405 closed important gaps in school pesticide protections and reinforced California's commitment to putting children's health first and protecting more than 6 million students, teachers, and staff.
Over the past 28 years, California Safe Schools has continued to work with parents, educators, students, scientists, physicians, school officials, and policymakers to advocate for safer school environments. One lesson has remained constant: Pesticide exposure in schools is almost always preventable.
Pesticides are designed to kill living organisms. While they target insects, weeds, fungi, and rodents, many also pose risks to human health. The question has never been whether schools should control pests. They should. The real question is how they do it.
For decades, many schools relied on routine pesticide spraying as the first line of defense. Yet experts have long recognized that safer, more effective approaches exist. Integrated Pest Management, or IPM, focuses first on prevention by eliminating the conditions that allow pests to thrive. Better sanitation, sealing cracks and openings, repairing leaks, improving waste management, and monitoring pest activity often reduce or eliminate the need for chemical pesticides. When pesticides are necessary, IPM emphasizes choosing the least hazardous products and applying them only when children are not present or when they could reasonably be exposed.
California's experience demonstrated that schools do not have to choose between controlling pests and protecting students. They can accomplish both.
Unfortunately, protections remain uneven across the United States. While some states and school districts have adopted strong Integrated Pest Management programs, others continue to rely heavily on pesticide applications with fewer safeguards. Parents may receive little or no advance notice before pesticides are used, and school staff may lack training in safer pest management practices. As a result, children's protection often depends on where they live rather than on a consistent national standard.
This is particularly troubling because children spend approximately 1,000 hours each year at school. Schools should be among the safest places in a child's life, not environments where unnecessary exposure to hazardous chemicals remains a possibility.
The good news is that we already know what works.
Integrated Pest Management has been successfully implemented in thousands of schools across the country. It reduces pesticide use while maintaining effective pest control, often lowering long-term maintenance costs by addressing the underlying causes of infestations rather than repeatedly treating the symptoms. Prevention is not only safer; it is also smarter.
Every school district should adopt comprehensive Integrated Pest Management policies that prioritize prevention, maintenance, monitoring, and least-toxic methods before chemical pesticides are considered. Hazardous pesticides should never be applied when children are present or could reasonably be exposed. Parents, teachers, and school employees should receive timely notification before any pesticide application so they can make informed decisions. School personnel and pest management professionals should receive ongoing training to ensure these policies are implemented consistently and effectively.
Most importantly, policymakers should recognize that children's health deserves a precautionary approach. When credible scientific evidence suggests a pesticide may pose a risk to children, protecting them should not depend on waiting years for absolute certainty while exposures continue. Prevention should always come before regret.
Nearly three decades after my son's exposure, we should still think about the question that was asked that day: Could it happen again?
The answer should be no.
No parent should have to wonder whether their child will be exposed to toxic pesticides during the school day. No child should suffer an asthma attack or another preventable health consequence because adults failed to take reasonable precautions.
We have the knowledge. We have safer alternatives. We have decades of successful experience showing that schools can manage pests without unnecessarily exposing children to hazardous chemicals.
The remaining question is whether we have the will to make those protections the standard in every school across America.
A safe school environment should never be left to chance. It should begin with a simple promise: No child should be placed in harm's way by preventable pesticide exposure.
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Backlash as Texas Approves 'Unconstitutional' Mandatory Bible Lessons in Public Schools
“That’s government-sponsored religious favoritism—and the First Amendment strictly forbids it," said one critic.
Jun 26, 2026
As education officials in Texas ban hundreds of books that run afoul of their interpretation of Christian morality, the State Board of Education on Friday approved a required reading list that forces the state's more than 5 million public school students to read from the Bible.
The Republican-controlled SBOE voted 9-5 with one abstention to approve the list, which includes passages from the Book of Exodus as well as the Shepherd's Psalm and the myths of Adam and Eve and David and Goliath.
"We’re going to stop watering down American history. We’re going to teach the truth. Our nation was founded as a Christian nation, and Texas is a Christian state,” Republican board member Brandon Hall—who is also a youth pastor at Cavalry Baptist Church in Springtown—said during a Thursday press conference in Austin.
That "truth" omits or marginalizes climate change, US imperialism, women's history, the genocide of Indigenous peoples, slavery, and racism.
Evelyn Brooks, the only Republican SBOE member to vote against the required reading list, told CNN on Friday that she believes the board's move is "unconstitutional."
“Teachers need to have their autonomy," she said. "They’ve been selecting books for decades."
In 2023, Texas' Republican-controlled Legislature passed HB 1605, which mandated the creation of a K-12 required reading list and directed the Texas Education Agency to develop state-owned textbooks. Those texts, called Bluebonnet Learning, contain lessons on Christianity starting in kindergarten. The SBOE approved Bluebonnet Learning as an optional curriculum in late 2024 and is currently working to correct thousands of errors in the curriculum at a cost of over $8 million to Texas taxpayers.
The SBOE action comes amid a legal battle over SB 10, a law signed last year by Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott that requires public elementary and secondary schools to display the Ten Commandments in every classroom. US District Judge Fred Biery, an appointee of former President Bill Clinton, subsequently issued a preliminary injunction blocking the law. Texas families also sued to block the legislation. However, Republican Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton—who is running for US Senate—demanded that schools comply with the law.
Public schools "exist to educate students with diverse faith backgrounds, as well as those who adhere to no faith doctrine," the Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF) said Friday. "Public schools are not Sunday schools, and elected officials have no business using state power to elevate one religion above all others. A required reading list that overwhelmingly favors Christian texts while excluding the writings and literary traditions of other faiths, not to mention the perspectives of millions of nonreligious Americans, sends an unmistakable message about who belongs and who does not."
FFRF co-president Annie Laurie Gaylor asserted that “a mandatory public school reading list should never function as a Bible lesson."
"Texas is telling millions of children that one religion deserves the government’s seal of approval, while everyone else is an afterthought," she added. "That’s government-sponsored religious favoritism—and the First Amendment strictly forbids it.”
Rabbi Joshua Fixler at Congregation Emanu El in Houston told CNN Friday that "this list is full of Christian texts that are inappropriate for public school classrooms."
"As a rabbi and a parent of Jewish kids, I think it is vital that this board make a distinction between teaching about religion and teaching religion," he added. "This list will force teachers to cross that line."
Fort Worth high school teacher Chanea Bond told The Associated Press on Friday that the SBOE's required reading list is "very old and very white."
“It is very narrow and does not represent what classrooms in Texas look like,” she said. “Going through most of high school without ever having much value put into voices that sound like yours kind of sends a message that your voices aren’t valuable.”
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Can We Build a Country That Chooses Butter Over Guns?
How do we stop this war? How do we redirect the money being wasted into the schools and health centers, bike lanes and sustainable-energy infrastructures that we all so desperately need?
May 16, 2026
Guns or butter. Butter or guns. Can we have both? If not, which should come first? Consider it one of those chicken-and-egg conundrums of modern society.
“Guns” is the stand-in for a well-funded military and “butter” for all the human goods, comforts, and needs of a society.
Economists, politicians, and generals have long considered the balance of guns and butter. Wage too many wars, produce too many arms, and there won’t be enough money to keep a nation decently fed and comfortable. Produce too many consumer goods, meet everyone’s needs, and a nation might find itself ill-prepared and vulnerable in the face of a possible attack or even invasion. Everyone from Nazi propagandist Joseph Goebbels to British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher has had something to say about the balance of guns and butter (or, more likely, the lack of it).
No surprise, but I like butter and don’t like guns. I have long been attracted to the graphics produced by groups like the National Priorities Project (NPP) and Brown University’s Costs of War Project that dramatize the opportunity costs of war investment in the United States. At some point, one of those groups created a pen that had a long scroll on a pull-out flap inside it. At parties, as you were discussing the military budget, you could take out that pen and unfurl a long bar graph comparing US military spending to the budgets for education, healthcare, and infrastructure. Neat trick, right?
Every war is bad, stupid, and represents a colossal failure of the imagination, but this one, with the Trump trademark on it, should be considered the ur-war to oppose, resist, and refuse to pay for.
These days, NPP has a new factsheet that offers a breakdown of how the cost (so far) of President Donald Trump’s Iran “escapade” could have been so much better spent:
- Covering Medicaid for all 14 million people at risk of losing their insurance,
- AND the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, for all 4 million people at risk of losing food assistance, including 3.5 million due to new work requirements for older people and caregivers,
- AND expanding Medicaid to an additional 10.3 million people.
Those numbers are based on the Pentagon’s request for $200 billion in supplemental funding for the Iran war effort. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth was on Capitol Hill on April 30, supporting a lowball estimate of the war costs as a mere $25 billion (and worth every dollar!) and asking for support for an inconceivable $1.5 trillion for Trump’s war machine in fiscal year 2027. Guns vs. Butter? More like guns force-fed foie gras and caviar and sautéed in the world’s most expensive butter.
Every Warship Launched, Every Rocket Fired
If I ever got a tattoo, it would probably be of this line from President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s 1953 “Chance for Peace” speech: “Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed.”
Eisenhower gave that speech 73 years ago (even as military budgets increased significantly while he was president) and yet the words ring truer than ever today. In reality, I’m unlikely to get a first tattoo at the age of 52, but I did see all of this up close and personal a couple of weeks ago at my Connecticut town’s school board meeting.
For months, school board members had been ringing an alarm bell about their budget. After years of scrimping and shaving, layoffs and early retirement packages, they were no longer able to economize their way to a balanced budget, and so were considering a “nuclear option”: closing one of our local schools.
Community members rallied, testified, and harangued. Busloads of kids joined our superintendent at the state capitol to ask for more support for our schools. For the last two months, everyone in my neighborhood has been talking about this, and on a Monday night a few weeks ago, the school board held a public meeting to make an ultimate decision about what to do.
I drove there over streets riddled with potholes, past new luxury apartments built as “workforce housing” for the engineers at General Dynamics Electric Boat, where a new class of nuclear submarines (12 boats for $132 billion) is now being designed. Those $2,200-a-month studio apartments overlook a gas station, train tracks, and a low block of struggling businesses in a flood zone.
A Theft from Those Who Hunger
The school budget gap (more than $7 million) is there for all the usual reasons, made more extreme because we’re living through what, in the age of President Donald J. Trump, can only be considered the cratering of imperial America globally and the volume is up to 11 on everything. In these years, the line items for staff health insurance, building utilities, and a host of other costs have skyrocketed. The contributions from the state of Connecticut aren’t even close to keeping pace. The whole enterprise is built on the backs of local property owners, and our taxes are already far too high.
The place most likely to be shuttered was CB Jennings School, right up the road from my house, which has (for the rest of this school year, anyway) 338 students. All but 30 of those students qualify for free or reduced-fare lunches, meaning they come from low-income households. The school population includes 149 “multi-language learners” and 66 special-education students.
The 338 kids there would be divided between the other two elementary schools in our neighborhood. The fifth graders would all go to the local middle school (which itself was to be consolidated from two buildings into one) and the eighth graders to the local high school.
Teachers and custodians, principals and paraprofessional educators, social workers and secretaries will all be moved around, too. Routines will be broken, friendships and collegial collaborations disrupted, teaching teams split up. There will be a great jostling for parking spaces, offices with windows, and classrooms that face out of (or into) the sun. September will be stressful indeed and no one is happy.
Who bears the brunt of all this disorder? The answer: the kids who pay no taxes and make no policies. The little ones who are already deemed behind when they show up for kindergarten and need all the help the professionals there can give them. The tween ones who just want to see their friends, show off their new braids, learn to play the trumpet, and get first place in the spelling bee. The older ones who need the breakfast, lunch, and snacks that are served at school. The ones who bring the light and the joy of learning with them every day.
The lives of those little ones and their slightly bigger siblings are all soon going to be subjected to massive disruptions.
A Theft from Those Who Are Cold
Of course, those “massive disruptions” are only so in relative terms. They’re but a minor hiccup compared to what’s happening in the lives of children throughout Iran during President Trump’s war on their country.
I cry about the war against Iran every day. (Truly!) The terror and the horror buzz through my head at the weirdest times: as I run errands, work in my garden, perform my school-crossing guard duties, and greet my young walkers. All this daily predictability and precious stability, the gorgeous ho-hum of the daily grind that has been stolen from the people of Iran by our war.
I look at pictures of Iranians cleaning up around buildings reduced to rubble and trying to go about their lives amid the catastrophe and I’m filled with awe. How would I ever begin again after surviving a rocket attack? Would I be able to extract the broom from the wreckage or ever brew tea again?
I tried to put such images aside when I went into the school board meeting that fateful night. When it was my turn to speak, I had three points to make—one minor, one secondhand, and one massive. I was nervous. My first point was easy. I argued that the school at the edge of the city should close instead of Jennings, which is more centrally located. My second point was awkward. My 12-year-old had written a speech, but then refused to read it and was whispering contradictory instructions to me as I got up for my turn to speak.
Finally, I got to my third point. Facing a semicircle of board members, I tried to channel the gravitas of President Eisenhower by pointing out that the Trump White House began its war against Iran by hitting a primary school with a Tomahawk cruise missile and killing 165 civilians, most of them schoolgirls. And I pointed out that decisions like the one to start a war with Iran ripple all the way to our coastline—destabilizing our local world and stealing from our kids, too. Closing an elementary school or having a massive budget hole are not our only two options, I said. We could instead be living in a society that prioritizes keeping elementary schools open and fully funded instead of bombing schools 6,700 miles away.
I tried not to think about the room full of parents and teachers behind me, but I still felt uncomfortably out on a limb making my geopolitical points during our local school board meeting. Despite my doubts, however, I continued, noting that between February 28—when my country started that terrible, illegal war—and March 27, the United States had fired 850 Tomahawk missiles at targets in Iran. And mind you, each one of those missiles comes at a cost to taxpayers of more than $3 million.
My three minutes of time were running out, so I rushed through the next part, mentioning that our senator, Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), estimated at the beginning of April that Trump’s war is now costing US taxpayers $1 billion dollars a day! And that’s before we factor in the long-term economic consequences of oil and gas price rises, disruptions to the global supply chain, and the cratering of my country’s already teetering standing globally.
I finished up by saying that we all have to work so much harder to stop this war as well as fund our schools and that the two were connected. This budget gap would be a difficult dilemma under the best of circumstances, but against the backdrop of war and calamity, it feels indicative of a much deeper problem than a few-million-dollar local budget holes. As I concluded. I made eye contact with the school board members and thanked them for their time.
Making my way back to my seat, I noticed that I was a little sweaty and that my hands were trembling. Why was I so nervous? Why was that so hard?
The Hopes of Its Children
Eisenhower’s speech is a rhetorical master class, well worth revisiting in this age of imperial fiat by tweet. Ike went on to intone:
This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. The cost of one modern heavy bomber is this: a modern brick school in more than 30 cities…. We pay for a single destroyer with new homes that could have housed more than 8,000 people… This is not a way of life at all, in any true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron.
After some formalities and hearing from a handful more people, the school board voted to shutter the CB Jennings Elementary School, a remarkably modern school in the heart of our city with a new playground and a beautiful library. The vote was unanimous. The board members were sad but resigned. It was treated as an inevitable but unfortunate outcome or even as a forward-looking, resolute action. They were “doing something” in the face of a huge budget gap.
And indeed, the school budget will be back in the black—for now—once a $1.4 million shortfall is settled by cutting more positions, shaving costs, and looking for grants. Meanwhile, the local schools that remain are indeed closer to a balanced budget (at least until utility costs spike even higher and yet more global war-making costs hit home in this country).
Humanity Hanging from a Cross of Iron
The cost of the war against Iran is just one reason to be against it. The wanton violence, the indiscriminate death dealing, the gold-plated hubris, and the gargantuan stupidity of Trump and crew, as well as the massive long-term impacts of the closing of the Strait of Hormuz, are something to try to take in.
Every war is bad, stupid, and represents a colossal failure of the imagination, but this one, with the Trump trademark on it, should be considered the ur-war to oppose, resist, and refuse to pay for. And sitting in that makeshift meeting room of the New London Board of Education, I felt like a tightly wound, somewhat muted Cassandra, requesting that people who are probably against the war, too, somehow consider it part of the reason we are being called upon to close a school and reduce the quality of our kids’ education.
We have a well-worn poster in the back hallway of our house. It’s an image of kids playing on a metal jungle gym alongside the words: “It will be a great day, when our schools get all the money they need, and the Air Force has to hold a bake sale to buy a bomber.”
A bake sale to buy a bomber? A car wash to get a Tomahawk? A dime drive for the next generation of nuclear submarines? This administration’s officials aren’t even pretending to enlist the public in support of their latest war, nor did they even try to get Congress to rubber-stamp it. They care that little for democracy, the rule of law, or even our hearts and minds. This White House grows fat on our outrage, our protest gestures, and our well-mannered critiques. They are printing money and telling lies in a frenzy of impunity that will (hopefully) finally be checked by the November elections. But there is so much violence and scapegoating and scaremongering coming out of Donald Trump’s White House and his Florida compound that many people are checking out on all of it just to carry on with their lives. But nothing now is NORMAL and we can’t allow ourselves to normalize any of it.
How do we stop this war? How do we redirect the money being wasted into the schools and health centers, bike lanes and sustainable-energy infrastructures that we all so desperately need? How do we take care of those victimized, maimed, and orphaned by our military? How do we take care of those rendered homeless, stateless, limbless by our wars?
The answer: We do something to protest, undermine, and challenge militarism every day. We work to connect those faraway wars, framed as invisible or normal or too complicated for us to grasp, to our everyday lives. We make all the awkward speeches we can. We hold up homemade antiwar signs. We refuse to pay for the wars we oppose. We continue to demand that butter, not guns, schools, not heavy bombers, homes, not destroyers be the focus of our lives.
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The Lesson From the LA Teachers' Win: There Is Money to Pay Educators If We Demand It
For too long, the narrative has been that we cannot afford to support teachers. We’ve just shown we cannot afford not to.
Apr 25, 2026
Before stepping into the classroom, I spent 12 years as an investigator with the California State Bar, examining cases of attorney misconduct. I chose to teach because I saw a meaningful way to serve my community, and I understood there would be sacrifice. Still, it took 10 years before my salary caught up to what I earned in my final year as an investigator.
In California, becoming an educator is neither easy nor inexpensive. In fact, it is one of the most challenging states to obtain a teaching license. Despite this, teachers remain among the most underpaid professionals relative to their level of education. According to the US Census Bureau, teacher earnings have not only lagged behind comparable fields, but have experienced a steady annual decline.
The debate is not whether schools have enough money, it is about what we choose to spend it on. Today, many educators cannot afford to live where they teach. Teaching, while never lucrative, used to offer a stable path to a middle class life. Educators could buy a home, live in the communities where they worked, and maintain the financial stability expected of other professions with similar levels of education. Sadly, even the most modest of those expectations are rapidly disappearing. I only own a home because I purchased it prior to switching my career.
Most educators did not choose this career for the money, but there is a clear difference between modest compensation and exploitation. Nearly 1 in 5 teachers in Los Angeles are housing insecure. And nearly 60% of educators across the country take on second jobs outside of teaching to make ends meet. It is unacceptable that the people responsible for educating our children are struggling to hold their head above water.
These victories for Los Angeles educators are not perks. They are the foundation of a functioning school system, and a respected career.
Teachers are also expected to subsidize their classrooms out of their own pockets. These stories are often framed as heartwarming and altruistic, but they reflect systemic failure and a lack of meaningful investment in public education. Few other professions require employees to pay out of pocket while already being underpaid.
The consequences of this underinvestment are becoming impossible to ignore. As the cost of living rises, fewer educators can afford to remain in the classroom. A teacher shortage has already hit Southern California, and the impact is profound. Nationally, teaching shortages have led to larger class sizes, burnout, and financial strain on the education system.
Education is expected to operate in scarcity while other sectors experience enormous growth. The education technology market alone is projected to grow by $170.8 billion by 2029. In the Los Angeles Unified School District alone, more than $1.6 billion has been spent on edtech. Framing this as a funding problem misses the point; it is a question of priorities. We are told we can’t make investments in educators, while billions continue to flow toward technology and outside contracts instead of the classrooms they are meant to serve.
And yet, during recent labor negotiations in Los Angeles, we were told a familiar refrain: There is no money.
This was the backdrop of three educational unions, representing more than 70,000 workers, on the brink of striking across Los Angeles. At the center of the dispute for United Teachers Los Angeles was a straightforward demand: a salary structure that reflects economic reality. As negotiations stretched over 14 months, frustration grew not only among educators but across school communities, culminating in escalating public pressure, organizing efforts at school sites, and an overwhelming strike authorization vote that made clear teachers were prepared to act if necessary.
Only when the possibility of a strike became real did the district return to the table with urgency. We ultimately won the majority of our demands, including overhauling the outdated pay system that kept incoming educators at artificially low salaries, raising the starting salary from $68,966 to $77,000 for teachers, and securing an average salary increase of 13.86% across the board. This is evidence that the “no money” claim is negotiable, not factual.
Just as significantly, for the first time in California, educators in Los Angeles have secured four weeks of paid parental leave. This is a historic breakthrough that now sets a precedent for teachers across the state of California, as well as the entire country. Additionally, we won a major expansion of student support, including more than 450 additional social workers, to address the growing mental health crisis among our youth.
These victories for Los Angeles educators are not perks. They are the foundation of a functioning school system, and a respected career.
When teachers are paid a living wage, they stay. When they can afford to live in the communities they serve, schools are more stable. And when students have access to trained mental health professionals, they are better able to learn. Investment is what makes public schools strong. Without it, everything else collapses.
For too long, the narrative has been that we cannot afford to support teachers. We’ve just shown we cannot afford not to. The lesson from Los Angeles is simple: School funding is not fixed by scarcity, but by priorities. And when educators and school workers organize, those priorities can change—for the better.
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