[mlyle]

The big problem is that no one more capable wants to work there.

We have a mild teacher shortage across the board (which may become major with reports of as many as 40% of teachers seriously considering leaving the profession this year). And then in turn, inner city schools are worse workplaces... which attract worse peers... You need a hell of a martyr complex to take this on, and even if you have it you won't last.

And throwing money at comp won't fix this, either: that's not a great motivator to get the people with the passion to fix this.

[rusabd]

Someone quoted 15k USD spent in Baltimore for each student. That is a lot of money to attract top talent.

[mlyle]

Yup, but money isn't great at motivating people to work hard; a lot of evidence implies it even does the opposite. And a huge chunk of that money is vacuumed up by administration.

Inner city school systems are great at grinding up passionate personnel, making them quit or just surrender to do things that look good on paper but don't improve anything.

[rusabd]

Looks you are actually found who needs to be replaced

[mtVessel]

Is it? How do you know? Have you reviewed the budgets? Do you work in education in Baltimore, and thus, have a sense of what an appropriate number would be?

I don't know the answers, but I do know this -- it's a hell of a lot less than what gets spent in the NY metro area.

[todd8]

Here is the data.

According to the US Census[1], out of the largest 100 US Public School systems Baltimore ranked near the very top in spending per child (5th out of 100). Baltimore spent $15,793 per child. Only New York and Boston spent considerably more.

[1] https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2020/school-s...

[mtVessel]

Thanks, that's much more informative.