Texas schools suffer from Legislature's knife. . .

What follows are exerpts from Manny Fernandez's article, "At Texas Schools, Making Do on a Shoestring," published in The New York Times on April 8, 2012:

From the previous school year to the current one, districts across Texas eliminated 25,286 positions through retirements, resignations and layoffs, including 10,717 teaching jobs, according to state data analyzed by Children at Risk, a nonprofit advocacy group in Houston. Texas public schools spend $8,908 per student, a decrease of $538 from the previous year and below the national average of $11,463, according to the National Education Association. California spent $9,710 and New York $15,592.

“I’ve been in education 42 years, and I’ve been a superintendent about 25 of those 42 years, and this is the worst that I’ve ever had to cut,” said John Folks, the superintendent of one of the districts suing the state, Northside in San Antonio, where officials eliminated 973 positions and made classes larger in a $61.4 million budget reduction. “We cut about 40 special education teachers. We cut about 28 athletic coaches. We froze salaries. School districts can’t take much more than this.”

You'll find the entire, very disturbing article here.  After you read it, let me hear from you.  I believe we must do better by our children.